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high
places and so it is always smoothed over.”
    “Friends?” She began. “Or do you mean...”
her voice lowered to a whisper, “lovers?” Thomas halted mid-step at
her forwardness.
    “We will discuss this is in the coach.” He
said instead of answering. They moved towards the doors where
servants were waiting with cloaks and hats. His valet spotted them
easily and arrived within moments with their cloaks.
    “Thank you, James.”
    “I will make sure the coach is ready.” He
bowed to them and walked off towards the door. Thomas placed Emma's
cloak around her shoulders before putting on his own.
    “Warmer?” he inquired with a devilish
smile.
    “I was perfectly warm outside, Thomas.” She
told him as she concentrated on adjusting the cloak around her
shoulders.
    “As was I,” he agreed.”

Chapter Four
    “There is truly not much
to tell about how I know Lady Carradine. When I had first met her,
she was Miss Genevieve Loring, daughter of a wealthy man. To this
day, I have no idea what it is he does for a living. Whatever it
was, it kept them wealthy and on the Continent. That is where I met
Lady Carradine. I was perhaps eighteen and Nathaniel and I were on
our Grand Tour. We arrived in Belgium and met up with some
classmates. All they could talk about was this English heiress.
They described her as the most beautiful and alluring woman they
had ever seen in their lives.” Lord Hartwell paused in his
tale.
    His fiancée found it impossible to smother
the unamused scoff that escaped her lips. Men were the greatest
fools in the world when it came to a pretty face. Like that
business with the Trojan War. To be fair, they were waiting for a
chance to start a war and Helen of Troy provided them an excellent
one. To run off with the handsome, albeit cowardly prince, of a
different land in an attempt to escape your older husband, was
brave. If not intolerably stupid. Emma could muse indefinitely on
the Greek myths, but now was not the time.
    “Shall I continue?” Thomas inquired archly.
Emma gestured for him to continue. “When I first met Lady
Carradine, it was some months later in Vienna. She had already made
quite the name for herself in Vienna. Men lusted after her and as
you might have guessed, she was not one to turn away favours. This
is how I met her.” He stopped once more, gauging Emma’s face. There
was an ever so slight narrowing of her eyes, coupled with a firm
set of her mouth. “She sought my company, finding me quite
handsome.” There was a certain tinge of male pride in his voice
upon revealing this fact. Even if one was not interested in said
woman, a man could not help but be a little bit pleased at being
propositioned. “I rebuked her finding the whole matter off-putting.
Nevertheless, she did not give up and followed Hedgeton and I
around to many other cities. Finally, we left for England and I
never heard from her again.”
    “Until
    “Exactly, until tonight. She is newly
married and not much of a threat if that is what you are worried
about.”
    Emma scoffed again. How presumptuous of him
to assume she was jealous! “I am not at all worried about this Lady
Carradine,” she replied. “I am vexed by her blatant disregard for
propriety.” She chuckled, amused at her own retort. “I sound like a
governess.”
    “Yes, you would be more vexed with that than
anything else.” He agreed. Thomas was a little unsettled with Lady
Carradine’s arrival in London. She had sworn she would never come
back, but she had the protection of her husband and even the Prince
Regent. Perhaps that is why she felt safe enough to come home.
Here, she could happily break all rules with censure. How long
could she go on like this? It had been many years since they first
met and she was just as classless then as she was now. Her great
beauty excused most of her behaviour and if that did not work she
had the wealth and power. Rather, she knew people who could erase
any indiscretion. He hoped she would stay