Wishing for Rainbows

To her surprise, as soon as Adelaide joined her friends, Ursula realised that Trenton had followed them across the room. She jumped when he stopped directly in front of her and stared at her challengingly.

“Flowers?” Trenton demanded with a frown.

Her spine straightened at the way he was glaring at her as though she had done something wrong. “I have received an arrangement of flowers from a secret admirer; several arrangements, in fact. What of it?”

“You think Brampton is the sender?” Trenton demanded incredulously. He tried to keep his voice low for fear of starting nefarious gossip, but it was damned difficult. Right now he wanted to shake the details out of her and kiss that aloof expression off her face.

If he was honest, he was not just angry at Brampton. He was annoyed that Barbarella had dared to turn up tonight. He had hoped she would have the dignity to keep her head down for a while. Given that she had ignored her father and chosen to attend the ball anyway, it was down to him now to ensure that Ursula didn’t cross paths with the wretched witch. In addition to that, Brampton was sniffing around Ursula. It made him want to punch the man right on the nose, warn Barbarella to keep her distance, and march Ursula straight home.

“Are you sure they were from Brampton?” he demanded, mainly because Brampton hadn’t been known to go to any expense on a woman before. A man like him took; he rarely gave. It made no sense that he had gone to such lengths for Ursula; unless he wanted something from her. The thought of that annoyed the hell out of him and made his voice far sharper than he intended when he spoke to Ursula.

“I-I don’t know. There was no name attached.”

“When did you receive them?” Trenton knew it was none of his business, and his relentless pursuit of the facts had drawn the curious stares of Adelaide and her friends, but he didn’t care. He had to get to the truth before matters went any further.

“They started to arrive the other week, why?”

“Started to arrive? Am I to take it that there have been more of them since then?”

“Why? Do I take it that some sort of crime has been committed?” Ursula asked instead of answering him.

“No, it is just uncharacteristic behaviour for Brampton. If someone sends flowers for over a week and doesn’t make their acquaintance, something is wrong somewhere,” he warned. He wondered if he would be better off carting Brampton around the back and punching him until he admitted sending them.

“What could be wrong with someone sending me flowers?”

“Just be careful about receiving gifts from strangers, Ursula. This is London after all. It is full of disreputable types who shouldn’t be trusted.”

“Does that include you?” she asked before she realised how offensive that sounded.

Rather than reply, he studied her thoughtfully a moment. He was spared having to speak past his temper by the arrival of a rather buxom blonde. As she pressed herself wantonly against Trenton’s side, she speared Ursula with a look that could have frozen her on the spot and then turned her rather sultry attention back to Trenton.

“Trenton, I have been looking for you everywhere,” she breathed into his ear without bothering to acknowledge Ursula. “It’s been too long darling.”

Trenton mentally cursed at the avid curiosity written on Barbarella’s face. The last thing he needed was to have to contend with Barbarella’s scheming. From the way her hand was sliding suggestively down his arm, she was still determined to try to lure him into matrimony. Last year, he had been drunk and had barely escaped her plot to entrap him. This year, he had no intention of succumbing to her continued dramatic machinations now that matters had been worked out with her father.

“Miss Somersby,” he growled with a glare. He peeled Barbarella’s questing fingers off his arm and took a step backward as he dropped her hand. “I didn’t realise you were here.”

Ursula studied the way the newcomer had plastered herself against Trenton and felt something deep within her crumble. This beautiful young woman was Trenton’s fiancée.

She studied the woman’s perfect, porcelain features and slender curves and felt a pang of jealousy that temporarily robbed her of breath. The woman was stunning, and right now was plastered against Trenton’s side as though she was made to be there. In contrast to the delightful creature, Ursula felt dowdy, plain and completely out of place.

She didn’t dare look too closely at what drove the emotion, but Ursula suddenly hated Barbarella Somersby with all of her heart. It was such an uncharacteristic feeling for her: to hate someone on sight, that she was a little shaken by it. However, there was something cold and calculating in the blonde woman’s eyes that just didn’t seem right, and brought about a fresh wave of discomfort over her engagement to Trenton. A part of her wanted to tear Trenton away from the woman, but she couldn’t without making herself look like a fool. They were engaged after all, and it really was none of her business.

Unsure what to do, Ursula looked at Adelaide but to her astonishment, before she could move to her aunt’s side, Trenton blocked her path.

“I think it is our dance, Ursula,” he murmured in a husky voice that Ursula had never heard before.

The contrast in his voice between the way he spoke to Barbarella, and the way he had just spoken to her was shocking. Ursula glanced at Trenton and then looked at Barbarella. For an engaged couple they didn’t appear to be very affectionate. Unless her eyes were deceiving her, Trenton almost appeared as though he hated his fiancé.

“Ready?” He drawled and held his elbow out when she didn’t move. “It’s our dance.”

A shiver swept down her spine at the blatantly intimate way he was looking at her. It hinted at a much more personal relationship between them than they had.

“Is it?” she cro

aked, wishing she hadn’t agreed to come to the ball at all now. She looked up when the blonde stepped in front of them, and went cold at the venomous hatred in the woman’s green eyes.

“Are you not going to introduce us, Trenton?” Barbarella asked without taking her spiteful gaze off Ursula.