‘My name is Ashe Herriard, Miss Hurst. Have you any other disguises I am likely to meet with?’
‘No, you have viewed them all.’ She regarded him, her head tipped a little to one side. He was reminded of Lucifer assessing a strange object for its potential as food or plaything. ‘Ashe. Is that an Indian name? I know a trader down at the docks called Ashok. He has been here for years and has an extensive business, but he told me he came from Bombay.’ She smiled. ‘A bit of a rogue.’
‘No, that element of my name is from my paternal grandmother’s family. If you want the lot I am George Ashbourne Talish Herriard.’
‘And Talish means?’
‘Lord of the earth.’
‘That seems… appropriate,’ Miss Hurst observed astringently. She was still leaning back, gently fanning herself, but the tension was coming off her in waves.
‘It is somewhat high-flown,’ Ashe agreed. ‘After my great-grandfather, the Raja of Kalatwah.’ He might as well get that out of the way now.
‘Truly?’ Miss Hurst sat up straight, dark arched brows lifting. ‘Does that make you a prince? Should I be curtsying?’ That last, he could tell, was sarcasm.
‘It made my grandmother a princess and it made my mother, who had an English father, confused,’ he explained and surprised a laugh from her. ‘I am merely a viscount with a courtesy title.’
‘She is very beautiful, your mother.’ He nodded. ‘And your father is exceedingly handsome. I imagine most of the women in the room have fallen in love with him.’
‘They will have to get past my mother first and she is not the demurely serene lady she appears.’ He stretched out his long legs and made himself comfortable. On the other side of their jungle screen the ball was in full, noisy swing. Cool air flowed through the gap in the window, wafting sensual puffs of jasmine scent and warm woman to him. There were considerably worse places to be.
‘Demure? She makes me think of a panther,’ Miss Hurst observed.
‘Appropriate,’ he agreed. ‘What is your first name? It seems hardly fair not to tell me when you know mine.’
She studied him, her brown eyes wary. ‘Indian informality, Lord Clere?’
‘Brazen curiosity, Miss Hurst.’
That produced another gurgle of laughter, instantly repressed, as though she regretted letting her guard down. ‘Phyllida. It is somewhat of a burden to me, I have to confess.’
‘It is a pretty name. And have I met Phyllida Hurst on a quayside, in a shop and in this ballroom? Or are there two other names you have not told me?’
‘I will reveal no more, Lord Clere.’
‘No?’ He held her gaze for a long moment, then let his eyes roam over her, from the top of her elaborate coiffure, past the handsome cameos displayed on the pale, delicious, swell of her bosom, down over the curves of her figure in the fresh green silk to the kid slippers that showed below her hem. ‘That is a pity.’
Chapter Four
Colour rose over Miss Hurst’s bosom, up her throat to stain her cheeks. It was delicious, Ashe thought, like the flush of pomegranate juice over iced sherbet on a hot day. She was no wide-eyed innocent if she took the meaning of his glance and words so promptly. But then she was obviously no sheltered society miss.
How old was she? Twenty-five, twenty-six? Attractive, bright, stylish, but not married. Why not? he wondered. Something to do with her secret lives, no doubt.
‘I would very much appreciate it if you did not mention that we had met before this evening, my lord.’ She said it quite calmly, but Ashe suspecte
d that it was a matter of far more importance than she was revealing and that she hated having to ask him.
‘Members of the ton are not expected to be shopkeepers, I assume?’
‘Precisely.’
‘Hmm. Pity my maternal grandfather was a nabob, then.’ He was unconcerned what people thought of his ancestry, but he was interested in how she reacted.
‘If he was indecently rich, and is now dead, there is absolutely nothing for the heir to a marquisate to worry about. Society is curiously accommodating in its prejudices.’ Her expression was bleak. ‘At least, so far as gentlemen are concerned. Ladies are another matter altogether.’
‘So I could ruin you with this piece of gossip?’
‘Yes, as you know perfectly well. Ladies are not shopkeepers, nor do they walk about anywhere, let alone the docks, unescorted. Did you spend much time as a boy pulling the wings off flies, Lord Clere?’