Not that tall and dark had ever been her preference. It seemed, unfortunately, that she had a weakness for blond hair instead.

“Shall we begin?” asked the golden-haired source of all her present problems. Jeremy looked no worse the wear for the late evening; no trace of the concern that had marked his features the night before was visible, and he was his usual carefree self. Diana had never previously thought of his typical demeanor as a mask, and yet now she wondered—he could not be as blithe as he seemed. The man who had visited her room the night before had certainly not been. It made her wonder what else she had overlooked about him over the years.

For so long, bickering with Jeremy had been something of a habit—comforting, almost, in its familiarity. She had always found him to be rather… unserious. This was not a complaint she tended to level against gentlemen as a rule, but something about Jeremy’s manner had always irked her. He was too handsome, too charming, too flirtatious—she didn’t trust him, not one bit. But it had taken only a couple of days for her to begin revising that opinion of him, and the idea that there might be more to him than she had thought was more intriguing than she cared to admit. She didn’t like the newfound fascination he held for her, and she felt certain nothing good could come of it—it made her feel powerless, and that was something she refused to be. Ever.

She would simply have to remain focused on the task at hand: seeing Willingham married off, posthaste.

The guests scattered as Rothsmere began to count, his hand held theatrically before his eyes. Diana contemplated remaining in the room for a moment, thinking that Rothsmere might rush out so quickly once he finished counting that he wouldn’t search it thoroughly, but she saw Langely eyeing one of the shadowy corners of the room and realized that her idea had already been taken. Instead, she went out into the corridor, turning in the opposite direction of the majority of the crowd at each corner until, after a few minutes, she was entirely alone. She knew that Rothsmere must have finished counting by now, but also found it unlikely that he was moving terribly quickly, so she took her time, wandering into and out of several rooms before finally finding a place that suited her needs.

She had never stumbled across this room on her previous visits to Elderwild. This didn’t surprise her—she’d taken quite a meandering path to discover it this time, and was not at all certain that she’d be able to find her way back to the drawing room without getting lost along the way. She had discovered a small sitting room, tucked away in a corner of the manor—the windows lining two walls instead of one informed her of this much, at least. Rich blue wallpaper covered the walls, cheerful against the gray day visible outside the windows, and she imagined it would look equally welcoming on a sunny or snowy day. It was full of second-best furniture, which was, of course, the very best sort—not so new or fancy as to be uncomfortable, the perfect amount of worn in. A window seat was set into one of the bay windows, and low bookshelves lined the walls underneath the windows on either side of the seat.

She knew in an instant that someone had loved this room very much—everything about it, from the wallpaper to the eclectic collection of artwork on the walls to the cracked spines on nearly every book on the shelves, told her that this had been someone’s retreat. Someone’s hideaway. Someone’s safe place.

However, it also had a disused feeling about it—Jeremy’s servants were quite diligent, so every surface was dusted and the furniture hadn’t been covered in sheets, as it so often was in unused rooms in country houses. But the air felt still and stuffy, as though the sound of laughter and conversation had not echoed within these walls for a very long time. She could not explain how she knew this, but her awareness gave her an odd pang of melancholy.

However, the room made a perfect hiding place. She scanned her surroundings, hands on hips, trying to decide where someone would be least likely to look. Her eyes landed on the drapes at the window seat. At the moment they were open, but they could be drawn to hide the seat from view, and the gloomy weather outside would ensure that her silhouette would not be visible. It was perfect.

She crossed the room and sat on the window seat, tucking her feet up beneath her, and pulled the drapes closed. She stared out the window at the rain beating against the glass, and at the smudged landscape behind it, the rain making the rolling green hills and woods look blurry and indistinct. She was just wishing that she had gone back to her room to fetch her sketchbook when she stiffened at the distinct sound of footsteps.

How was it possible? There was no way Rothsmere could have found her so quickly, and she was certain that no one in the group had followed her. The footsteps did not proceed with the halting progress indicating that their maker was searching for people in hiding. Instead, they were purposeful, growing louder every second. There was, she realized in a flash, only one person who would move through such a remote corner of the house with such deliberate intent; equally unfortunately, she knew, there was nothing she could do to escape him.

The footsteps halted for a moment, as the person to whom they belonged no doubt took in the drapes closed across the window seat. They resumed a moment later, now muffled by the rug, and Diana closed her eyes and sighed as they came to a halt directly before her.

A moment later, the drapes were twitched back, and she opened her eyes to find Jeremy staring at her, his expression a cross between amused and disgruntled.

“I suppose,” he said after a moment’s silence, “it would be too much to ask that you not poach the best hiding spot in the entire house.”