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surrounded by admirers. He gave Darlington a slow, exuberant smile, then turned back to his conversation with Hopwell.
    It was working.
    Nobody had realised yet that the man they thought was the Duke of Darlington was actually Crispin Scott, the Chancellor’s son, in dress-ups.
    Darlington left the room, and allowed himself the very small luxury of stopping in a dark corridor to lean against the wall, where no one might watch. He tried to catch his breath.
    Fool. Worse than a fool.
    He hadn’t meant to speak to her – hadn’t known he would find Lydia’s sister haunting the same anonymous corner of the ballroom he’d chosen for himself. He had told himself he would just have a look at her, this sister Lydia never spoke about.
    He had paid for his curiosity.
    She fed pigs, and loved her mother, and her nose was crooked as a scrapper’s from the rookeries. She had the eyes of a wild creature, gold and wary, and did not belong here, in London. She had caught and fixed him in the beam of her regard. She had illuminated the thing that cowered at the very centre of his soul.
    He threw his head back against the wall, trying to make a clear path for his breath, from mouth to lung.
    His night had not even begun. He still had a role to play. There was a woman upstairs, waiting.
    He forced himself away from the wall. He was no longer a boy. He was the Duke of Darlington, as his father had been before him.

Chapter Three
    Kit pushed forward through the crowd gathered about the Duke of Darlington, and ignored the slight flush on her cheeks. This was her chosen course; she would not be granted an audience in private.
    She had read something about his encounter with BenRuin, in the days since. BenRuin had gone for him in a gentleman’s club, in front of countless witnesses. He had almost got his knife to the Duke’s throat, if rumour could be believed.
    Aside from the utter idiocy of approaching a duke without an introduction, he would likely abhor her connection to BenRuin. But then there was her connection to BenRuin’s wife.
    He was less pretty up close.
    ‘Your Grace,’ she said, and sank into a curtsey so low her knees wobbled.
    He held his hand out to her. A kind face, a kind gesture. Not the man she’d envisaged, given her brother-in-law’s fury. It made her certain Lydia’s affair had nothing to do with this man at all, and everything to do with her husband.
    ‘You know my sister, Lady BenRuin.’ She kept her voice low, and the Duke drew her to the side.
    ‘You must be Miss Sutherland. It is a pleasure to finally meet you.’
    ‘This is not about pleasure, Your Grace. I . . .’ And how exactly did she tell off a duke, now that she was standing before him, no matter how gentle he seemed? ‘I do not want you to see my sister any more.’
    ‘A commendable desire,’ he said, without blinking an eye. ‘You will be happy to know she and I have parted ways already.’
    She tried to read anything from his face but a kind of concerned benevolence, and could find no trace of untruthfulness. How different he was from the man in black.
    She nodded, and he was taken away from her by the young men who crowded around him before they could even exchange farewells. Let Lord Marmotte look to his own wife – Kit’s business was done. Let the gossips make what they would of it. Let them think the graceless Miss Sutherland was making a play for a duke. She left the room and walked down the hall, where a passing couple looked at her oddly.
    Right. She was striding again. Lydia had talked to her about that. At length.
    She looked into a room where about ten tables were set up for cards. Some of the young men were wearing the decorated hats she’d read about but never seen, and their wrists were wrapped in leather. At least her father had never stooped to putting flowers in his hat, she thought.
    It wasn’t much comfort.
    ‘Will you play?’ a man asked behind her, and touched her elbow.
    She moved quickly out of the way.