Where The Heart Leads by Stephanie Laurens Page B

forced to don what she considered a disguise. She had to convert from being herself to being Miss Penelope Ashford, youngest sister of Viscount Calverton, youngest daughter of Minerva, the Dowager Lady Calverton, and the only unmarried female in the clan.
    That last designation grated, not because she had any desire to change her marital status but because it somehow set her apart. Set her on a pedestal that she cynically viewed as akin to an auction block. And while she never had the slightest difficulty dismissing the mistaken assumptions too many young gentlemen inevitably made, the need to do so irked. It was irritating to have to suspend her thoughts and find patience and polite words to send importuning gentlemen to the rightabout.
    Especially as, while she might be standing by the side of a ballroom, she was usually mentally elsewhere. Thermopylae, for example. To her the ancient Greeks held a far greater allure than any of the youthful swains who tried to catch her eye.
    Tonight’s venue was Lady Hemmingford’s drawing room. Fashionably gowned in green satin of such a dark hue it was almost black—having been forbidden by her family from wearing black, her color of choice—Penelope stood by the wall, a political soiree in full voice before her.
    Regardless of her boredom with—indeed, antipathy to—such social events, she couldn’t cry off. Her unfailing attendance with her mother at whatever evening functions the Dowager chose to grace was part of the bargain she had struck with Luc and her mother in return for Lady Calverton remaining in town when the rest of the family had departed for the country, thus allowing her to continue her work at the Foundling House.
    Luc and her mother had flatly refused to countenance her remaining in London on her own, or even with Helen, a widowed cousin, as chaperone. Unfortunately, no one could see Helen, sweet temperedand mild, as being able to check her in any way, not even Penelope. Despite her brother’s unhelpful stance, she could see his point.
    She also knew that an unvoiced part of their bargain was that she would consent to being paraded before those members of the ton still in the capital, thereby keeping alive her chances of making a suitable match.
    Within the family, she did her best to openly quash such thoughts; she saw no benefit in marriage at all—not in her case. When out in society, she, if not openly, then subtly and unrelentingly, discouraged gentlemen from imagining she might change her mind.
    She was always taken aback when some young sprig proved too dense to read her message. I’m wearing spectacles, you dolt! was always her first thought. What young lady wishful of contracting a suitable match came to a ton event with gold-rimmed spectacles perched on her nose?
    In reality, she could see enough to get by without her spectacles, but things were fuzzy. She could manage within a restricted area like a room, even a ballroom, but she couldn’t make out the expressions on people’s faces. In her teens, she’d decided knowing what was going on around her—every little detail—was far more important than projecting the right appearance. Other young ladies might blink myopically and bumble about in an attempt to deny their shortcoming, but not her.
    She was as she was, and the ton could simply make do with that.
    Chin elevated, gaze fixed on the cornice across the room, she continued to stand by the side of the Hemmingfords’ drawing room, debating whether among the more recently arrived guests there were any with whom she—or the Foundling House—might benefit from conversation.
    She was distantly aware of music issuing from the adjoining salon, but resolutely ignored the tug on her senses. Dancing with gentlemen invariably encouraged them to imagine she was interested in further acquaintance. A sad circumstance given she loved dancing, but she’d learned not to let the music tempt her.
    Suddenly, with no warning whatsoever, her senses…ruffled.