Page 7 of Once a Scoundrel

“I need to speak with you alone.” When she hesitated, he pressed, “Please, Faith. For an old friend.”

An old friend. She blinked away the stinging in her eyes and reluctantly agreed. “All right.”

Stephen took her arm to lead her to her parents who were waiting at the side of the room. The false smile Faith fixed on her face told everyone how simply thrilled she was to have the marquess back in England, even through her heart was ready to throw him onto a packet to China.

He lowered his mouth to her ear. “I missed you, Faith.”

“You did not,” she returned, forcing her smile not to waver.

“So much more than you realize.”

They reached her parents, and he bowed politely before excusing himself, muttering something about seeking out a cigar. He gave her a parting look that sent the butterflies in her belly fluttering anew.

Quick anger at herself flared inside her. Even now, after all the anguish he’d caused her, he could still so easily unsettle her.

“So,” her father drawled as he watched Stephen walk away, “Dunwich has returned.”

“Yes,” Faith answered, struck by how Papa had referred to him. She couldn’t remember her father ever using Stephen’s title before. He’d always been referred to as Grey’s son. Or simply Stephen. Never before had Papa acknowledged that Stephen was not only a fully grown man but nearly his equal as a peer of the realm.

She wasn’t certain he had changed, but his return had certainly changed the way people thought about him.

Papa leaned down to ask her, “Did you enjoy your dance?”

“Yes.” Not entirely a lie. There were moments when she’d enjoyed it a great deal. She bit her lip. “Are you upset that we waltzed?”

“Not at all. He’s Grey’s son and deserves our hospitality.”

She quirked a dubious brow at that, not certain she believed him, yet she placed a kiss on his cheek just the same. “Thank you.”

“But be careful with him, Faith,” he warned, as always the overprotective father who had England’s most eligible gentlemen quaking in their boots at the prospect of asking to court his daughters. “The army changes the men who serve in it. He isn’t the same man you knew before.”

She hoped he was right.