Page 9 of A Sky Painted Gold

“Sorry that took so long,” he says, and his eyes flicker towards the party. “It’s a bit of a din in there, and I can’t seem to take two steps without someone wanting to talk my ear off.”

The glass in my hand is cold to the touch, and I raise it to my lips, feeling the bubbles leap towards me even before the sharp taste floods my senses. My first taste of champagne. It tickles my nose and gives me the tiniest injection of bravery.

“Poor you,” I say sweetly. “Although perhaps throwing an enormous party isn’t the best idea if you want to be alone.” I look up at him over the top of my glass but his face remains stony.

“It’s not about being alone,” he says. “It’s about being with someone worth talking to.”

I’m totally thrown, as the sheer arrogance of that statement overwhelms me. This man certainly has a high opinion of himself. I bury my face in my glass, trying to hide my disapproval by throwing back a gulp of my champagne, but I end up spilling most of it down my front instead.

“Anyway, it’s not my party,” Robert continues, and thankfully he seems oblivious to my clumsiness. “It’s my sister Caitlin’s. I should really introduce you.”

“Didn’t you want to introduce yourself first?” I ask. It suddenly strikes me as impossibly self-important that he hasn’t done so. I mean, yes, OK, I know who he is, but he doesn’t know that I know. Something about that makes me want to pick a fight.

“How rude of me.” He smiles, but it’s the smile of a shark before it attacks. “I quite forgot the proper etiquette when one meets someone hanging from the branches of a tree.”

“I wasn’t hanging from the branches,” I say acidly. “You make me sound like a monkey. I was perched. Elegantly.”

He gives me a long look. I know exactly who he is, but I’ll die before I admit it. I glower back at him.

Then he surprises me by reaching for my right hand, bending over it in a little bow and brushing my knuckles lightly with his lips. All the blood in my body seems determined to rush to my cheeks, even though I desperately will myself to look unmoved.

“Robert Anthony Frederick St John Cardew, your most humble servant,” he says, like a character in a regency novel, and I know, I just know, that he expects me to swoon.

“Louise Rose Trevelyan.” My voice is little more than a growl. “And I sincerely hope that you’re not expecting me to curtsey.”

He looks up and laughs, a short, sharp laugh that seems to have been surprised out of him, and his face is transformed for a second by a sudden lightness that makes him almost handsome. If that’s the kind of thing you like, I suppose.

“That’s a lot of names you’ve got,” I say, snatching my hand back from his fingers and wiping my slightly clammy palm on my shorts.

“I’ve got a few more, actually,” he says coolly, all that unexpected lightness gone from his face. “But I thought that for the sake of expediency I’d better save them for another time.”

“Right,” I agree. “Maintain an air of mystery.”

“Very important,” he says, and then after a pause he adds, “For a good story.”

“Ye-es.” I eye him nervously. It seems a strange thing to say, and there’s something dangerous and self-satisfied in his voice, like a card player about to reveal his winning hand, although his face remains implacable.

“Lady Amelia would approve.” His voice is silken, and he’s not looking at me.

I almost drop my glass, and I feel the blood leaving my face. “W-what did you say?” My words are little more than a croak. Surely I have misheard what he said?

“Lady Amelia,” he repeats conversationally. “I think she’d be firmly in favour of maintaining an air of mystery, don’t you? Although she can be a trifle … overdramatic at times.”

I close my eyes for a second, forcing my brain to make sense of his words. With a sinking feeling I remember the notebook that I lost. My eyes snap open, and I can see from the light gleaming in his gaze that he is enjoying this.

The truth dawns on me then, that I must have left the notebook behind the last time I was here, and my stomach lurches as I realize where my notes have ended up. Those fledgling thoughts, those precious scribbles, and it was Robert Cardew who found them. Worse than that … he read them. I never let anyone read them, no one but Alice, that is, and now this … this man is making fun of them.

“Overdramatic,” I repeat, mechanically.

Robert inclines his head. “I suppose it rather comes with the genre,” he muses, and I feel a wave of anger wash over me. I expect my literary tastes are a little low for him, the great big arrogant, patronizing snob.

“I suppose it does,” I force myself to say with a lightness I don’t feel. A lightness that conceals the simmering, shimmering fury rising within me. “Perhaps you would be so kind as to return my notes to me. Losing them has put me a little behind.”

“Well, as much as I enjoyed them, I’m afraid I don’t carry them around with me,” Robert says glibly, patting his pockets as if to convince me the notebook isn’t there.

“Of course not,” I grind out, trying to hide how much I’m stung by the joke, by the fact that he’s laughing at something that matters so much to me, treating it so dismissively.

A frown flickers across Robert’s face. “I—” he begins, but I cut him off.