And should he tell her what he'd discovered? Would it do her any good to know? Cedric Penhallan would laugh in her face, destroying that eager dream to discover a family who would make up for the loss of her own.

While Julian was walking through the orchard, Cedric Penhallan drove up to Tregarthan. He was deliberately late, and his hostess had left her post at the head of the stairs long before he strolled up them.

He paused at the double doors standing open onto the main salon thronged with brightly clad women like so many butterflies and their more somberly dressed escorts. The musicians were playing a waltz, and he saw Celia's daughter immediately, twirling gracefully in the hold of a young man in scarlet regimentals.

Cedric remained standing in the door, fixing his gaze on the slight figure. Celia had worn those colors, he remembered. And she too had danced with that lively grace.

“Lord Penhallan, we're honored.” Lucy hurried across the room toward him, sounding breathless and startled. Her eyes darted in search of Julian, who surely should be there to greet this important guest, but there was no sign of her brother. She bowed and shook hands with the viscount.

“May I procure you a glass of wine… Oh, Gareth.” With relief she saw her husband a few paces away. “Gareth, here is Lord Penhallan.”

Gareth too looked for his brother-in-law. He didn't feel in the least competent to deal with a man who moved in lofty circles far out of his own orbit, and who was gazing at him with a look of derision from beneath his bushy gray eyebrows. But he searched manfully for a suitable topic of conversation and asked his lordship about his stud.

Tamsyn had felt her uncle's arrival, just as she'd felt his eyes on her. As the music died, she smiled at her partner and excused herself, refusing his eager offer to accompany her into the supper room.

She walked steadily across the floor. Cedric's eyes met hers as she approached.

“Oh,” Lucy said, relieved at the diversion. “Permit me to introduce Lord Penhallan, Tamsyn. Viscount, this is my brother's ward, Senorita Baron. She's come to us from Spain, the Duke-”

“Yes, I have heard the story,” Cedric interrupted rudely. “It's common knowledge in the neighbourhood.”

“Of course, how stupid of me,” Lucy murmured, flushing.

Cedric made a briefly dismissive gesture and said, “How do you do, Miss Baron?”

“Well, I thank you, senor. JJ She smiled sweetly as she bowed. “It is an honor to meet you.” Her hand fluttered toward the locket at her neck before she said, “Please excuse me, I have promised this dance, and I see my partner waiting.”

She walked off without a backward glance, but the hairs on the nape of her neck stood up as she felt his eyes on her back and the force of that speculative, menacing gaze swept over her.

Lord Penhallan watched her for a minute; then he said shortly, breaking into Gareth's elaborate recitation of a race he'd seen at Newmarket, “Good night, Lady Fortescue.” His massive bulk spun with extraordinary agility, and he was gone.

“Well!” Lucy said, outraged. “What a horrible man! How could he be so rude? What did he come for if he was going to leave the minute he arrived?”

“No telling,” Gareth said. “But the Penhallans are all toplofty… think they're too good for everyone else.”

“Not a St. Simon,” Lucy said, drawing herself up to her full height. “St. Simons are as good as Penhallans in anyone's book.”

“Yes, I daresay,” Gareth said soothingly. “But Lord Penhallan is mighty powerful in the government. It's said the prime minister never makes a move without his approval.”

“Well, I think he's detestable. Thank goodness he's gone.” On which note Lucy went off to ensure that the tables in the supper room were being replenished.

Julian re-entered the house through a side door and thus missed Viscount Penhallan's brief visit. He glanced into the salon. The company was thinning, but Tamsyn was still dancing. He crossed the floor and lightly tapped her partner on the shoulder. “Forgive me, but I'd like to claim a guardian's privilege, Jamie.”

The young man relinquished his lady with a jerky bow and went to lean disconsolately against the wall.

“Are you enjoying yourself?”

“Oh, yes,” Tamsyn said, but she sounded distracted, and he could feel the tension in her body as he turned her on the floor. There was an almost febrile glitter to her eyes, and her skin was flushed.

“How much wine have you had?” he asked, steering her off the floor.

“A glass, no more.”

“It must be excitement, then.” Smiling, he took his handkerchief and wiped her damp brow.

“It is my first party since I was seven,” she said with an answering smile, but the attempt at mocking humor lacked conviction.

“I'm going to London in the morning,” he said abruptly, realizing as he said it that he'd only just decided what to do.

“Oh?” She looked at him, and her dismay was a clarion call. “Why?”

“I have Wellington's business to see to.”

“But you weren't going for another two weeks.” She nibbled her bottom lip, frowning. “Why so sudden, Julian?” There was a look in his eye that filled her with a deep apprehension. He looked like a man steeling himself to jump off a cliff.

He didn't immediately reply but drew her backward into a deep window embrasure. His voice was low and grave. “Come back to Spain with me, Tamsyn.”

Whatever she'd been expecting, it hadn't been that.

“Now?”

“Yes.” He brushed a wisp of hair from her brow.

“Come back with me and we'll go campaigning together. And we'll stay together and enjoy each other until it's over.”

Until it's over. Her heart wept at the finality of the words and the closed mind of the man who couldn't embrace a future with the woman who loved him because she didn't fit the right mold.

“But I haven't done what I came here to do,” she said quietly.

“Does it really mean that much to you, Tamsyn?

What kind of life would you have in England, even supposing you found your mother's family and persuaded them to accept you? This isn't right for you, you know it isn't.” He gestured to the emptying room, where the musicians still played, though desultorily now. “Let's go back to Spain. We can be together there in a way we can't here.”

“Do you care for me?” Her voice was small, her face as pale now as it had been flushed before.

“You know I do,” he said, touching a finger to her lips. “That's why I'm asking you to do this.”

“But we have no future together? No real future?” His silence was answer enough.

“I suppose not,” she said dully, answering her own question. “A St. Simon could never have a future with an illegitimate brigand. I know that.” She tried to smile but her lip quivered.

“That sounds so harsh,” he said helplessly.

“The truth often is.” She stepped backward and her eyes focused, the sheen of tears vanishing as anger and pride abruptly came to her aid. She would not permit this man to look down upon her, to decide she was not good enough for him. The daughter of El Baron and Cecile Penhallan had no need to stoop to placate and beg a St. Simon. “No, I can't come back with you. I will do what I came here to do. But I absolve you from the contract, milord colonel, since you can no longer see your way to honoring it.”

She was pure Penhallan now, cold and arrogant, and he fought his own surge of anger at her insolence.

He bowed stiffly. “Of course, you may stay at Tregarthan for as long as you wish. Lucy will continue to sponsor you, I'm sure. I believe you'll find her a more appropriate sponsor than myself, anyway.”

Appropriate! What had that to do with anything? She turned from him with a curt gesture of farewell, her mouth hard, her jaw set. “I bid you Godspeed, Colonel, and a safe journey.”

He stood there in the embrasure as she walked away, across the nearly deserted salon, and out of the room. Silently, he cursed his own stupidity in making the offer that he'd known she wouldn't accept. He had made it partly for himself, but also partly for her, a desperate attempt to prevent her from discovering who she was and the inevitable hurt that would follow when Cedric Penhallan laughed her from his door.