From Chapter 1
One man detached himself from the group of law clerks gawking at Temperance after her humiliation in her own dining room — Owen Randolph, Papa’s apprentice. Temperance’s heart softened a little. Here was the one person who’d shown her any kindness, even for a moment, in her difficulty with Lord David. She held out her hand. “How do you do, Owen?”
She curtsied as he bowed over her fingers. “Good afternoon?”
That brought back memories. Ever since they were children, he’d always seemed to end every other sentence as a question.
She might still be able to accomplish her objective. “Any chance you might be willing to play checkers?”
The corner of his mouth lifted, even the shadow of his smile charming. “I think not. I’ve lost far too much to you as it is.” Owen cleared his throat and turned to peer through the doorway to the drawing room. “Not enjoying your father’s reception?”
“Some of the company is rather . . . coarse.”
He glanced back at her, one eyebrow perched at a skeptical angle. The next room literally held the finest minds in British America, and she’d just insulted them.
“Lord David?” Owen guessed. “Your cousin? In-law?”
He remembered? “Yes.”
Owen still seemed rather uncertain. “Family feuds must be difficult to endure.”
“He should be in jail.” He should have been hanged, but Temperance tried to hold her tongue at least a little.
“Have you not heard, then?”
She abruptly turned toward Owen. “What?”
“Your father didn’t tell you?” Owen searched the drawing room again, as if for her father.
She hardly wanted to wait to hear whatever this was from Papa. “You had better.”
He shifted his weight. “Your cousin — in-law —”
Temperance resisted the urge to take him by the shoulders and shake the words loose. “What about him?”
“Your father got the magistrate to agree to expunge the records.”
She rolled the words over in her mind, trying to make sense of them. She was a lawyer’s daughter, for heaven’s sake. She ought to know what “expunge” meant.
She didn’t. At least they were old enough friends that Owen could never judge her. “What does that mean?”
“It will be like it never happened. No legal record of Lord David ever having been involved.”
Temperance’s hands flew to her mouth of their own accord, and she took two steps back from the drawing room door. Could her father care so little for her feelings? For a human life, the man she’d loved?
“Temperance?” Owen followed her, taking her arm as if to steady her.
She didn’t realize how much she needed that, and she found herself leaning on him. “When?”
“I’m not entirely certain. Possibly before the Congress began; his mornings have been so taken up with the convention.”
Of course he hadn’t told her.
“Are you well?” Owen asked.
Temperance managed to shake her head. He helped her to the nearest chair.
This couldn’t be happening. Was she the only person on earth who remembered Winthrop had lived? Or simply the only person who cared?
“May I get you something to drink?” Owen offered. “Or eat?”
“Drink,” she murmured. Hopefully a cup of her parents’ fruit punch would revive her.
“Wait here.”
She could hardly be expected to do otherwise, no matter how much Papa’s clerks sat there gawking at and whispering about her.
Could she let this happen to Winthrop’s memory?
Was there anything she could do to stop it?
After being waylaid for several minutes by her cousin’s husband, Owen finally filled the cup for Temperance. Some rescue he’d managed. She was surely either improved or insensible by now. He weaved his way through the men milling about the drawing room and returned to Temperance in the elegant, cream-colored dining room.
In the same chair, Temperance sat with her gaze trained straight ahead, but when he reached her, relief registered right away. She accepted the cup and took a sip. “This is very sweet.”
She didn’t like the punch? “Shall I fetch you something else?”
“No, no — I mean the gesture.”
“Oh.” That was a compliment, wasn’t it? Was he supposed to thank her?
Five minutes in Temperance’s presence and he was a stammering stable boy again. She’d always had this effect on him, and time hadn’t lessened it in the least.
If anything, it had made him acutely aware of the distance between them, between his frayed brown homespun and her printed cotton gown, between his run-down, rented rooms, shared with his mother and sisters, and the fine mansion they stood in now.
He had absolutely no business still fancying a woman who could barely admit his acquaintance, but his heart had never heeded his scolding. Three years as her father’s law apprentice had done nothing to assuage that fancy, either.
Still, he ought to ensure she was quite well. He should probably take the seat next to her, stay with her until she was fully recovered.
Temperance finished her punch and set her cup on a side table. “Will you remember me to your sisters?” she asked.
“To be sure.”
“Thank you.” Her smile was weak.
“Are you well again?” Owen asked.
She drew a shuddering breath. “I don’t know if I ever can be,” she murmured.
Owen only had a passing familiarity with Lord David’s case from the previous year, but he was fairly certain the victim had been the governor’s son. Surely that ne’er-be-good had nothing to do with Temperance’s shock.
Even as he assured himself, however, Owen remembered what little he knew of Winthrop Morley: he was fashionable and rich. He might not compare with Lord David in either respect — on the rare occasions Owen had seen him, he’d found Winthrop’s fashion laughable rather than enviable — but surely those were qualities Temperance would prize in a man.
And clearly they were not qualities Owen could ever possess.
Temperance rose from her chair before Owen could offer his hand. “Thank you,” she said, and she was the one holding out her hand. He shook, gladly, even if it meant Temperance would be taking her leave.
Obviously that was for the best if his mind couldn’t seem to accept she would never be his.
“You’ve always been so kind to me, ever since we were children.”
Kind. That had always been how she’d taken his every gesture. Not that he could have hoped for more at five or ten.
They were not children any longer. “Can you believe we’ve known one another nearly twenty years?” he asked.
“It boggles the mind. I shan’t forget this, old friend.” She pressed a kiss to his cheek and squeezed his fingers before heading out of the room by some back way.
His mind spun with the possibilities. She’d kissed him. She’d offered her hand. She’d squeezed his fingers. Surely that meant — certainly — it could only —
Owen sank into the chair Temperance had left. That was utterly ridiculous. Her handshake held no special significance, no lingering touch, no loving caress. Her kiss was not that of a woman in love.
He glanced over at the younger men who worked in the office, seated across the dining room. They were studiously looking away from him.
He had never told anyone how he felt about Temperance Hayes, but somehow it seemed the whole world knew. Except Temperance. Even when he’d gone and said something so ridiculous and obvious as “I’ve lost far too much to you.”
She had stated her intentions straight out: old friend. That was all they would ever be.
Owen has loved Temperance since they were children. Can they ever be more than friends?