“Not exclusively,” Claire said, smiling back at him for the first time, succumbing to his casual humility-a rarity in men of his class. “Although, surely you know that wealth is the prime allure in the ton.”

“How is it then,” he murmured, reaching out and shoving her hood aside so he could better see her face in the glow of the carriage lamps, “that you are indifferent to its attraction when your sister is not? Furthermore,” he said more softly as he took in her delicate features, green eyes, and lush mouth with the critical eye of a connoisseur, “why are you so intriguing while your sister is merely pretty.”

“Don’t,” Claire protested, pulling up her hood, purposefully resisting his flattery.

“Humor me,” he murmured, slipping her hood off again. “I’m just admiring your hair. My mother’s hair was the same color.”

His voice had taken on a sudden gentleness and she remembered hearing the stories. How his beautiful mother and her lover had died in a carriage accident on the road to Dover-not that anyone blamed the countess for fleeing from her depraved husband. That the viscount refused to live with his father afterward was added scandal; he’d set up his own establishment though he was scarce sixteen. “It’s an unfashionable color now, I’m told.” She didn’t speak of the circumstances of his mother’s death, though the rumors had followed him. Nor did she wish to offer sympathy to a man like Ormond who had overcome his sorrow by availing himself of every vice and excess without regard for the females he’d ruthlessly discarded in the process.

“I find that the fashionable world is often in error.” His voice, like hers, was without emotion, as though they both were carefully weighing their words. “Harriet tells me you’ve lost your parents, too,” he said.

He spoke as if his father was dead, she thought. “Yes…four years ago. Our parents died of the putrid throat. We are wards of our aunt as you no doubt know-or rather Harriet is. I am not.” Please, God, may she soon be quit of this carriage. His nearness was becoming disquieting.