They danced by him. He saw her eyes were brighter than the gentleman's, she was that excited.

He stood quietly, watching. Around and around they whirled, the man keeping her to the perimeter so no one would dance into their path.

He could do nothing but wait, which he did, leaning negligently, arms crossed over his chest, against a wall beside a large palm tree that had a red bow fastened to one of its fronds. He didn't know her name, yet he already knew she wouldn't be a Mary or a Jane. No, her name would be exotic, but he couldn't ever think of a single English name exotic enough to fit his image of her.

He saw a pallid young gentleman and a lady who appeared to be his mother whispering as they looked toward him. He smiled at them, a black brow arching, not that he blamed them for their gossip. After all, he was the new Lord Mountjoy, and people were speculating on how he was adjusting to a title as empty as a gourd since the old earl had left all his wealth to Nicholas's three younger half brothers. All that was left to him was the entailed moldering family estate in Sussex, Wyverly Chase, built by the first Earl of Mountjoy, who had fought the Spanish like a Viking berserker and managed to charm the eternal virgin Queen Elizabeth. She had duly elevated Viscount Ashborough to his earldom. Wyverly Chase was going on three hundred years old, and showed every decade. As for the entailed three thousand acres, his father had ensured it was as worthless as a lack of money and care could make it by the time he'd died. His son was left with nothing but fallow fields, desperate tenants, and mountains of debt.

Was the young man's mama wondering where he'd come from? He'd heard one man whisper that the new earl was newly arrived from China. That made him smile.

Nicholas saw a man looking toward him, saw him say something to a portly man beside him. Was he speculating on whether Nicholas had yet met with his three half brothers, all young men now, two of them, he'd heard, as wild as any Channel storm? Ah, but most importantly, beggared as he was, had he come to London to find an heiress?