“At last! I thought you’d never arrive, Victoria,” said Lady Melly, swooping upon her with curling gloved fingers. “The Earl of Tretherington is here, and word is, he’s in search of a wife.”

“Tretherington?” Victoria echoed, looking at her mother with a raised brow. “Mother, please. I’m not about to be courted by a man old enough to be my grandfather.”

“But, Victoria,” Melly continued, “Tretherington House! It’s grander than Westminster, or so they-”

“If you’re so enamored with Tretherington House, why don’t you set your eyes on him yourself?” asked Victoria. “Then you can be Lady T. You might just as well, Mama, for I don’t believe Jellington will ever come up to snuff.” She rarely called her mother that informal name, but something prompted her to really look at her parent tonight. Perhaps Lady Melly’s incessant desire to see Victoria married-again-stemmed from her own loneliness of widowhood.

Her mother was a fine-looking woman for her age. With the same dark, curling hair she’d bestowed upon her daughter and a more curvaceous figure, not to mention a more outgoing personality, she’d had her own share of admirers since her husband’s death. One of them, in fact, had been the vampire that Duchess Winnie had been stalking with her ungainly stake that night in Rome.

Victoria had relieved the duchess of her hunt, slaying the Conte Regalado herself. And shortly thereafter, she’d used her aunt Eustacia’s special gold medallion to relieve Lady Melly, Duchess Winnie, and Lady Nilly of their memories of that particular occasion.

“I?” Lady Melly looked as though Victoria had suggested she dye her hair green. “But of course not. And, to be sure,” she added coyly, looking at her beau, who was eyeing her from across the room, “Jellington has already proposed to me. Six times.”