Free Love Not a Rebel by Heather Graham Page B

faces, and she would find that he was looking for her, only for her. Perhaps she would allow her hand to flutter to her throat, and, of course, her heart would be pounding mercilessly.
    He would be the most elegant man present. Tall, and with his soft blue eyes and near-platinum hair. Lean and nonchalant, he would wear mustard brocade, she was nearly certain, for the color so enhanced his masculine beauty.
    His eyes would touch hers …
    And she would know that this night was indeed the night, the most beautiful of all summer nights—no, the most beautiful of all nights.
    He would thread his way through the crowd to her, and he would capture her hand, and soon she would be on the dance floor with him. But his need to speak would be great, and he would sweep her away, out to the garden,into the maze. And she would run behind him laughing; all the way to the statue of Venus, and there he would set her upon the bench and fall down upon one knee and beg her to be his wife. She would smile, and clasp him to her to breast, and—
    “Amanda! Amanda! We’ve guests arriving! Come down here immediately.”
    Her dream dissolved in a shimmer of gray ashes as her father called her harshly.
    “Yes, Father!”
    “I’m going down; the guests are already filing in. Amanda!”
    “I’m coming, Father!” she called in return. She swallowed down a touch of pain that he should always be so brusque with her. She was his only child, and though he provided for her in all things, he never displayed the slightest affection. She wondered sometimes if he despised her for not having been born a son, or if he despised her for bringing about her mother’s death with her birth. She didn’t know, and she learned over the years to harden her own heart and not to care. Danielle had been with her always, and Danielle showered affection upon her. Harrington, the butler and head of the staff, was proper in public and affectionate in private. At least she knew what caring was.
    And now …
    Now there was Robert. Lord Robert Tarryton. And she believed that he intended to ask her to be his wife this very night. She was so in love with him.
    There had been other men in her life. In fact, she thought with a rueful smile, there had been many. She was accomplished, she was beautifully clad, and she was her father’s daughter. Dozens of the most influential young men had called themselves her suitors, and she had laughed with them and flirted with them, but she had never given her heart away and, for all of his coldness, her father had never forced her hand. Even when John Murray, Lord Dunmore, the royal governor of the colony, had teasingly suggested that she was of an age, her father had shrugged and said that she had a mind of her own, shewas not quite eighteen, and there was plenty of time for marriage.
    She did have a mind of her own, and she enjoyed life. Before leaving the Colonies for her schooling in London, she had ridden with Sir Henry Hershall, sipped spiked lemonade on the balcony swing with the Earl of Latimer’s second son, Jon, and played golf with the Scottish commander of Lord Newberry’s Highlanders. And even Robert she had teased mercilessly until she had returned home in November last year and discovered that she was in love with him, wonderfully in love, at last.
    “Amanda!”
    “I’m coming, Father!”
    She rushed from the balcony, and through her room to the hallway, and from there, to the top landing of the winding stairway. Once there she paused, breathing deeply.
    The great hallway below was already filling with guests. She hurried down a few steps and then paused again. This was her grand entrance. She was supposed to move slowly and demurely. She inhaled again, resting her fingers delicately on the bannister. She felt her heart beat. Robert should just be arriving. She should glance to the entryway and find him, and his eyes should be upon her.
    Perhaps he had already arrived. She quickly gazed out over the room, smiling to