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father is counting on me to see that you marry well. He would never forgive me should I allow you to get tangled up in some scandal with that man."
    Clarissa sighed unhappily at this edict, but said little, merely turned to peer at the haze of dark and light speeding past outside the carriage. There was little use in arguing; she'd learned that through the issue of her spectacles. So Clarissa merely swallowed her anger, pretended to be distracted by the passing lights, and replayed her short time with Lord Mowbray in her head.
    Adrian Montfort, the Earl of Mowbray . She repeated his name in her head and thought it suited him. He'd seemed terribly nice to her, not at all what she would expect of an earl. The few she'd met before this had always seemed rather arrogant and cold, but Adrian hadn't displayed either tendency. He'd been patient and sweet, so understanding and encouraging. Clarissa could still remember the sound of his smoky voice, the fresh, almost woodsy scent of him, and the feel of his strong arms around her as he'd moved her across the dance floor. She'd felt so safe in his arms, Clarissa found it hard to believe he was a rakehell or debaucher of young women.
    A loud sigh from her stepmother interrupted her thoughts, and she squinted warily at the smeared figure on the opposite seat.
    "If only you were not so blind," Lydia bemoaned
    suddenly. "I would not even need worry about you fancying him."
    "Why?" Clarissa asked curiously, just barely managing to refrain from pointing out that she wouldn't be blind if she had her spectacles back.
    "Because the man is as ugly as his sins," Lydia pronounced. "He used to be considered one of the handsomest of men in the ton. However, when the war started, he went off to battle and came back with that huge ugly scar. He is the talk of the ton now. No one can believe he would show his face in polite society, ruined as it is."
    "Then we are a perfect pair," Clarissa muttered. "Two misfits everyone likes to point at and whisper about."
    "What was that?" Lydia asked sharply.                     
    "Nothing." Clarissa turned her gaze back to the passing city streets, blurry as they were, and heaved a sigh. Nothing her stepmother said had lessened Mowbray in her eyes. She simply didn't believe he would ruin her, and she knew he wasn't ugly. Clarissa had seen the scar that marred the side of his face. True, she'd seen it in bits and pieces, glimpses caught only when he'd leaned close to speak, but it hadn't seemed all that awful to her, and the other side of his face was perfect. She had found him terribly handsome.
    Clarissa didn't say as much to her stepmother, however. She knew better than that.
    Chapter Four
    Clarissa watched the blur of movement in the ballroom and sighed deeply. It had been a week since the De Morriseys ' ball, where she'd met the Earl of Mowbray . A mere week, she thought with a sigh. It felt like ten. Life had slid back into its pattern of blind clumsiness on her part, and the tedious—not to mention somewhat dubious—attentions of the elderly Lord Prudhomme . It seemed, despite her little accident in setting him afire, he was willing to continue his courtship. But the man now made sure that any and all incendiary and liquid-bearing items were kept well away from her.
    Clarissa was eternally grateful that he was too busy playing host at this, his own ball, to bother her with his attentions, but she was bored. Bored to tears. She was also slightly obsessed with the evening she'd made the acquaintance of Lord Mowbray . That was the one bright spot in the entire time she'd spent in London
    to date. And despite her stepmother's orders to avoid him, Clarissa found herself watching every passing blur in the hope that it might be him. She was also listening for the low, smoky tones of his laugh. He had a lovely laugh.
    As if her thoughts had produced it, that low, smoky voice was suddenly whispering in her ear, "These are rather boring affairs,