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inquired.
    "Yes," Miss Stone replied, her eyes glowing with
suppressed laughter. "Would you care to borrow my book?"
    Her quip earned her a lazy, devastating smile of
admiration. "I see that some form of atonement for my earlier behavior is in
order. Mademoiselle," he said with laughing gravity, "would you favor me
with a dance tomorrow night?"
    Whitney hesitated, taken aback by his engaging smile and
open admiration.
    Mistaking her silence for coquettishness, Nicolas
shrugged, and all the warmth left his smile as he said with mocking
amusement, "From your hesitation, I will assume that all your dances are
already bespoken. Another time, perhaps."
    Whitney realized he was withdrawing his invitation, and
she instantly decided the man was as arrogant and perverse as she'd first
thought. "None of my dances are bespoken," she floored him by candidly
admitting. "You see, you are the first gentleman I've met in Paris."
    Her deliberate emphasis on the word "gentleman" did not
escape Nicki, who suddenly threw back his head and laughed.
    "Here is the bracelet," Lady Gilbert said, hurrying into
the room. "And Nicolas, please remind Therese that the clasp is broken."
    Nicki took the bracelet and left. He climbed into his
carriage, instructed his groom to drive him round to his mother's, then
relaxed back against the leather cushions. They drove past a park whose
winding paths bloomed extravagantly with spring flowers. Two pretty females
of his acquaintance lifted pastel-gloved hands at him in greeting, but Nicki
scarcely glanced at the Gainsborough-like scene. His thoughts were occupied
with the young English girl he had just met.
    Try as he might, he couldn't understand how Whitney
Stone and his addlepated chatterbox of a sister had become such boon
companions, for they were as dissimilar as lemonade and heady French wine.
Therese was a pretty thing, sweet as lemonade, but she had no hidden depths
to interest a man.
    Whitney Stone, on the other hand, was a veritable
treasure of contrasts, sparkling like rich, red burgundy with the promise of
hidden and tantalizing things to come. For a seventeen-year-old, she had
borne his mocking disdain with remarkable composure. Given a few years,
Nicolas decided, she would be fascinating. A chuckle welled up in his chest
as he recalled how adroitly she'd retaliated for his remark about the
etiquette book, by offering to tend it to him.
    It would be a pity, he decided, for such a rare jewel as
she to be relegated to obscurity at the crowded debutante ball tomorrow
night, merely because she was a stranger to France.
    Gorgeous tapestries adorned one side of the gigantic
ballroom, and the opposite wall was mirrored to reflect the light from the
thousands of candles in the glittering chandeliers overhead. Catching sight
of her reflection in one of the mirrors, Whitney nervously studied her
appearance. Her white silken ball gown was trimmed with broad scallops
caught up and held in place with pink silk roses which matched the ones
entwined in the heavy curls at her crown. She looked, she decided, a great
deal calmer than she felt.
    "Everything is going to be wonderful, you'll see,"
whispered Aunt Anne.
    Whitney did not think everything was going to be
wonderful at all. She knew she couldn't possibly hope to compete with the
dazzling blondes and redheads, the demure little brunettes, who were
laughing and talking easily with smiling young men garbed in black, but with
brightly colored waistcoats of silks and satin. Whitney told herself she
didn't care a pin about anything as foolish as a silly ball, but she knew it
wasn't true. She cared very much.
    Therese and her mama arrived only seconds before the
musicians raised their instruments for the first dance. "I have the most
splendid news," Therese whispered breathlessly, looking like a confection in
her white lace gown with her cheeks pink and her shining blond hair
elegantly curled atop her head. "My maid