Only when the crowd had swallowed her up did he turn away. He felt oddly flat.

He should have gone back to his room then. It was nearly midnight. He’d done his duty. Showed up. Even danced. No one would remark on his vanishing now.

But he didn’t go. He prowled the edges of the dance floor, restless and out of sorts. Edgy. Hungry. And not for food. His body was still aware of how neatly Edie Daley had fit into his arms.

“Damn it.” Abruptly he turned and asked the nearest unattached female for a dance.

Why not? He’d danced once tonight already. It was just more of the same.

But it wasn’t the same. This woman was nothing like Edie Daley.

She didn’t settle into his arms with a reluctance that gave way to rightness. She plastered herself against him, locked her fingers together behind his neck and nibbled on his jaw. She didn’t so much dance as slither and move against him until at last the music ended and Nick was finally able to peel her off again.

“Another?” she murmured.

“No.” He’d had enough. More than. “I’m done dancing,” he said firmly, though years of having good manners drilled into him made him try to look regretful as he stepped away. “I’m calling it a night.”

Even as he did so, someone’s hand touched his arm from behind. “I’m glad to hear it,” an unexpected female voice said.

Nick spun around—and stared with shock into Edie Daley’s gray-green eyes. She linked her arm firmly through his and gave him a blinding smile. “Because I’ve just decided that I’d love to see those architectural renovations.”

NICK’S brows shot up. So did his heartbeat. And the spark of interest that had vanished when she had was back in spades.

But even as his libido was in favor of her suggestion, his brain was saying, Hang on a minute.

“Change your mind?” he asked her, careful not to sound too eager even though he damned well was.

Edie’s smile, if possible, grew brighter. “Yes.” Her voice was firm and clear. No hesitation at all. But he spotted a glitter in her eyes that he hadn’t seen before. And was that a bit of her sister’s desperation in her tone? He narrowed his gaze on her.

Her lashes flickered rapidly. Her smile amped up a bit more. Yes, this was desperation. And defiance, too. He could see that now. But exactly who or what had inspired it, he had no idea.

Carefully he let out a breath, drew another as he studied her from her flyaway hair to the tips of her stocking-clad toes. He wanted to take the stockings off those toes.

Would she let him?

Whatever was going on, taking her to his bedroom couldn’t be a bad thing. Could it?

Nick guessed he’d find out.

Putting his hand over hers, he smiled down at her. “By all means.” Then he turned to the blonde he’d danced with, the one who was still standing there and whom he’d completely forgotten about. “Thank you for the dance,” he said to her politely. “Good night.”

Then he laced Edie’s fingers through his and started to lead her back to where they’d first met.

“The door is that way.” Edie was practically dragging her feet.

“Shoes,” he said and dived beneath the table. The miserable things were still there. He grabbed them and rose again, then slanted Edie a glance.

“You don’t want to wear them, do you?”

She laughed, but it was a more brittle laugh than she’d shared with him before. Something had indeed happened. “I certainly don’t,” she said.

Nick tucked the shoes in his coat pockets so only the spiky mauve heels protruded. Then he offered her his arm. With no hesitation at all, Edie linked her arm through his and walked, head held high, along beside him, her bearing more regal than the queen of Mont Chamion.

Her posture was stiff and far more tense than when they’d danced, and she didn’t speak again. But Nick knew better than to ask about it now. Edie kept her gaze straight ahead until they had nearly reached the door.

Then, near the door they came upon Mona and the small but inevitable knot of men clustered around her. Edie barely glanced their way, but she turned her gaze on him, focused a melting smile right at him and fluttered her lashes.

Nick almost laughed. He did smile at raised brows on Mona’s face. There was a look of surprise and something else—consternation?—on Edie’s mother’s face. Whatever had sparked Edie’s return, it had something to do with her mother.

Or, Nick realized as Mona said something to the man standing next to her who was staring at Edie and frowning, did it have something to do with him?

He was about Nick’s age, fair-haired and handsome in a young Robert Redford sort of way. Familiar looking, but Nick couldn’t put a name on him.

An actor, no doubt. Actor friends of Demetrios’s were thick on the ground tonight.

This one transformed his frown into an engaging grin and stepped forward to intercept them as they approached. “Edie! Long time no see. I was so glad when Mona said you were here.”

Edie’s fingers tensed against his arm, but she smiled, too. “Not here for long,” she said, still moving. “We’re just leaving.”

“But we haven’t danced.”

She kept smiling, but Nick could see it was tight. “Nice to see you again, Kyle. Good night.”

“I’ll see you in the morning, then,” the man called Kyle said.

But they were already past him and headed toward the door when Edie said brightly to Nick in tones that were certainly loud enough to be overheard, “Which wing is your room in?”

Nick didn’t think he imagined the sound of several people sucking air behind them. His own brows arched, but he said cheerfully, “I’ll show you,” gave her a melting smile for good measure and held the door so she could sail through it ahead of him.

Only when the door closed behind them did Edie seem to sag. But almost at once she pulled herself up straight and tall again, and kept right on walking until they’d left the reception area totally and were in one of the long walnut-paneled corridors. There at last she stopped and took a deep breath, then looked up at him.

“Thank you,” she said, all her previous brightness gone. But the brittle tone had vanished, too.

Nick liked that. “My pleasure.” She looked pale suddenly and he said, “Do you need to sit down?”

She gave him a wan smile, but shook her head. “I’m all right.”

Still she looked rattled. Not at all like the Edie Daley who had come running to defend her baby sister. “What am I missing?” he asked her.

She looked down at her feet, then rubbed the bottom of one stocking-clad foot against the top of the other. They looked as vulnerable as she did. He wondered if she was going to deny that he was missing anything.

But at last she looked up at him and made a wry face. “My mother’s heavy-handed attempt at matchmaking, I fear.”

“The blond guy with the hundred-dollar haircut?”

Edie looked startled, then sighed and nodded. “Yes.”

“You’re not interested in him?” Nick was surprised how glad he was to hear it.

“No!” she said with a force that indicated more than indifference. She seemed to realize it because she muttered, “I’m not. I was just—I was afraid she’d try something like this.”

“She being your mother?”

Edie nodded.

“She often sets you up?”

“She hints.”

“And you don’t like that?” He supposed she had a right to dislike matchmaking relatives as much as he did. But most women he knew welcomed the meddling. “Matchmaking is a bad thing?”

“Yes, it is,” Edie said flatly. She didn’t elaborate at first, and he thought she was going to change the subject. But then she sighed, “She thinks I need to start dating again.”

“Again?” Nick prompted when she didn’t explain.

There was another pause, as if she were deciding how much to say. Finally she looked around, then back at him and said impatiently, “Where are these architectural renovations?”