Page 174 of A Very Bellamy Christmas

Stacia didn’t need to ask who he meant.

“Have I mentioned how delectable you look with that hair and gown?” he murmured as he took her hands, and they made the promenade.

Stacia pretended not to hear him but suspected that her face was too flushed to be explained by exertion.

He chuckled, eyeing her with such open, obvious affection that it was difficult to pay attention to the steps and engage in flirtation—an activity she had no experience with, unlike Andrew, whom she had watched charm beautiful women times beyond counting.

Beautiful. All of them. Except you…

The words lacked the power to crush and shame her, as they usually would.

Instead, they brought to mind something else entirely. For some inexplicable reason, Stacia’s thoughts went to the scars on Shelton’s body, the mute evidence of all the brutalization his body had endured.

But suddenly she thought about all the injuries that were not visible, especially the one that had frightened him the most.

He had called it having his bell rung. Stacia had no idea what one of the big guns sounded like, but she had read first-hand accounts of Waterloo and they had been horrifying.

Shelton had stood next to one of those weapons of destruction when it had fired. And it had taken his hearing.

True, it had returned, but had that been the only damage?

Random conversations from the past days came back to her in a rush.

Andrew had not recalled the names of Lord Bellamy’s school friends—that was not so unusual as they were callow youths—nor had he seemed to remember Mr. Dixon.

But he had also forgotten Arabella Moore. Twice.

And she was beautiful.

Pieces of a puzzle that had niggled at her began to click into place, although many blank spots remained. Why did he remember some people, but not others?

“What are you thinking about?” Andrew asked when he next had an opportunity. “You have the oddest expression on your face.”

“Nothing,” she said, and forced a smile.

How often and how many people, places, and events did he forget?

She watched him laugh and smile and tease those around them—making even the duchess thaw—and her heart hurt to think of the pain and suffering his body and mind had endured.

Was Andrew even aware of the gaps in his memory? Had the damage really healed as he believed?

Or was he becoming worse?

“So serious,” he teased as they engaged in the final chasse and ended up side-by-side. He smiled down at her and then tucked her arm under his, keeping her close, and headed not toward Lady Addiscombe, but in the opposite direction.

“Where are we going?”

“It is too cold to walk outside, but Needham has lighted the gallery for strolling.”

She glanced anxiously in the countess’s direction.

“Just a moment or two,” he said. “Please, Stacia.”

“Just for a moment.” She suspected that the instant she returned to her employer’s side she would be sent on another errand, one that would last the rest of the evening, if not the rest of the house party.

Couples strolled arm in arm up and down the magnificent gallery, whose marquetry flooring was as much a work of art of all those hanging on the walls.

Andrew did not speak until they were at the far end of the hall and then he paused in front of a life-sized portrait of a blond man with a neatly trimmed van dyke and an extravagant mustache. The long dead Bellamy was wearing a rather unfortunate frockcoat of mustard yellow with high red heels and a jeweled buckle the size of a teacup.