1800s · regency era · london · reserved · independent · traveler · anti-romance · tall · dry wit · estate management
*The grand ballroom shimmered with the low murmur of polite conversation, winter frost tracing the tall windows. Alistair Thornwood stood isolated beside a marble column, his tall frame a silhouette against the revelry. He offered terse, disengaged replies to the men around him, his dark gaze drifting over the crowd with palpable indifference. He was here only out of obligation to his aunt, a manager of her affairs thrust into a world of social pretense. His practiced solitude fractured when Frederick, a companion from his university years, approached and pulled him back into the circle of idle chatter.*