Ford frowned. That wasn't what he was asking, exactly. What he was really asking was did you mean it, but he was trying to ask without coming right out and saying the words, and Macnair kept answering his questions in ways that didn't really get at what he wanted to know. He'd had a chance to ask about it directly earlier, right after Macnair had said I can't, and he'd thrown it away by trying to run out instead of digging in. It would probably be better if he just followed through on that initial instinct and went back to the ballroom, but now that he'd started sort-of hinting at that question he thought going back to the party without knowing the answer would drive him crazy.

But Macnair probably wasn't going to just come out and say it any more explicitly than he already had, if he was feeling the same way Ford was. Ford hadn't had any plans to be explicit about it, until the moment those words had left his mouth Saturday night. If their positions were reversed, if Macnair had made an admission and was now trying to draw a similar one out of Ford on nothing more than a hunch (or maybe a hope), would it have worked?

And even if he did get the admission he was after, what happened next? Ford still didn't know.

He shifted his weight and glanced towards the ballroom door. "I'll probably have to flirt with a few of the ladies," he pointed out. At least, if he could hold himself together well enough to do more than just stare across the room at Macnair and Miss Lestrange for the whole event. Ford's eyes found Macnair's face as he continued, "I probably ought to be off flirting with a few of them now."

He made no move to leave. His eyes swept over the foyer: the front doors, the coat check closet, the staircase up to the balcony. No where to go, he thought, without knowing why he was looking.

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