A Lot Like a Lady (12 page)

Juliet touched the strands of pearls at her neck and smiled. They hadn’t fallen off.

“His grace’s gift might have been made for you,” Lady Charity said with a smile.

“They are lovely, aren’t they?” Juliet captured the chain that dangled in the front and ran it through her fingers. If only they
had
been made for her.

Well, they aren’t yours. They belong to Annabella. The duke likely thought he was just gifting his stepsister with some of the family jewels. Best you remember that, girl.

She sighed. But certainly it wouldn’t hurt to pretend… just for the evening. A kernel of longing settled in her heart. She no longer understood why Annabella hadn’t wanted to come to London. The duke had been quite kind — well, most of the time. Did Annabella not long for the parties and the dancing?

Juliet shifted in the straight-backed wooden chair, within a row of others that lined the long wall of the long assembly room. Ornate carved molding framed every archway in white. The heavy wooden doors had been flung wide and guests wandered in and out with ease. The gleam of hundreds of candles flickered against the walls, casting them in molten gold.

Juliet hadn't expected the evening to be filled with the murmur of sedate dinner conversation. But she had been completely unprepared for the clomp and stomp of so many feet leaping across the dance floor. From her seat, she had a limited view of the musicians fiddling and scraping in the balcony above the festivities. What she could see of the dance floor was even more limited as people strolled past or stopped to chat in front of her. She straightened and craned her neck to see around a young miss who stood giggling in front of her.

Charity tapped her on the arm with her folded fan. “Do sit back, dear. You resemble an ostrich stretching your neck so. And you look as though you are begging someone to ask you for a dance.”

Juliet snapped back into her seat and folded her hands in her lap, stung because she
had
wanted someone to notice her and request a dance. Everyone appeared to be having such fun and now that she knew how to dance — at least as well as some of the ladies here — she so longed to join in. So far two men had approached and her heart had quickened in anticipation. But then, for no apparent reason, both had veered off at the last minute, swerving to other young ladies seated nearby.

His grace was certainly making the rounds. He’d been in motion nearly from the moment they’d arrived. Juliet glowered at the petite dark-haired woman dancing across from him in the star formation, her hand clasped in his while her eyes shined at him. Her movements were graceful and she often arched her back when doing the crossover, shamelessly flaunting her ample cleavage at her dance partner.

A young man with nut brown hair and dark brown eyes caught her eye from across the room and smiled. James, he was… Lord Michaels, the Earl of… oh, dear she couldn’t recall, though his grace had introduced the two of them only an hour or so earlier. Lord Michaels strode purposefully in her direction and Juliet sat up straight, forcing herself to remain calm, though her heart pounded hard against her breast.

Her feet tingled with eagerness to step onto the dance floor for the first time with a dashing young nobleman, and her smile deepened as she anticipated his courtly bow. Her breaths came in short gasps and she concentrated on slowing them down. The gleam in his eyes sent chills up and down her arms.

Lord Michaels slowed his steps and he blinked. With but a few paces between them, the smile faded from his face and he blinked his eyes with what looked astonishingly like surprise. Confusion welled as his steps faltered, and then consternation rumbled through her when he stopped and turned to a girl who sat nearby, the one with the glorious auburn hair. Juliet’s heart sank. Perhaps Lord Michaels hadn’t been looking in her direction after all.

Had he noticed how eagerly she’d awaited his approach? Her face flamed. Well, if she couldn’t dance, she’d find the refreshments. Stiffening her spine, Juliet twisted toward Lady Charity, sitting beside her, and was shocked at her severe disapproving frown. But then it vanished so quickly, perhaps she’d imagined it.

Someone on the dance floor laughed, a delicate lilt that snapped her head around. The flirtatious lady dancing opposite the duke wasted no time playing the demure deb. Juliet swallowed the lump of hurt and something else she couldn’t define that had lodged in her throat.

What did you expect? He escorted you here. He never said he’d entertain you.

She closed her eyes as bitterness washed the back of her throat. She could have spent the evening curled up in the duke’s fine library. Why hadn’t she made another excuse to stay in? She didn’t belong with these people.

The music came to a stop. The dancers bowed, curtseyed, rearranged themselves on the floor, changed partners, or left to sit out the next. From midway across the room, Grey caught Juliet’s eye. He raised an eyebrow and started to saunter in her direction. Oh, what dreadful wrong had she committed now? A sudden chill settled into her bones and she pulled the pale blue wrap closer around her shoulders.

Why did he have to look so dashing in his dark tailcoat and breeches? The snow white cravat caressed his throat exactly where Juliet wished to touch him with her lips. Grey smiled and Juliet caught her breath, her face heating even though he could not possibly know what she had been thinking.

When he stood directly in front of her, Grey inclined his head in a slight bow. “My lady, are you not enjoying the ball?”

“I… why, ye—”

“No, she is
not
,” snapped Lady Charity. “When a young lady is escorted to a ball, she expects to dance.”

Grey started and his brow drew together. “Are you not receiving requests to dance?”

“And just who will be asking for her company on the dance floor, your grace?” Charity sniffed. “Since you have yet to take the lead and show ‘tis the right thing.”

His face blanched. Mortification heated Juliet’s cheeks. “Of course. Please accept my apologies. I seem to have forgotten my manners.” He bowed before her and offered his hand. “Will you do me the honor of sharing a dance?”

Juliet’s heart fluttered, seeming not to care that the duke had only asked her to dance at Charity’s irritated prodding.
If only he’d asked me because he wanted to.
“Of course, your grace,” she murmured, tamping down some of her excitement. Though she tried, she found herself unable to meet his eyes.

She reached up, placed her hand in his, and allowed him to draw her to her feet. As she followed him to the dance floor, Juliet whispered a prayer of thanks for the aunts’ insistence upon a new gown. The silk swirled around her legs and whispered across her ankles like a lover’s caress — or at least what she thought such a caress might feel like — but she didn’t trip on the hem.

Grey squeezed her hand lightly and a frisson of awareness raced through her. “Do you recall the steps?” he murmured with a glance at her feet.

She’d practiced every day since their lesson in the drawing room, at first with the aunts in attendance and then alone, until she could perform them with her eyes closed.

Juliet tilted her head and contemplated Grey with a sideling stare. “Do you fear for the safety of your feet, your grace?”

Grey tugged their hands and drew her close enough to whisper in her ear. “Well, now, that rather depends on whether you plan on aiming a kick my way.”

Juliet choked on her next breath. Heat rose from her neck and flooded her face. So much time had passed since their altercation at the livery, until he’d made mention during the dancing lesson, she’d convinced herself the kick must not have connected with his leg after all, and perhaps she’d imagined his howl of pain. And when he had brought it up, she’d apologized and then assumed he had forgiven her.

Apparently he had not.

“Y-your gr-grace, pl-please—” Juliet began to tremble so hard her voice shook.

With a smile, Grey ignored her stuttering and steered her to the position across from him for the contra dance. Juliet’s breath caught when Lord Michaels and the pretty auburn-haired girl took their place as the neighboring couple. Her heart kicked itself up into her throat.

Be still. He didn’t snub you. He was never looking to you in the first place.

Lord Michaels’ gaze lingered on Juliet’s a moment too long and he inclined his head in a gesture of acknowledgment that seemed to include both Juliet and Grey.

Before she could dwell upon the earl’s odd behavior, the music started and the four joined hands for circle left. After the first few moments, Juliet gave herself to the dance. The rest of the assembly room blurred into oblivion as she stepped and twirled, joined hands with her partner, then her neighbor, then dropped hands and fell back, stepped forward and clapped hands with her partner, switched places with the auburn-haired girl during the ladies’ chain, then found herself being swung around by her neighbor, Lord Michaels, before completing the ladies’ chain and returning to Grey.

As they swung into the crossover, Lord Michaels captured her hand and squeezed, sending her the smile of a hunter. He held on past the music’s cue to change partners, hampering Juliet’s rhythm. She shook her hand loose and quickened her step, then lunged into the next corner of the star, slipping her hand into Grey’s right on the note, a thrilling little musical victory for her. When Grey swung her around and directed her back across to their neighboring dancer, she didn’t want to turn loose of his hand. His touch sent tingles of responsiveness shooting through her, and the energy of the dance carried her away.

The music quickened and the room disappeared into a swirl of color and other bodies twirling about the floor. Just when she was certain she’d never be able to keep up the pace, the music reached a crescendo and then stopped. Amid applause, the dancers thanked one another. Following protocol, she lowered herself into a curtsey for Grey, the movement awkward since her legs wobbled.

When she surely would have tumbled forward, Grey captured her hand and offered support even as he bowed his thanks for the dance. His gaze captured her, as he regarded her with a half-smile lifting the corners of his mouth.

“Come. Let us see to some refreshment.” He tucked her hand into his elbow and led her toward the assembly room’s far end.

From the corner of her eye, Juliet caught the abrupt movement as Lord Michaels turned on his boot heel and stalked in the opposite direction.

****

“It all looks so wonderful, but I don’t think I can eat a thing,” she murmured.

“Nonsense.” Grey chose an apple puff and held it to Magpie’s lips. Her eyes went round, and she parted her lips without appearing to give it any thought, nibbling at the edge of the pastry. “You need to keep your strength up for the next dance.”

“Next dance?” She almost squeaked when she swallowed the bite she’d taken.

Grey held the pastry to her mouth again and smiled. “Of course. It’s customary to dance twice with each partner. Did your aunts not inform you that you might well go home with bloody feet?”

Her lips quirked upward. “I rather thought they meant my feet would be trampled during the dancing.”

Good, some of the tension gripping his magpie was beginning to ease. “I am quite certain you will experience a fair amount of being trampled tonight as well, depending upon who partners you next. Although…” He smiled. “I daresay a few well-aimed kicks will serve to keep your feet quite safe.”

The magpie’s face colored up and she hastily averted her gaze. “I’m sorry,” she mumbled.

Something seemed to click inside… near his heart. He reached out and cupped her chin in his fingers, grazing her lips with his thumb. “Don’t let my jesting distress you, Lady…” The mystery surrounding her arose to taunt, but Grey squashed it flat with a gulp of air. “We were both in the wrong that day.”

She took a half-step back. Her mouth might have fallen open had his fingers not still been supporting her chin. Grey caressed her lips once more before dropping his hand, and she sighed. She drove him close to madness with her nearness and this was neither the time nor the place for the thoughts and desires that taunted him.

“Excuse me, your grace.” That was Lord Ellicot’s voice at his elbow, a neighbor in town as well as in the country.

Grey turned with a smile of greeting. “Good evening, Ellicot.”

“Might I have a brief word with you?”

“Certainly.” He half bowed to Magpie. “Will you excuse me, please?”

She smiled but with that hesitant, birdlike nervousness she tended to. If he left her alone too long, she might try to take flight.

He led Henry Ellicott off to the side of the refreshment area, hoping the older man merely wanted to discuss arranging a business deal and nothing more.

“Who is the young lady?” Ellicott peered over Grey’s shoulder.

“My… stepsister, Lady Annabella Price.” Grey’s heartbeat quickened. He hadn’t considered that some of members of the peerage would know Regina and her daughter and might feel behooved to disabuse him of the notion that his stepsister was currently in residence at his London home.

“Is it?” Ellicott tore his gaze away from the little magpie with obvious reluctance. “
Hrmph
. I haven’t seen the child in quite some time. She’s grown into a beautiful young woman, hasn’t she?”

“Indeed she has.” Grey eased out a breath as his pulse slowed to a more reasonable pace. “What can I do for you, Ellicot?”

“Well, it’s about your man at Wyndham Green.” Lord Ellicott picked at the ruffle on his shirtsleeve. “It might be nothing. You know how servants talk sometimes.” He raised his eyes, revealing concern and perhaps censure in their depths. “But I wouldn’t be your friend if I didn't say something.”

A sense of foreboding splashed over Grey and his mouth went dry. “Dawes?”

“Yes, er… It seems your Mr. Dawes has been escorting the Duchess of Wyndham about, and he seems to be showing himself far more flush in the pockets than he has been in the past.” He cleared his throat but didn’t avert his gaze. “I suppose he could have come into some money… an inheritance or a reward for a job well done, perhaps?”

Grey’s jaw tightened.
Came into an inheritance indeed. Yes, no doubt he’s come into quite an inheritance. Mine.

“Thank you for informing me of this.” Grey concentrated on unclenching his jaw.
Nothing to be done about it tonight in any case.
“I will most certainly be seeing to the matter.”

“Thought you’d want to know,” said Lord Ellicott gruffly. “Of course, I will treat this knowledge with the utmost discretion.”

His mind whirling, Grey repeated his gratitude and excused himself. A note.
He’d express a note to Jon asking him to investigate. But quietly. If Sheridan Dawes was indeed collaborating with Regina in some scheme to part him from his inheritance, it would explain the discrepancy in the books. But how did Annabella fit into the puzzle? And what of the magpie who’d shown up in his stepsister’s place? Sometimes she seemed every bit the lady of breeding, carrying herself with flawless grace. But other times… what sort of lady climbed on the back of a horse without benefit of a saddle?

In the meantime, the next dance was setting up and he had every intention of partnering his “stepsister” for that one also.