To Have and to Hoax(70)

“Come, wife,” James said, taking Violet by the elbow and steering her away from the group before she quite seemed to realize what was happening.

“Let go of my elbow, you idiot,” she hissed, shaking off his touch as soon as they began their slow progress across the crowded room. “Have you taken leave of your senses?”

“No,” James said through gritted teeth, smiling at some of the curious glances being thrown at them as they walked. “But I’m wondering if you have.”

“I don’t know what you mean.”

James snuck a sideways glance at Violet; her head was held high, her voice as lofty as that of a queen. It was maddening.

And maddeningly attractive.

With some effort, he focused on the matter at hand. “I know you invited Lady Fitzwilliam here tonight, so you needn’t even pretend on that account.”

“I am flattered that you think I have so much sway over Lady Rocheford that I should be able to control the guest list at her ball.” Violet’s tone was sweet, innocent, but James was unmoved.

“All right,” he allowed. “But I don’t for a second believe it was a coincidence that we met her so soon after arriving.”

“James, we are at a ball. The entire point is to see and be seen.”

“Ah, yes,” James said mock thoughtfully. “And I could not help seeing that Lady Fitzwilliam was rather friendly this evening.”

“Perhaps she took pity on you and thought to offer you the gift of female companionship, since you made your interest so blatantly obvious yesterday.”

“It is strange that she seemed so patently disinterested in any sort of flirtation yesterday, and yet this evening seems to have had a change of heart,” he said icily, pausing as they reached the refreshment table. He poured a glass of lemonade so hastily that some of the liquid sloshed onto the white linen tablecloth. He thrust the glass at Violet, then poured another one for himself—despite the fact that, not being a debutante himself, he couldn’t recall ever having drunk the watered-down swill previously.

“Perhaps she had time to reconsider,” Violet said, taking a careful sip, her tongue darting out to catch a drop from the corner of her mouth. How was it that the small pink tip of a perfectly ordinary tongue could be so mesmerizing? James couldn’t tear his eyes away from it, nor could he ignore how desperately he wanted to be in close contact with that tongue once more.

“You’re a reasonably handsome man,” she added, “if one likes that sort of thing.”

This, at least, was enough to draw his attention. “ ‘That sort of thing’?” he inquired. Once he had poured a third glass of lemonade for Lady Fitzwilliam, they moved away from the table and began a slow circuit of the room, keeping close to the walls rather than taking the most direct path back across the dance floor, which was full of people milling about, as the orchestra was between sets.

“Oh, you know.” Violet waved an airy hand. “Tall. Dark. Handsome. It’s all right for some, I suppose, if you find that type terribly attractive.”

“But you don’t.”

“I’m afraid your charms have rather faded for me, James.”

He blinked. His charms had faded? It had to be simple male pride that accounted for the burst of indignation—indignation laced with some deeper, more potent emotion—that this statement provoked. “Perhaps it’s merely been too long since you’ve sampled them,” he managed.

“I don’t see how that can be true,” Violet said with a laugh—was it his imagination, or did that laugh sound slightly unsteady? “Or have you already forgotten our—er—encounter earlier this evening?”

James stopped dead in his tracks, forcing Violet to halt as well. All the teasing was gone from his voice as he said, “I’ve never forgotten anything about you, Violet. About us.”

She blinked up at him. “Oh.”

“Just so we are clear.”

She blinked again, and then her face resumed its expression of archness. “Well then, my point remains.”

“And which point was this?”

“That I’m not some girl of eighteen to be taken in by a handsome face and a few kisses.” She kept her voice low, smiling blandly at an acquaintance they passed.

“So you do find me handsome,” he said triumphantly. He tightened his grip on her arm.

She feigned disinterest—it was a decent charade, but he saw through it. At some point in the past fortnight, he had come to know her again—not in the way he once had, of course. But the part of him that had, from their first meeting, beat out a pulse of recognition had been awakened once more.

“The fact remains,” she said, sniffing, “that it takes more than a couple of improper kisses to turn my head these days.”

“Have my kisses been improper?”

Her cheeks heated under his gaze, and he mentally crowed. “They certainly have.”

“How so?” he pressed, enjoying himself thoroughly. “Is it not proper for a husband to kiss his wife in the sanctity of his own home?”

“Well—”

“Now, I will grant you, had I kissed you somewhere in public, that would have been improper.” He slowly drew her toward an alcove they were passing, shaded in part by a potted fern. “Had I led you into a dark corner of a crowded ballroom and pressed you against a wall, and kissed you with half the ton milling about a few feet away—that would have been improper.” He had reached the alcove in question and turned her to face him, edging her back into it and blocking her from view of the crowd. He leaned forward, and her chin tilted up, her breath quickening.