A Lady of Persuasion (The Wanton Dairymaid Trilogy #3)(4)

It was a simple plan, really. She would marry a lord. She would become a lady of influence. And then she would make the world a better place. One, two, three. But first she must get through this dance without disgracing herself completely. The task was proving easier conceived than accomplished.

“Right,” the man whispered as they crossed paths again.

Right? What did he mean, right? Now irritation bubbled inside her. There was nothing right about his presumptive behavior. There was most certainly nothing right about the surreptitious touch that glanced off the base of her spine— there. A firm brush just above her left hip that had her startling, quivering, pivoting …

Turning to the right.

“Then left,” he murmured. “Mind the feathers.”

Bel turned to her left, ducking to avoid a sudden onslaught of ostrich plumes as she circled a dour-faced matron. Her mind whirled. He was helping her through the dance. It wasn’t enough that he already had her intrigued, thrilled, angered, and just a little bit afraid. Now, to this stew of emotion inside her, he was adding gratitude.

He was making her like him.

“Now back,” he whispered. “Nicely done.”

Oh, this just became worse and worse. They stood at rest again, and Bel felt his gaze burning over her skin. In a desperate effort to discourage him, she lifted her chin and shot the handsome stranger a haughty, quelling look.

In return, the man winked. Winked!

More distressed than ever, she averted her eyes. She should have known it wouldn’t work. She had no talent whatever for haughtiness or quelling.

But she was an expert at following rules.

This dance had rules. A pattern. There was a right way to step, and a wrong way. The thought calmed her. If she adhered to the pattern, followed all the right steps, perhaps she could subdue this tempest of sensation within her—all these inconvenient feelings stirred by a gentleman whose name she did not even know and whose fine profile she would never forget, should she live to the age of ninety-four.

Bel squared her shoulders. I have a mission, she reminded herself as she took her brother’s hand and moved numbly through the pattern. Turning first left, then right, then releasing his hand to circle back round. I have a purpose, a cause.

“You have me utterly bewitched.”

The words set her trembling anew. How did the man keep passing so close to her, so indecently near, without drawing attention?

Bel looked to her brother, whose forehead was wrinkled with concentration. As Gray danced, his lips moved ever so slightly. One, two, three … He was too absorbed in the pattern to notice a thing.

Perhaps she ought to flee. Would it draw a great deal of attention, if she simply turned on her

heel and ran? She sighed. Of course it would. And as much as she hoped to draw society’s attention, she didn’t want to attract it that way. If she wanted to change the world, or even some small corner of it, these people must respect her and follow her example. Her comportment must be above reproach.

No, she could not flee. She must stay. She must follow the pattern of the dance. She must move toward this unnervingly handsome man and allow him to take her hand once again.

“Give me a word.” His hand slid up to clasp her arm just below the elbow. Just above her glove. His thumb stroked her bare flesh, and Bel quivered with exquisite fear. “One word.”

Together they halted in the center of the dance. His eyes held her captive, warm copper alloyed with insistent steel. His voice was low, for only her ears. “Forgive me, but there is something between us. Some force I can no better explain than resist. I am faint with it, feverish. Give me a word. Tell me you feel it, too.”

Bel made a feeble attempt to retract her arm, but his grip tightened, his thumb pressing against the racing pulse in the hollow of her elbow. She couldn’t think what to do. There were no more thoughts in her head, only riotous, mad sensation pounding in her blood.

“Do you? I beg of you, speak the truth.”

Her eyes squeezed shut. She was a good girl. A good, good girl.

She did not lie.

“Yes.”

CHAPTER TWO

“Then you belong with me.”

Toby slid one arm around his lady’s waist, grasped her other hand in his, and danced her right off the parquet, twirling her toward the row of glass-paned doors that opened onto the terrace. They were almost to the door when that oaf Grayson finally looked up from his feet and noticed his partner had gone missing. He scanned his immediate circle in vain. The dancers around him stopped, their bemusement certain to become amusement soon enough. With a laugh, Toby swept his temptress and her yards of green silk straight out into the night. Now there was a story the ton would remember, when the names Sir Toby Aldridge and Sir Benedict Grayson bumped against one another in conversation. Grayson might have eloped with Toby’s intended bride, but now Toby had stolen an admirer straight from Grayson’s own arms.

He could not call it complete revenge, but he could call it a solid beginning. And now, he could turn his attention to the gorgeous creature he held in his arms. Could it possibly have been just minutes he’d been yearning for this embrace? It felt like years. A lifetime. Or here, in this Greek-styled colonnade, he could imagine it an eternity. It was as though an enchantment had been cast around them, binding them together with some primeval, pagan magic.

“Remarkable,” he whispered.

She froze in his arms, though she made no attempt to pull away. The rush of cool night air surrounding them only emphasized the heat building between their bodies.