Remember Love (Ravenswood #1)(87)

I thought it was the most romantic dance I had ever seen.

His sister was gazing at him with anxious eyes. And oh, how could he say no to her? How could he watch disappointment wipe that eager expression from her face? Had he really just been telling Gwyneth that he was incapable of love?

“I will take you, Steph,” he said. “I will learn the steps with you. But only so that I may waltz with you at the assembly. If a mere brother will be an acceptable partner, that is.”

“Oh, Dev,” she cried, and her eyes brightened with pleasure—or was it with tears? “Will you go too, Gwyneth? I was hoping, as a last resort, to be allowed to go with you if I could not persuade anyone here to take me.”

“I did learn the steps when I was in London,” Gwyneth admitted. “I was not allowed to dance them at a ball, though, and it was all of two years ago anyway. So yes, maybe I will go to Sidney Johnson’s tomorrow evening so I can remind myself. Perhaps I will even find a partner at the assembly.”

“Oh, of course you will,” Stephanie said, beaming. “Devlin will waltz with you if no one else asks, though I am sure everyone will. You will, will you not, Dev? There will surely be more than one waltz.”

“I will waltz with Devlin if he asks me,” Gwyneth said, and laughed—a sound of pure mischief.

Stephanie looked from one to the other of them, a suddenly arrested look on her face. “Where have you been?” she asked.

“Strolling along the poplar walk,” he told her. “And sitting in the summerhouse for a while.”

“Oh,” she said, looking between them again. “Well. I must go inside and find Mama. I will see you tomorrow evening, then, Gwyneth.” And she hurried off back to the front of the house.

Devlin gazed after her, a frown on his face. “The old Pippa would have been first in line to learn a new dance,” he said. “She would have been fairly bouncing in excited anticipation of an upcoming assembly. I have not heard her mention this one, and Steph does not seem to think it even worthwhile to ask her to go to Johnson’s tomorrow evening. She really is very badly hurt.”

“Yes,” Gwyneth said.

“And Stephanie is convinced no one will dance with her,” he said. “She is only fifteen, of course. But I seem to recall that young people her age were allowed to attend the assemblies and did. Is it her weight, Gwyneth?”

“I think that may be part of it,” she said.

“But she eats very sparingly,” he told her.

“I have an aunt in Wales,” she said, “who insists that she has only to look at food and her waist expands by two inches. For some people weight seems to have little to do with the amount they eat. But women often feel unattractive if they believe themselves to be fat. Or they are made to feel unattractive. Perhaps men too, though not quite as much, I believe.”

“I adore her, Gwyneth,” he said with a sigh—and realized that he really was allowing his tight grip upon his emotions to be loosened. But, God damn it all to hell, Pippa and Steph were his sisters.

“I know,” she said.

“I am going to need your help,” he said before realizing that he never needed anyone’s help. But she was going to be his countess and . . . Ah, hell.

“I know,” she said again.

The stable yard was deserted, Ben and Owen having long gone about their business elsewhere. Gwyneth and Devlin went inside the stables, where he saddled her horse, despite her insistence that she could do it herself, while a groom was saddling his. She put on her hat, and Devlin helped her to the sidesaddle and handed up her whip.

They rode to Cartref in a silence that was unexpectedly companionable. Though he did feel close to exhaustion, Devlin realized. It was something he had felt a number of times since his return to Ravenswood. It was surprising, really. His life on the Peninsula had been far busier, less comfortable, more strenuous, more dangerous. More full of anxiety. Though that one word gave him pause. There were numerous types of anxiety. It had been almost exclusively a physical thing when he was there. Here it was something quite different. Emotion was battering at him from all sides here, and the effort to keep it outside of himself while at the same time dealing with the issues that had caused it was fatiguing.

“Would it be better if I talked to your father tomorrow instead of now?” he asked her. “If I merely made an appointment with him today?”

“Yes,” she said. “I want to have time to be looking my best for this extraordinary marriage proposal you have promised me. And I think I want you to be looking your best too. And Dad will have time to prepare some impressive speech to deliver to you. Mam will have time to rise to the occasion. Idris will have time to hide.”

Was she laughing at him? He looked across at her. She was. Though not so much laughing in derision, perhaps, as bubbling with exuberance. She was feeling happy, God help him. And God help her. She was looking like the Gwyneth he remembered, though now he was the cause of that look and was not merely observing it from afar.

“I believe extraordinary was your word,” he said.

“But I will insist upon a very special marriage proposal,” she told him.

He wondered for a startled moment if she would always tease him. If she would refuse to allow him to take himself too seriously.

“Sir Ifor and Lady Rhys will not drive me from the door with a broom when I arrive tomorrow, then?” he asked her.