Page 18 of The Scholar's Key
“Ask me to dance,” she whispered, and he looked around, already assuming she was speaking to someone else.
“You want to dance with me?” he said when he didn’t see anyone about, and she rolled her eyes.
“Yes. Why else would I ask you? I need to speak to you.”
Ah, yes, the necklace. He had nearly forgotten about that.
The musicians struck up a waltz, and he held his hand out to Percy, leading her onto the floor, as a scent that reminded him of the cherry blossom orchard at his brother’s estate washed over him. He settled one hand on her waist, taking the other in his hand, as he attempted to remain unaffected at the heat of her palm against his through her gloves.
“Were you able to speak with Mrs. MacNall?” he asked, his eyes looking about the ballroom over her shoulder.
“I spoke with her,” she said with a sigh, her breath against his neck causing him to shiver. She was the perfect height in his arms, her head in line with the crook of his shoulders. “Unfortunately, it came to naught. She had no interest in speaking with me, let alone allowing me to see the necklace. However, I was able to come close enough to it to see the Spanish inscription. It is the necklace we are looking for, Mr. Rowley, I know it.”
“Call me Noah.”
“Pardon me?”
She leaned back away from him, her beautiful blue-green eyes searching his face. It rather disconcerted him, but he allowed her to do so as he also couldn’t look away from her.
“With our common goal and the time we are spending together, I am happy to have you call me by my first name,” he said.
Primarily, he wanted to hear it on her lips. He hoped his reasoning would be acceptable.
“Very well, Noah. You may call me Percy.”
“Do you prefer it to Persephone?”
“I do,” she said, looking up at him from beneath her dark lashes. “Persephone sounds so formal. And of course, it is difficult to say. When my brother was a child, he couldn’t say it, so he said Percy instead and the name has stayed with me ever since. Only my mother calls me Persephone.”
“Bringer of death.”
“Pardon me?”
“The name Persephone is Greek,” he explained. “It means bringer of death.”
“Lovely,” she said with an undercurrent of sarcasm, and he realized she didn’t appreciate his explanation but she couldn’t help herself.
“Actually, it is,” he said. “She was said to gently guide and comfort those descending to death. Interestingly, she personified duality, for while she was the wife of Hades, she was also the daughter of Zeus and Demeter, and was the goddess of regrowth, spring, and vegetation.”
“You are a man of much information.”
Noah took a step backward, his face warming as he had been caught up and said far more than he had meant to, as he often did. He cleared his throat and attempted a simpler tactic.
“Percy suits you.”
She beamed, and warmth blossomed from deep inside him that he was the one who had caused such a reaction.
“Now, Noah, I believe you have a much better chance of convincing Mrs. MacNall to show you the necklace. Also, do you know Lord Chesterham?”
“In passing.”
“Would you be able to speak with him? Ask him where he purchased the necklace? It must have been stolen and he then bought it for Mrs. MacNall. Unless she has another protector. Does a woman only have one at a time?”
She looked at Noah with such conviction in her eyes that he would be able to answer the question, but he hardly knew what to say.
“I-I wouldn’t know. I have never paid such a woman, nor do I have any close acquaintance with a man who has.”
“Oh.” Her lips formed a round pink circle. “I suppose that is commendable.”
