Page 24 of Never Second Guess a Lord
“Fabulous.” She eyed the crowd below. “Then a few more days it is.”
He had never heard sweeter words and vowed to make every moment count, starting with their entrance into the ballroom. Or so he had intended until he saw the wary look on her face.
“Are you all right, my lady?” He thanked a servant who delivered drinks. “You have grown quite pale.”
“I am.” Prudence took in the couples swirling by on the dance floor. “This is just…” She glanced at him uneasily. “It matters not.”
“It matters entirely.” He kept his arm wrapped with hers lest she swoon. “Would you prefer to leave? We do not need to—”
“No.” She inhaled deeply, squared her shoulders, and sipped from her champagne flute. “It is high time I face this again. That I see it in the here and now rather than what it once was.”
While curious what she meant, he nodded, sipped his own champagne, and let her go on if she so chose. Hoped she would. That she began to understand the only way beyond her past was through it. By remembering it, then letting it go.
And it just so happened she did.
“You see, balls like this became much dreaded as my marriage went on,” she said softly. While some might say the claret they enjoyed while touring had loosened her tongue, he knew better. Deep down, she needed to release this anguish and felt comfortable enough to do so with him. “I came to dread seeing my late husband dance with others because I knew…”
She need not say what she knew. He understood.
“I thought the heartbreak was the worst part,” she continued. “But it turned out the embarrassment was far worse. False friends gossiped and pitied me from behind their fans. Or perhaps they thought me a fool as there was a great deal of laughter too.”
He could just imagine how that must have felt. How it must have been knowing many of those women had likely bedded her husband. Something she need not say, but he saw on her face. In her eyes. A pain that came and went so quickly one had to be observant to catch it.
“Then might you dance with me instead of watching him dance with others?” He knew it was risky, but he set aside their drinks, bowed from the waist, and held out his hand. Spoke softly lest anyone overhear him. “Might you dance on your terms without others looking down on you? Pitying you? Because you are not to be pitied, Lady Barrington.” He shook his head. “Not then and certainly not now.”
She glanced from his hand to his face, not with fear but something akin to interest. Perhaps even determination. While he sensed she wanted to distance herself from this as much as he had wanted to distance himself from Elizabeth’s pianoforte, it seemed she was braver in the face of change than he because she slipped her hand into his. Better still, he could tell by the ease on her face she had not done it out of obligation to propriety but because she truly wanted to conquer her past.
While the music had initially been livelier, he could not help but note that the band switched to a waltz too swiftly to be a coincidence. To that end, he had little choice but to pull her close and swirl her onto the dance floor.
No choice but to lose himself in a way he never expected.
Chapter Nine
As Jacob swirledPrudence into a waltz that almost felt otherworldly, she finally understood what women meant when they claimed their feet never touched the floor upon dancing with a man. Where moments before, she had been painfully aware of everyone and lost in bad memories, everything vanished when in his arms. When lost in his eyes. Because it very much felt that way. As though she fell headfirst into Jacob’s chocolate, near-obsidian gaze. Tumbled until he caught her, and she floated.
As if her feet no longer touched the ground.
She had not danced in far too long and thought she would miss a step or two but did the opposite. Whether because he was an excellent dancer and she trusted his lead, or because being with him lent her confidence, she sailed over the floor.Theysailed as if they had been dancing together all their lives.
Though part of her was tempted to look at all those tittering women from her past hiding behind their fans, she could not pull her gaze from Jacob’s face if she tried. Could not glare into the past if she wanted to. Rather, she was completely immersed in the present. Aware only of his heat so close. The strength of his strong, graceful body but inches away.
It seemed he wanted to say something, perhaps reassure her all was well, but he appeared as incapable of speaking as her. As caught up in the moment. Entrenched in something that felt nowhere near platonic. Nowhere near where she had been determined to keep things.
“Nor should they be, dear sister,” Grace would say, her heart in her eyes. “Not when a man makes you feel like this. Because this is everything. What you deserve. What you have long deserved.”
“While that might be true,” her youngest sister, Abby, would argue, “Prudence has every reason to be wary. To keep things platonic with the Lord of Argyll.” She could almost see Abby notch her chin. “I know, too, considering my own loveless marriage. The prison it often feels like.” Her brows would shoot up. “So I say, why would anyone who suffered such seek anything but freedom and perhaps even adventure after that?”
Abby would make a good point, too. One Prudence should keep firmly at the forefront of her mind when it came to Jacob. And she tried, she really did, but it felt more and more impossible as they danced. Everything about him drew her in. Not just now, either, but every moment since she first walked downstairs.
From the second their gazes locked, she knew her time with him was nowhere near over. That in mind, she needed to rally her courage and apologize at last. For all of it. Not just incidents earlier today but for those from years ago. For causing him such trouble not just in society but in his marriage, because surely she must have. Truth be told, she owed him more of an apology than she had already given, and she fully intended to offer it in time.
Because therewouldbe time.
She would see to it because she enjoyed his company immensely. Enough that wherever fate took her next, she would want him in her life. She could not say to what extent, only that he was undoubtedly going to be her first real friend outside of her sisters.
As it happened, they did not just dance one waltz, but three in a row hardly realizing it. Eventually, however, they agreed refreshments were in order and retired to the adjoining room, where Maude waved them over with a wide smile. She stood with Lady Campbell, who smiled in turn.
“Oh, how divine you two looked dancing together.” Maude beamed at them. “I could hardly take my eyes off of you when I was in the ballroom.”
