“Remind me never to dance after eight courses again,” Isolde said, grinning as she sat down next to Amelia on the pianoforte bench.
Her friend did not miss a single note of the music she had begun to play, her fingertips so deft and skilled that she could probably play blindfolded. “You make a very handsome pair. Is he pleasant?”
“Always such restrained questions,” Valery jumped in. “Give us the juicier gossip. What did you talk about? You seemed to be conversing for most of the dance. Did your heart flutter when he looked at you? He could not stop staring!”
Valery’s cousin, Beatrice, leaned over the main body of the pianoforte. “Everyone thinks that those pesky stomach butterflies are a sure sign of attraction, but one ought to consider the other times that one feels that way.”
“What do you mean?” Isolde raised her gaze to Beatrice: a beautiful, exciting, feisty creature who was as intimidating as she was fascinating, just as Valery had said she would be.
“Well, the feeling is almost identical to the bad kind of nerves one gets before an important event, and the feeling you sometimes get when something is not quite right, but you cannot pinpoint what is wrong,” Beatrice explained, jewels jangling on the bracelet that draped from her slender wrist.
Isolde pressed her hand to her stomach, as if she might feel those butterflies trying to free themselves. She had never thought of them as something unwelcome before, as her mother had always told her that they were a certain way of knowing if love could blossom.
“I am not sure that I felt butterflies,” she admitted in a low voice.
“Did you feel anything? A sense of calm, a sense of ‘rightness,’ a sense of complete ease?” Beatrice prompted.
Isolde frowned. “I confess, I was so occupied with the dancing and the talking, and not muddling either, that I do not believe I felt much of anything. But he is certainly the nicest gentleman I have encountered since my debut.”
The second nicest,she reminded herself although, if she was being honest, she had no notion of what her savior was like. He had rescued her, yes, but what if he was otherwise an awful person? What if he was cruel or unkind or rude? What if they met again, and he ruined the image she had of him in her mind?
“Are butterflies always something to be cautious about?” she asked Beatrice, who seemed rather worldly.
Beatrice shrugged. “It depends on the context.”
“So, if someone gave me butterflies, it mightnotbe a bad thing?” In the palace gardens, and whenever she had thought of it afterwards, Isolde’s stomach had definitely fluttered.
Beatrice leaned closer, her eyes flitting toward the middle of the room. “Is it that gentleman who claims to be your guardian?”
“What?” Isolde gasped. “Heavens, no! Why, if you knew us, you would realize that he is the very last person who could cause my stomach to flutter.”
Valery sighed. “He is so ridiculously handsome, though. When he was seated beside Amelia, I do not mind admitting that I was a little bit jealous.”
“There was no reason to be,” Amelia murmured as she continued to play for the new couples who had taken to the dance floor. “My brother has made it clear that he wants me to ‘enchant’ His Grace, but I have no interest in the man. Yes, he is handsome. Yes, he has been pleasant to me. Yes, he helped me in the park. But… he is not for me.”
Valery scoffed. “Whyever not? Any gentleman would be lucky to have you. Isolde could put in a good word for you if you asked; I am sure.”
The suggestion gave Isolde pause, for she had never considered that Edmund might find himself a wife before. Even before he went to the Continent for his grand tour, he had seemed disinterested in the idea.
She tried to imagine it: Edmund strolling around the park with a pretty wife upon his arm, dancing with her at balls, enjoying dinner parties at her side, making a home with her, but she could not get her brain to comply. In every vision that popped into her head, rather ridiculously,shewas the one in the role of Duchess.
“Isolde?” Valery prompted. “You would do that for Amelia, would you not?”
Amelia grimaced. “I do not want her to. As I have said, I have no interest in His Grace, despite what my brother wants for me. And I doubt His Grace has any interest in me, either.”
Puzzled by the sudden flurry of activity in her stomach, and the warmth that flooded her from her cheeks to her chest, Isolde twisted her head around to try and find Edmund in the room.
When she had started dancing with Noah, he had been at a table by the terrace doors. Now, he was nowhere to be seen.
“Well,” she said hesitantly, looking back at Amelia, “if you ever change your mind, do let me know. I would, of course, be happy to sing your praises to Edmund.”
Beatrice grinned at that, clicking her tongue. “Edmund, is it? You call one another by your names?”
The butterflies transformed into panicked moths, Isolde cursing herself for using his given name. In public, she rarely made such a mistake, and the more she attempted to explain herself, the more Beatrice would probably think she had something to hide.
“Did I say his name? Goodness, I did not mean to,” she said. “It must be the dancing; it has left me quite dizzy.”
She braced for Beatrice to press her, but she did not. Instead, Beatrice offered a sad sort of smile and stuck out her hand, saying, “Then let us be dizzy together, for I am in the mood to dance, but I amnotin the mood to dance with a gentleman.”
