And I shall not tell you the rest, for you will accuse me of being silly and romantic again.Nor would she tell him that her masked stranger was the reason she had not yet decided what to do about Noah. If there was still a chance that her champion might be found, she had to pursue it until all hope had vanished.
Of course, the ‘how’ of finding her shadowy champion continued to evade her.
“Who was he?” Edmund pressed, taking a step back and bowing to her.
Evidently, he was quite serious about them dancing together. A bewildering realization, for here was the gentleman who crowed about propriety and scorned her for the smallest misstep, determined to dance with her alone.
“Oh, he is of little importance,” she replied. “I did not like him very much, and I do not believe that he and I wanted the same things, so I would prefer to forget all about it.”
Edmund’s eyes pinched, and she could see him fighting off the urge to ask further questions. “You are supposed to curtsy,” he said thickly.
Rolling her eyes, she dipped into her most graceful, sweeping curtsy. “Really, Your Grace, this is not necessary. I feel more foolish than if I were to dance by myself.”
“Edmund,” he said.
“Pardon?”
“Call me “Edmund.” The formality is grating when I am already living in your family’s townhouse,” he replied, shocking her yet again.
Between his behavior at the dinner party, his fleeting smile in her direction in Amelia’s family drawing room, not running a mile when he heard that Isolde’s mother was away, and leading her into a most inappropriate dance, she was beginning to wonder if Edmund had been replaced with someone else. He assuredly was not the Edmund who Vincent had left in charge of her.
“Are you quite well?” She gaped at him. “Did you hit your head in your sleep, or is this some… trickery?”
Edmund put one arm across his waist and the other behind his back and turned in a slow, elegant circle, the movement highlighting his athletic physique: the broad shoulders, the height of him, the powerful arms, the sharp lines of his abdomen and the slight curve of his back.
“Trickery? Whatever do you mean?” he asked, returning to his original position.
Puffing out a strained breath, she echoed the movement. “You have not been acting at all like yourself, and it is starting to concern me gravely. So, I was just wondering what you have done with the real Edmund? Where have you put his sour face and clipped remarks? Where have you put his unshakeable sense of duty and propriety?”
“Do you want to enchant and inspire awe or not?” he replied more gruffly, more like the Edmund she was used to.
“I wouldliketo make it through the Season with my reputation intact,” she urged, shaking her head. “I mean, for goodness’ sake, why did you bring us close to the windows where anyone might look in and see? Doyouwant me to be embroiled in a scandal? Are you trying to sabotage me?”
He flinched at that, his gaze darkening. And as he hopped from foot to foot, she could not help feeling that there was a thrum of annoyance in his leaps.
“The drapes are closed,” he pointed out, as she performed the same hops to the left and right, landing gracefully back where she started.
“My point remains—what are you trying to achieve here, Edmund?” His name came easily to her tongue, though not without conjuring a flush in her face. Speaking his name madeher remember Beatrice’s grin the night before, when she had accidentally said it in public.
All of a sudden, he was right in front of her, grasping her hand and lifting it between them. He began to walk slowly in her circle, and though she knew she should break away from him, instinct and her ladylike education compelled her to turn with him.
“I am not trying to achieve anything other than your improvement on the dance floor,” he replied, his voice thick. “But I will say this, while I have your unwavering attention; you are right to be cautious about choosing the gentleman you will marry.”
He stopped and moved his hand around, curving his fingertips around her hand as he began to turn in the opposite direction. Stumbling over the abrupt change, Isolde ended up much closer to him than she had intended. Indeed, there was barely a finger’s length between them.
“I do not need you to validate my caution,” she mumbled, breathlessly aware of his broad chest and the muted scent of lavender that drifted from him, mingling with the comforting aroma of woodsmoke. A heady, somewhat familiar perfume, though she could not place it.
He halted, catching hold of her other hand, clasping both between them. His chest rose and fell rapidly as if he, too, were breathless, though they had only been dancing for a minute or two. He could not have been closer without embracing her.
She waited for the panic to strike her again, but in its place was a pleasant sort of shiver, partway between excitement and nerves. And with that feeling bristling in her veins, she looked up into Edmund’s eyes, daring him to make the next move in a dance she no longer knew.
“You are not listening,” he rasped, his grip loosening on her hands. “You never listen. I am trying to tell you that youdeservea man who is worthy of you, and being worthy of you is no simple matter. I doubt there are even five gentlemen in all of England who would be able to claim that title.”
Her breath caught in her throat as he lifted his hands to her face, cradling it gently as if he wanted to just hold her head there for a moment, to make sure she was hearing him. The trouble was, though the words made sense, she did not understand what it was he was trying to say to her.
“Might you point me in their direction?” she whispered, her hand gingerly coming to rest on his lapel.
He flinched as if she had punched him instead, a ripple of turmoil moving across his handsome face. His mouth made the faint shapes of words, but no sound came out, like he was rehearsing what he wanted to say first. And as he did so, she could not draw her attention away from his lips, wondering if they had always been so… appealing.
