“Me? Who is the one with their clothes half undone?”
“I didn’t do this on purpose.” She waved her hand at her gown, trying desperately to fix it, though she had no power to fuse material together. She tried to tie the strap instead to the bodice, but it simply looked much worse.
“Well, that’s better.”
“Your sarcasm is still not helping,” she snapped back. He raised a single eyebrow. Infuriatingly, it was an attractive look. It shifted his features into something that wasn’t so dark but was almost…mischievous.
What the hell am I thinking?
She shut down the thought at once and turned her back on him, the better to hide the problem with her dress.
“That won’t do. If you’re going to go back into the ballroom, you’ll need to do something better than that.” The Duke had suddenly rounded the rococo chair and stood before her, his dark figure overbearing in the apricot light of the candles.
“What are you doing?” she hissed as he took hold of the strap. “Oh…” She gasped.
He had at once pulled the strap free.
“You –” she was ready to throw all sorts of curses and insults at his head when she found him re-tying it in a different way.
“There, that is at least a little better, is it not?”
“Better?!” She looked down. She supposed it was marginally better. Though it was still obvious how torn her dress was. “Oh,this is hopeless.” She turned away from him and walked around the chair again. To her surprise, she heard footsteps and looked back to see he was following her, his gaze fixed on her shoulder. “What are you doing?”
“It still doesn’t look right. You’ll never get away with it like that.”
“You think!?”
“Now who’s one for sarcasm,” he muttered coolly, stopping and leaning against the back of the chair where he had been sitting.
“I’m well aware it will not work. All I need is for the dress to stay in place whilst I make it back to my room.”
“You’re not going to go back in?” His brows knitted together. “You’re Evelina’s sister, aren’t you?”
She blinked.
He knows who I am?
For some reason, this felt strange. It also made her stomach somersault, as if the organ had flipped around inside of her body. This dark man, this mysterious man who talked to few and sat in the shadows of every room, knew who she was.
“I am,” she said quickly, nodding.
“Then you’ll be missed if you don’t go back in.”
“They will not miss me.” She fiddled with the strap again. “Have you not read the scandal sheets?”
“I keep away from them on principle. My name is too often in there.”
“Likewise,” she muttered, then pulled on the frayed strap. A little more tore away.
“Oh, well that’s perfect.”
“You are not helping!”
“I tried to help, you made it worse.” He looked over his shoulder back at the door. For the first time, she saw full expression in his face.
A deep frown. He’s panicked we’ll be caught like this.
“Please, just go.” She threw a hand at the door. “Neither of us wish to be caught like this. Leave so I can try to fix this without being seen.”
