“You promised me a dance.”
“I’m not dressed for it.”
“Return to the Hestia and change, then—”
“I’m not coming back.”
“Mrs. Garrison will want to see you.”
“She’ll understand.” He pushed through the doors and into the ballroom. This time, he kept to the edges of the room, head hung low.
Isabella followed, catching him once more. “Is it because you do not know how to dance?”
His eyes flashed. “Will our lives be like this? You constantly doubting how well I fit into your world?”
She reared back. “N-no. I was only. Of course you know how to dance. Mrs. Garrison would insist, and…”
Something tight and itchy buzzed between them as her words trailed off. And when the confident chords of a waltz strummed to life, he grasped her hand, her waist, and swept her onto the dancefloor. The heady twirl floated her skirts out, and she relaxed into his arms, trusted his expert movements as the candlelight blazed above.
It seemed as if the world paused for them, the string quartet wavering, the conversations hushing, the dancers falling away.
She smiled, only a moment, before catching sight of Rowan, rock jawed and stiff, his eyes blank. She was alone in heaven, then, and her floating skirts sank back around her ankles.
“Are you hurting?” she asked, squeezing his shoulder.
“Not especially.”
“I am glad. Can you tell me how you did it?”
“I’ve a safe. He’d been keeping the letter there. I told him the safe was broken.”
She could put the rest together. She should have thought of a safe herself. He’d known, then, for quite some time, where the letter was. And he’d not told her. Just as he’d failed to tell her of his plan. What if something had happened to him?
To their right, a high laugh clashed with the tremble of a violin. It seemed perfectly aimed at her and Rowan.
“See over there.” She jutted her chin across the ballroom, in the opposite direction of the laugh. “Do you see the woman sleeping upright against the pillar? She is my Aunt Millicent. Before his death, she was a great correspondent with Lord Byron.”
“You’re lying.”
“Not at all. Apparently, she possesses a wicked mind the poet found fascinating.”
“She’s mad, bad, and dangerous to know?”
Isabella laughed. “You’d not think it to look at her, would you? She has never let disapproving voices keep her from acquaintances she wished to foster.”
More laughter to their left, hissing whispers, too. The rapid flutter of fans hiding mouths blurred as he spun her around.
He didn’t notice, not while he gazed at her, his mouth softening into a sweet curve. “You’re wearing flowers in your hair. What are they?”
“I wanted an Irish rose. I could not find one, though. The gardener gave me pink and white roses instead.”
He scowled. “No thorns?”
A couple dancing absentmindedly beside them backed away, their censorious attention a sledgehammer Isabella ignored.
“None.”
The hand around her waist disappeared, and his fingers gently grazed her temple before diving into her hair, stealing a pink rose. He put it in his jacket pocket.
