“Ready?” Lillian asked, bouncing slightly with eagerness that pulled him back to the present.
“Ready,” Edmund confirmed, though he felt anything but.
They began the sequence again, and immediately his awkwardness returned. Without Isadora’s grace to guide him, he moved like the soldier he’d been—all rigid precision without the fluidity that transformed steps into dance. Lillian followed gamely, but her confidence flagged as his stiffness communicated itself through their joined hands.
“Sorry,” she murmured when they nearly collided. “I’m not?—”
“You’re doing perfectly,” he assured her, forcing his attention to remain on his ward rather than the woman watching fromthe shadows. “The fault is mine. I’m rather out of practice at anything requiring grace.”
“That’s not true. You were lovely when dancing with Lady Isadora.”
The observation was delivered with the brutal honesty of youth, and Edmund felt heat climbing his neck. Had it been that obvious? Had Lillian witnessed the way he’d held Isadora, the hunger that had surely shown in his face during those moments when his guard had dropped completely?
They attempted another sequence, and this time disaster struck properly. Lillian stepped forward as Edmund moved back, and her foot came down squarely on his boot with enough force to make them both freeze.
“Oh no!” Her eyes widened and she slammed her hands over her mouth. “Uncle Edmund, I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean?—”
The apology died at once as Edmund began to laugh.
Though it started as a chuckle, it soon grew. His entire body shook with it, years of tension releasing in waves that left him breathless and somehow lighter than he’d felt since before James died.
“You should see your face,” he managed between gasps, one hand still holding Lillian’s while the other pressed against his chest as though he could contain the laughter physically.“As though you’d committed murder rather than simply demonstrating what I’ve been telling you—everyone makes mistakes when learning.”
Lillian stared at him for one suspended moment, her expression shifting from horror to wonder to something approaching delight. Then she began laughing too—bright giggles that transformed her entire bearing from frightened student into joyful child discovering that her fearsome guardian possessed actual humanity beneath his stern exterior.
They stood together in the center of the drawing room, laughing like fools over a misstep that would have earned sharp correction under any other circumstances. And Edmund felt something crack wide open in his chest—some wall he’d built so carefully around whatever remained of his capacity for joy.
When was the last time he’d laughed like this? Really laughed, with his entire body rather than just polite amusement? Before the duel, certainly. Before James’s blood had stained his hands and society had branded him dangerous.
Before he’d convinced himself that feeling anything was weakness.
From the corner where she’d retreated, Isadora watched with an expression that made Edmund’s breath catch despite his laughter. She was smiling—not the careful, diplomatic expression she employed for social occasions, but something genuine and warm that reached all the way to her eyes and transformed her entire face.
She’d witnessed his first true smile since James’s death. Had watched the Dangerous Duke transform into something approaching human through the simple act of dancing badly with his ward.
And the wonder in her eyes suggested she understood the significance of what she was seeing.
The laughter gradually subsided, leaving Edmund feeling wrung out and strangely peaceful. Lillian was still giggling softly, her hand in his, looking up at him with an expression he’d never seen directed his way—something that looked uncomfortably like affection.
“Again?” she asked hopefully. “I promise to aim for the floor this time rather than your feet.”
Edmund glanced toward Isadora, seeking permission or guidance or perhaps just wanting to see that warm smile directed his way. She nodded encouragingly, her eyes still holding that soft wonder that made his chest ache.
“Again,” he agreed, and this time when they moved through the steps, he found himself actually enjoying the process rather than merely enduring it.
And if his attention kept drifting toward the woman watching from the shadows, well. That was a complication he’d address later.
Or possibly never.
Probably never.
But for now—for this one stolen afternoon in a drawing room decorated with Christmas cheer—Edmund allowed himself to simply exist. To laugh with his ward, to meet his wife’s eyes across polished floors, to imagine that perhaps joy wasn’t entirely beyond his reach after all.
CHAPTER 19
“The pheasant is rather dry this year, wouldn’t you say?”
Edmund made some noncommittal sound that might have been agreement, his attention fixed on Isadora three seats down, rather than Lord Hartley’s tedious observations about the evening’s fare. She sat between Lady Fairfax and that insufferable bore Ashford, smiling with practiced grace that had become her armor against Yorkshire society’s endless curiosity.
