Jenny kept her hand firmly on Kevin’s arm as he led her up the stairs to the assembly rooms, Martha right behind. She wasn’t sure what to expect of the fabled hall. Certainly the size of the crowd exceeded her expectations. Ladies in brilliant satin gowns far more daring than hers swirled about on the arms of their darkly clad escorts. Conversation buzzed like the drone of a hundred bees. Perfume clouded the air, or perhaps it was nerves dimming her senses. At least the plastered walls were set with statuary where a bluestocking might safely hide. Alcoves offered sofas where she might sit out the dances. The musicians were tuning up in their place above a door that likely led to the supper room—another place she might go unnoticed.

“You’re doing marvelously,” Kevin murmured, and all thoughts of escape fled in the warmth of his gaze.

Countess Lieven greeted them, dark eyes glittering like the diamonds at her throat. “Miss Welch, Mr. Whattling, good of you to come.”

“Thank you for the invitation, your ladyship,” Jenny said. “May I present my friend, Miss Tindale.”

Martha curtsied, pale and trembling at such an honor.

The countess inclined her head. “I believe your other friends have already arrived. Enjoy the evening.”

Friends? She could not imagine that she had many here, but as Kevin led her deeper into the room, Susan St. John hurried to meet them, emerald skirts fluttering.

“Would you have thought it?” she asked, color high. “Us, at Almack’s? It defies logic.” She turned to Kevin before Jenny could respond. “I understand I have you to thank for this miracle, Mr. Whattling.”

Jenny stared at him. He offered Susan a bow. “It was my great pleasure to suggest you and Lady Trevithan to the countess. Your beauty and wit would grace any event.”

Susan shook her head as she transferred her gaze to Jenny. “Is he always like this?”

“Yes,” Jenny said with no little awe. “He is.”

Even Martha was gaping, but at their surroundings or Kevin’s kindness, Jenny wasn’t sure. Kevin smiled as Susan gave Jenny’s arm a squeeze. “I saw Joanna a moment ago. Let me bring her to you.” She hurried off.

“Thank you,” Jenny murmured to Kevin, stepping closer to him.

He nodded. “I thought you might like reinforcements. Not that you need them tonight. I will have to fight the other gentlemen for the chance to dance with you.”

“No fighting,” Jenny teased. “Not tonight.”

He sobered, as if reminded of his challenge to Mr. Safton, and she wanted to call back the words. But he offered her his arm again, and she realized couples were gathering for the first set. She ought to wait for Susan and Joanna, but suddenly she wanted only him. Martha gave her an encouraging look as Kevin led her onto the floor.

The first was a country dance, the same one he had stood up with her for last fall. Had he told the musicians to play it? This time she resolved to be neither awkward nor tongue-tied.

She focused on the steps, acquitted herself well, even earned a smile or two from the other gentlemen with whom they partnered in the figures.

“I actually enjoyed that,” she marveled as Kevin led her from the floor.

“Your praise would swell my head if your presence hadn’t already swelled my heart,” he promised her.

“How is it you always know what to say?” she asked as they reached the wall. Martha, she noted, had ensconced herself in the dowager’s circle, where she was deep in conversation with another companion.

“I take my inspiration from my company,” he assured her. “I have never met anyone who didn’t appreciate sincere encouragement.”

And he was sincere. How easily he found things to admire about the people who approached them for conversation. He complimented this one’s sense of style, that one’s manner of address, another’s agility on the dance floor. Everyone grew more at ease in his company. Even her.

“I will not ask for your hand again so soon,” he murmured beside her as couples took the floor for the next set, Joanna on her husband’s arm and Susan with Mr. Witherspoon. “However, I hope you will save me a set later.”

Jenny laughed. “It will likely be the only other set I dance.”

“Miss Welch?”

Jenny turned to find a handsome man with hair nearly as gold as Kevin’s and sparkling green eyes standing beside her. He swept her a bow. “Might I have the honor of this dance?”

“Cheeky, Prestwick,” Kevin said when she stood there with her mouth hanging open. “Have you been introduced?”

He pressed a hand to the chest of his celestial blue waistcoat. “What gentleman does not know the most intelligent woman in London?”

Jenny still could not credit it. “Did you arrange this too?” she accused Kevin.

His brows shot up.

“Miss Welch, you wound me,” Mr. Prestwick said. “Can you not accept my offer as genuine?”

“No,” said another tall, lean, dark-haired man, elbowing Mr. Prestwick aside. “Because she’s about to accept mine. Miss Welch, I stood up with you last Season at the Baminger ball. Surely I acquitted myself well enough to warrant a repeat performance.”

“Lord Petersborough,” she acknowledged, remembering. She glanced between the two men, noting the eager looks, the pleasant smiles. They really wanted to dance with her. Her!

“I couldn’t possibly choose,” she said.

“I can,” Kevin said. He transferred her hand to Lord Petersborough’s arm. “Be a good sport, Prestwick, and let his lordship take a turn.”

Mr. Prestwick pouted, and his friend preened as he escorted Jenny out onto the floor.

If she had doubted their motives, the line of gentlemen importuning her for dances over the course of the evening disabused her of that notion. Even Kevin Whattling could have not convinced so many of them to wish her company. She sighted him with a dowager on his arm more than once; once with Martha, who alternated between blushing at the honor and paling at the company surrounding her; and once with Susan. She could hardly wait until it was her turn again.

“Enjoying yourself?” he asked as he led her forth at last.

“More than I had thought possible,” she answered.

He had gone to fetch her and Martha refreshments when Susan and Joanna joined them.

“What a crush,” Joanna said, waving her ivory fan. An alabaster-skinned beauty with raven hair and sparkling eyes, she had married last Season in June. “Everyone must have returned to town early this year.”

“Wait until Easter,” Susan predicted. “With Wellington’s victory last year, everyone will still be celebrating.”

“You have been much in demand,” Joanna said with a smile to Jenny. “I’m glad to see the gentlemen have finally realized your worth. Or should I say one gentleman in particular?”

Jenny’s cheeks heated.

“Who is that?” Susan asked with a nod toward the door.

An auburn-haired gentleman had just entered. He stood tall and stately in his regimentals, gaze sweeping the ballroom. Was it Jenny’s imagination that the look hesitated over Susan?

The countess met him as if fully intending to refuse him entrance at so late an hour, but his words to her made her pale, and she stepped aside.

“Sir Richard Collins,” Joanna supplied. “He’s something of a hero, according to Allister. He was wounded on the Peninsula.”

As they watched, he moved through the crowd, cane supporting one leg, until he drew up before a knot of older gentlemen. Jenny recognized Lord Hastings, Lord Petersborough’s father, in the center. Sir Richard bent and spoke into his lordship’s ear. Lord Hastings stiffened.

“Now, what do you suppose that is all about?” Susan wondered.

They didn’t have long to wait for an answer. Sir Richard and Lord Hastings had barely reached the countess, perhaps to take their leaves, when another man burst through the door.

“He’s free! Napoleon has escaped and is marching toward Paris!”

 

–

 

Kevin froze halfway back to Jenny’s side, hands tightening on the glasses of ratafia. Napoleon? Escaped? Would the war start again?

Cries rang out around the hall. Gentlemen rushed to reassure the ladies. The officers in attendance, so newly returned home, gathered as if for solidarity. Kevin strode to Jenny’s side.

Lord Trevithan beat him there. The dark-haired lord was also recently retired from Lord Hastings’s service. He bent to kiss his bride on the cheek.

“We stopped him once, we’ll stop him again,” he promised her.

Jenny nodded. “Well said. I only wish I knew a way to help.”

That was all Jenny—never content merely to learn. He had been so proud of her tonight. That pride only grew as she traded ideas for a moment with Trevithan.

“We’ll need more men,” his lordship concluded. “So many in France are still loyal to the Corsican. He’ll raise an army in no time.”

His wife put a hand on his arm. “Lord Hastings will want to talk to you.”

“With all who assisted him,” he said with a look to Kevin. Then he excused himself and his wife even as Miss Tindale joined the group.

Miss St. John was watching the door as Sir Richard and his lordship quit the room. “Will Sir Richard be called back too, even with his wound?”

Kevin could not tell her that the war hero had already made himself available to Lord Hastings. Likely he had been on duty at the War Office when word had arrived.

“Every man may be called upon in time of need,” Kevin allowed.

Jenny was watching him instead of the door. “Lord Trevithan made it sound as if you personally should be involved.”

Once he would have been the first to follow Lord Hastings out the door, as the officers were doing even now. His life had taken a different course. He had too much to risk. Handing Miss Tindale the glasses, he took Jenny’s hand in his. “I have served the War Office in the past. Now, other matters are more important.

“Surely not more important than stopping Napoleon,” Miss Tindale protested.

Kevin gazed down into Jenny’s hazel eyes. The blue and brown swirled together like the waters of the Thames at sunrise. “Far more important than any threat to the Empire or even the world. My honor and my love are at stake.”

Miss Tindale gasped, and Miss St. John applauded.

Jenny’s lips trembled, and he was sorely tempted to kiss her, right there in front of London’s finest. But she merely lay her hand over his.

“If Napoleon can escape, then anything is possible, sir, even the union of a bluestocking and a Corinthian.”