Clary reached the ballroom just in time to hear the tail end of Helen’s speech. She was compelling, as she always was when speaking of a cause she cared for passionately. One gentleman near the front of the gathered guests applauded with particular vigor. Tall, slim frame, wavy chocolate hair. When he turned to smile up at Helen, Clary recognized his chiseled jaw in profile.
Dr. Nathaniel Landau.
Clary pressed through the guests and drew up next to him. “I’m glad to see you this evening, Dr. Landau.”
“Miss Ruthven, I had no idea you were the sister of an earl.” Even as he spoke to her, he kept his gaze fixed on Helen. Like any besotted man should.
“I never expected to be, but my sister lost her heart to him and he to her.” Clary waved as Helen stepped from the small dais that had been placed at the ballroom’s edge for her to stand on while she spoke. “Perhaps you know how that feels, Doctor.”
The man finally cast his light brown gaze her way. “Perhaps I do,” he admitted, the faintest wash of color infusing his cheeks.
“Good.” Clary liked him, and any anxiety she’d felt about losing her best friend and comrade to marriage faded as she saw how the man’s gaze kept finding Helen in the crowd. He was well and truly smitten, and Helen deserved nothing less. “Be sure to dance the waltz with her.”
“Believe me, I intend to.”
Helen finally reached them, with Sally in tow. “How was my speech? Too strident? Too wordy? Did I mention everything I should have?”
“Perfect,” Clary and Nathan Landau assured at nearly the same time.
When the musicians began playing, the young doctor turned immediately to Helen. “Miss Fisk, thank you again for inviting me this evening. Would you do me the very great honor of dancing the quadrille with me?”
Helen swept a stray hair from her cheek and looked from Dr. Landau to Clary to Sally. “Perhaps you should partner Sally for this first dance.”
Beside her, Clary sensed Sally beginning to vibrate like a leaf in a strong breeze.
“Very well,” he said politely. “Shall we, Miss Sally?” He offered the girl his arm, but the disappointed look in his eyes was as clear as Sally’s giddy grin. He started toward the center of the ballroom where couples were taking their places for the dance, then paused to gaze at Helen over his shoulder. “The waltz, then, Miss Fisk?”
Clary nudged her friend’s arm.
“The waltz, Dr. Landau,” Helen said in a whispery tone.
When he’d departed with their student prancing behind him, Clary and Helen burst out in nervous laughter.
“I may actually get to dance this evening.” Helen folded the page of notes from her talk and began fanning herself. “And what about you? Where did you disappear to?”
“The library.”
“Were you so convinced we’d sit out this dance along the back wall that you actually went in search of reading material?” Helen peered quizzically at Clary. “The library couldn’t have been very exciting, so what happened to put that flush in your cheeks?” After glancing at couples performing the quadrille, Helen narrowed her gaze on one tall, bulky, black-haired dancer. “Did Mr. Adamson, by any chance, stumble into the library too?”
“I was the one who stumbled, straight into him, as luck would have it.” Clary licked her lips as she watched him, recalling the feel of his mouth on her skin. “I gave him a dancing lesson.”
Helen squinted at her and pushed up her glasses. “Is that a euphemism I’m not aware of?”
“No.” Clary chuckled and took Helen’s folded notes to fan her cheeks. “He followed me to the library and asked me to teach him to dance. That is all.”
“That is decidedly not all. I’ve known you too long to mistake that tremor in your lips. There’s something you’re not confessing.”
Clary bit her lip and forced her gaze anywhere but at Gabriel. She gestured toward the dance floor. “He brought Miss Morgan with him this evening.”
“I see.” Helen assessed the young lady. “She dances well. Blushes freely. Smiles at him a great deal. And yet he’s looking at you.”
He was. In between revolutions around the dance floor, and every time his body was positioned toward Clary, he looked toward where she stood at the side of the ballroom. Each time their gazes met, a tremor of awareness rippled through her, as if he’d reached out and touched her.
When the quadrille ended, the guests applauded before drifting to the edges of the ballroom to await the next set.
“You should ask him to dance,” Helen whispered.
“That’s not proper etiquette, Miss Fisk. You know as well as I do that gentlemen ask ladies, not the other way around.” Clary pointed to where Nathaniel Landau was wending through the guests with Sally at his side, coming to claim his waltz. “As Dr. Landau so admirably demonstrated earlier.”
“I’ve always loathed that part,” Helen admitted. “If ladies could invite gentlemen to dance, there would be no more wallflowers.”
“I thought we’d decided there were advantages to being a wallflower.”
“True,” Helen mused, “though I’m too tired for plotting this evening, and I’m afraid I couldn’t concentrate on Euclid if I tried.” Her eyes fixed on Dr. Landau as he drew up beside her.
It was abundantly clear what Helen was focused on, and Clary couldn’t blame her. A moment later, the handsome doctor swept her away to prepare for the waltz. Sally swayed, unable to keep herself still, at Clary’s side.
“I wish I could dance every day.” Sally grinned at her. “Won’t you partner with anyone this evening, Miss Ruthven?”
“No one has asked me yet.”
The girl cast her gaze around the room and stopped at the only other man she’d met before. “Why not that gentleman who came to the school and stopped Mr. Keene? He did us both a good deed that day.” Sally shivered, as she often did when referring to the man who refused to let her be, despite her repeated rebuff of his advances.
“I happen to know that Mr. Adamson is not skilled at dancing. He may not know how to waltz.”
“But it’s the easiest dance ever. It’s just a lot of twirling and stepping.” She demonstrated by dancing the waltz box pattern and spinning at Clary’s side. “You could teach him.”
Clary pressed the back of her hand to her overheated cheeks. “I needn’t dance tonight, Sally.”
“Miss Ruthven.” A soft voice came from behind.
Clary stood and turned toward the sound. Miss Morgan approached. Alone.
“I came to offer you a word of thanks, Miss Ruthven.”
“Oh? For what?” Clary’s pulse began fluttering in her throat, and her nervousness did nothing to cool the heat in her cheeks. She scanned the room, but Gabriel Adamson was nowhere to be seen.
“For teaching Mr. Adamson to dance the quadrille.”
“He told you that?”
“Indeed. He spoke of little else as we danced.” Miss Morgan looked toward the corner of the room.
Gabriel had returned to the ballroom. Clary tried not to stare.
“Mr. Adamson and I are longtime friends, Miss Ruthven. He knew my father, who considered him the son he never had. When Papa died, it was only natural that Gabriel and I continue as acquaintances. I’m very fond of his sister too.”
If the lady had come to tell her details about Gabriel’s history, Clary was all too eager to listen. But if Miss Morgan had come to brag of their connection, Clary wasn’t sure how much more she wished to hear.
“What I mean to say is that I sense how much he wishes to dance with you, and I hope you will accept his invitation.” She peered down at the program folded in her hand. “Another waltz comes soon. That is a rather facile dance.”
Also the one requiring partners to stand the closest. Clary shifted on her slippers. “Thank you for coming to speak to me, Miss Morgan. However, Mr. Adamson hasn’t asked me to dance. Until he does, I shall await another partner.” Not that she expected one to appear. Though she suspected Helen would urge Dr. Landau to take the same pity on her as he’d shown Sally.
“For his sake,” Jane Morgan leaned in and whispered near Clary’s ear, “I shall offer him a bit of encouragement.”
Gabe escaped the heat of the ballroom and strode into the Stanhope’s high-ceilinged main hall. The air smelled of roses, and he spun around, expecting to find Clary nearby. Disappointment welled up when he saw only footmen preparing to dispense refreshments and a cluster of maids watching at the threshold as the guests danced.
Striding forward, he swiped a champagne flute from a footman’s tray and downed the fizzy sweetness in one swallow. Sweet and fizzy. Champagne and Clary Ruthven had a good deal in common. He reached for another glass, tipping it back so quickly, a bit dribbled onto his rented suit.
“Are you trying to drown yourself in it or just get soused?” The feminine voice emanated from near a potted palm in the long hall.
He knew that voice, and he knew he shouldn’t seek her in a spot where others couldn’t see them. Not that he wanted anyone to see what he wished to do with her, but he had no desire to risk her reputation or his job.
“Come here,” she insisted. “I need to speak to you.”
His hesitation was so momentary it could hardly be called hesitation at all. “Yes, Miss Ruthven? What did you wish to speak to me about?”
A hand shot out and gripped the lapel of his jacket. She pulled him toward her, behind the leafy foliage.
“Miss Morgan says you spoke to her of me.”
He frowned. He expected Jane Morgan to be a bit more discreet and a bit less eager to play matchmaker. “I told her that you instructed me in dancing the quadrille.”
“Nice of you to acknowledge my assistance.”
“No, it wasn’t.” Nice. He didn’t wish her to think him nice. Nothing he’d done in his life was nice, and nothing he wanted to do when she was near was nice either. “Perhaps I simply wanted you to get the blame if I stepped on her toes.”
“Did you?”
“Step on her toes? Thankfully, no.” He looked down, where her fingers were still curved around his lapel, and then at her mouth. He licked his lips, longing to taste her again. He lifted his glass between them. “Do you like champagne?”
“I do.” Without any hesitation, she took his flute and downed the rest. She shivered and smiled up at him. “I love the bubbles.”
He loved her smiles and how freely she gave them.
“I would ask you to dance, but I don’t know how to perform any of the other sets.”
“Ah,” she said, tugging at his lapel. “That is the matter I wished to speak to you about.” Releasing his jacket and scooting out from behind the palm, she crooked a finger and said, “Come with me.”
He’d never received a more innocent, erotic, enticing invitation in his life. And he knew with bone-deep certainty that if he took the next step and followed her, there would be no going back. Not just tonight. But every night after. He wanted her. If he followed her, he’d snap his thread of self-restraint and touch her again. Taste her again.
“I thought I’d show you how to waltz, and then wait to see if you ask me to dance the next one with you.” Her laughter had a musical quality that echoed in his chest.
He followed as she led him into the drawing room he’d entered with Jane when they arrived. Empty now but for the detritus of discarded cordial glasses and teacups.
“I think we’ll have enough room here.” In the space between the fireplace and the settee, she spun in a circle, causing the hem of her gown to flutter up, much as it had that day he’d seen her storming out of Fisk Academy with a mallet in her hand. She lifted a hand out to him. “Dancers get a little closer for the waltz.”
Striding toward her, Gabe shouted at himself to go slow. To behave like the gentleman he’d trained himself to be.
Gloveless fingers on him, she slid a hand down his arm until their palms were flat against each other. Their fingers threaded together. She came closer, guiding his arm around her waist.
Gabe hissed at the feel of her body against him. The quadrille hadn’t felt like this, and he was grateful he’d chosen that dance rather than this one to partner Jane. “What comes next?” He gazed at her mouth and wished more kissing was on the agenda.
“We move in a box pattern.” She moved closer, her left hand braced on his arm. “Just follow my lead. At least for now.” She slid one foot over and then other, then the same foot back, followed by the other. Then over again, back again. A box shape, just as she’d described. “Excellent,” she praised, and he hated the thrill of pleasure the single word spun through him. “Except once you’ve gotten the steps down, you should keep your head up, eyes on me.”
“That won’t be difficult.”
She tripped, her lips parted, shock widening her eyes. Mercy, did the lady truly not know how appealing she was?
“The real trick,” she said in a quavering voice, “is weaving along with the other couples.”
But there weren’t any other couples in the drawing room. Only him. Only her. The settee in the periphery of his vision taunted him. How easy it would be to lead her back, lay her back, and continue what they’d started in the library.
He stumbled, and she squeezed his arm tightly.
“You’re distracted,” she chastised. “Perhaps we should stop and rejoin the others.”
“I was thinking of you.” He glanced at their joined hands. She hadn’t put her gloves back on, and he loved that her heat was warming his palm. “Remembering your hands on me.” He licked his lips when hers parted, her breath rushing out to tickle his face. “Remembering our kiss. Wishing we could pick up where we’d left off.”
He brought their joined hands to his mouth, pressed a kiss to the back of her fingers. Warning bells raged in his head. He’d silenced his conscience all those years in Rigg’s employ, but the voice was stronger now. Yet he couldn’t stop kissing her, pressing his lips to her hand, her wrist. She responded, lifting a finger to trace the shape of his mouth. When she slid gently along the seam, he took her fingertip between his teeth. She tasted of vanilla and cinnamon, as if she’d just pulled her hand from a biscuit jar.
Running her finger across a jagged line near his mouth, she traced an old scar. “Tell me how you got this.”
The spell was broken. Even the slight buzz of champagne couldn’t keep reality at bay. He was a scarred, twisted man, and she was lovely and good and everything he could never deserve.
He looked around him to ground himself. Gazing into her eyes, holding her in his arms, he’d forgotten who he was. Who she was. That he stood sucking her finger in her own brother’s home. The brother who paid his wages and could decide to sack him without a second thought.
“We should go back to the ballroom,” he said, though each word was painful to get out, as if he didn’t have enough breath for any of them.
She stilled as she had in the library. Frozen in frustration and disappointment. “Very well, Mr. Adamson.” Without waiting for him, she rushed for the door. “Tell Miss Morgan there’s no need to thank me this time.”
“For what?”
“For the moment when you take her into your arms for the next dance.”
“And if I ask you instead?” He shouldn’t. He couldn’t. But he wanted to. Desperately.
“I’d say no.”