by Mary Balogh
He arrived late. It was perhaps not a wise thing to do when time was of the very essence, but earlier in the evening he had acquired cold feet—the almost inevitable consequence of having been forced to wait more than twenty-four hours to begin implementing his search—and had stayed at White’s long after he had finished his dinner and his companions had left to go about their evening business, some of them to attend this very ball. He might have come with them and hoped to enter the ballroom almost unnoticed. Instead he had stayed to fortify himself with another glass of port—only to discover that fortification had demanded several more glasses of port than just one.
He did not have an invitation to the ball, but he did not fear being turned away—not after a few glasses of port, anyway. He was, after all, the Earl of Sheringford. And if anyone remembered the rather spectacular scandal of five years ago, as everyone surely would—well, they would undoubtedly be avid with curiosity to discover what had become of him in the intervening years and how he would behave now that he was back.
Duncan wondered suddenly if any of the Turners were in town this year, and fervently hoped not. It would not be a comfortable thing to come face to face with Randolph Turner in particular—the man he had cuckolded.
He was not turned away from the ball. But of course he had arrived late enough that there was no longer any sign of a receiving line or even of a majordomo to announce him. He stepped into the ballroom, having left his hat and cloak downstairs in the care of a footman, and looked about him.
He felt very much on display and half expected that after all there would be a rush of outraged persons, led by ladies, to expel him into outer darkness. It did not happen, though undoubtedly he was attracting some attention. He could hear a slightly heightened buzz of sound off to his right.
He ignored it.
It was indeed a squeeze of a ball. If everyone decided to dance, they would have to push out the walls. And if everyone decided to rush him… Well, he would be squashed as flat as a pancake.
He had arrived between sets, but couples were gathering on the floor for the next one. Good! He would be able to view the matrimonial prospects at his leisure provided that buzz of interest to his right did not develop into a swell of outrage to fill the ballroom.
He could see Con Huxtable and a few other male acquaintances some distance away, but he made no move to join them. He would become too involved in conversation if he did and perhaps allow himself to be borne off to the card room. He would be willing enough, by God. He could feel his mood turn bleaker and blacker with every passing second. This ought not to be happening.
He had not planned to go wife hunting yet—or perhaps ever. He had certainly not planned to come to London any year soon.
How the devil was he to begin?
There were pretty women and plain ones, young ones and old ones, animated ones and listless ones—that last group being the wallflowers, he suspected. Most of them, indeed, were still standing on the sidelines, nary a partner in sight though the dancing was about to resume. He should probably concentrate his attention upon them.
It was one devil of a way to choose a bride! Pick the most bored-looking wallflower and offer to brighten her life. Offer her marriage with a man who had abandoned his last bride almost literally at the altar in order to run off with her married sister-in-law and live in sin with her for almost five years. A man who had no wish whatsoever to marry but was being forced into it by the threat of penury. A man who no longer believed in romantic love and had never practiced fidelity. A man with an illegitimate child he refused to hide away in some dark corner of the country.
He had fixed his narrowed gaze upon a mousy-haired young girl who, if his eyes did not deceive him from this distance, had a flat chest and a bad case of facial spots, and who was beginning to notice his scrutiny and look decidedly frightened by it, when he was distracted.
A missile almost bowled him off his feet—something hurled his way in order to expel him after all, perhaps?
He clamped his hands about the two arms of the missile in order to save himself from landing flat on his back—what a spectacular reentry into society that would be!—and realized that it was a human missile.
A female human, to be exact.
Very female.
She was all generously sized breasts and delicious curves and subtly fragrant dark hair. And when she tipped back her head to apologize, she revealed a face that did the body full justice, by thunder. She had wide eyes and a porcelain complexion and features that had been arranged on her face for maximum effect. She was loveliness personified from head to toe.
He held her against him longer than was necessary—and far longer than was wise in such a public setting, when his sudden appearance was already provoking attention. But she would surely fall over if he released her too soon, he reasoned.
She had long legs—he could feel them against his own.
She was beautiful and voluptuous—and pressed by some happy chance to his body. Could any warmblooded male ask for more? Privacy and nakedness and a soft bed, perhaps?
The only negative thing that could be said about her—on the spur of the moment anyway—was that she was not young. She was probably his own age, give or take a couple of years. That was not at all young for a woman. She was undoubtedly married, then. She must have been snaffled up off the marriage mart ten or twelve years ago. She probably had half a dozen children. A pity that. But fate was ever a joker. He must not expect his search to be this easily or happily concluded.
There was no ring on the left hand that was splayed over his chest, though, he noticed.
All of which thoughts and observations flashed through his head in a matter of moments.
“Excuse me,” she said, flushing and looking even more beautiful, if that were possible.
She was pushing at his chest. Trying to get away.
There was no harm in being hopeful, was there?
“Why?” he asked her. “What is your hurry? Why not stay and dance with me? And then marry me and live happily ever after with me?”
He felt her body grow still and watched the arrested look on her face. Then her eyebrows arched above her eyes—and even they were lovely. It was no wonder some poets wrote poems to their ladies’ eyebrows.
“Does it have to be in that order?” she asked him.
Ah. An intriguing answer indeed. An answer in the form of a question.
Duncan pursed his lips.
She had bowled him over after all—and rendered him temporarily speechless.
4
MARGARET almost laughed, though more with hysteria than with amusement.
What had he said?
And what had she answered?
Gracious heaven, he was a total stranger, and not a very reputable-looking one at that. Was anyone observing them? Whatever would they think?
His hands had loosened their hold on her arms though they still remained there. She could have broken away quite easily and hurried on her way out of the ballroom. Instead she looked up at him and waited to see what he would say next.
He had pursed his lips, and his very dark eyes—surely they could not be literally black?—gazed steadily and boldly back at her.
He appeared to be quite alone. Some instinct told Margaret that he was not the sort of man with whom she ought to be talking, especially without a formal introduction. But here she was standing very close to him, her hands splayed on his chest, his clasping the bare flesh of her upper arms between her sleeves and her gloves. And they had been standing thus for more seconds than any ordinary collision ought to have occasioned. They ought to have sprung apart, both embarrassed and both apologizing profusely.
Oh, goodness.
She pushed at his chest again and, when he still did not release his hold on her arms, she dropped her own to her sides. Her back prickled. Half the ton was somewhere behind her. Including her family. And including Crispin Dew. And the Marquess of Allingham.
“I am afraid it does,�
� the stranger said at last in answer to her question. “If I dash off immediately in pursuit of a special license, you see, and then someone to perform the ceremony, this particular set will surely be over by the time I return. And someone else will have discovered you and eloped to Scotland with you and left me clutching a useless document. If we are to both dance and marry, it must be done in that order, I am afraid—much as I am flattered by your eagerness to proceed to the nuptials without further delay.”
How very outrageous he was, whoever he might be. Margaret ought not to have laughed—she ought to have been offended by the levity of his words, absurd and quick-witted though they were.
But she laughed.
He did not. He gazed intently at her and dropped his hands to his sides at last.
“Dance with me now,” he said, “and tomorrow morning I will procure that special license. It is a promise.”
It was a strange joke. Yet he showed no sign of finding it amusing. Margaret found herself shivering slightly despite the fact that the smile lingered on her face.
She really ought to run from him as fast as her feet would carry her and keep the whole width or length of the ballroom between them for the rest of the evening. Her own words had been very indiscreet. Does it have to be in that order? Had she really spoken them aloud? But his answer, alas, proved that she had.
Who on earth was he? She had never set eyes on him before tonight. She was sure of that.
She did not run.
“Thank you, sir,” she said instead. “I will dance with you.”
It would be better to do that than run away simply because the Marquess of Allingham, whose hand she had refused three separate times, had chosen to betroth himself to someone else. And because Crispin was at the ball, and she had told him she was betrothed.
The stranger inclined his head and offered his arm to lead her out to join the other dancers. It surprised Margaret to discover that the dancing had still not begun. That collision and the bizarre exchange of words that had followed it must all have happened within a minute or two at the longest.
The arm beneath her hand was very solid indeed, she noticed. She also noticed as she walked beside him that her initial impression of his physique had not been mistaken. His black evening coat molded a powerful frame like a second skin. His long legs looked equally well muscled. He was taller than she by several inches, though she was a tall woman. And then there was that harsh, dark, almost ugly face.
It struck her that he might be a frightening adversary.
“It occurs to me,” he said, “that if I am to be granted a special license tomorrow, I ought to know the name of my bride. And her place of residence. It would be mildly irritating to pry myself away from my bed at some ungodly hour of the morning only to have my application denied on account of my inability to name my bride or explain where she lives.”
Oh, the absurd man. He was going to continue with the joke, though his grim face had not relaxed into even the suggestion of a smile.
“I suppose it would,” she agreed.
The orchestra struck up with a lively country dance tune at that moment, and after a short spell of dancing together they moved away from each other in order to perform a series of steps with the couple adjacent to them. When they came together again, it was with the same couple, and there was no chance for private conversation, absurd or otherwise.
This was really very improper, Margaret thought. As he had just reminded her, he did not know her and she did not know him. Yet they were dancing with each other. How on earth would she explain the lapse to Vanessa and Katherine? Or to Stephen? She had always been a stickler for the social niceties.
But she discovered that she did not much care. She was almost enjoying herself. The marquess’s announcement—and his assumption that she already knew—had seriously discomposed her. So had the appearance of Crispin. But here she was dancing and smiling anyway. And there was something definitely amusing about the joke the stranger had set in motion.
How many ladies could boast of meeting a total stranger and being asked to dance with him and marry him—all in one breath?
Her smile widened.
“Might I be permitted,” the stranger asked her when they were dancing exclusively with each other again, “to know the name of my prospective bride?”
She was tempted to withhold it. But that would be pointless. He could quite easily discover it for himself after they had finished dancing.
“I am Margaret Huxtable,” she told him, “sister of the Earl of Merton.”
“Ah, excellent,” he said. “It is important to marry someone of impeccable lineage—important to one’s family anyway.”
“Absolutely, sir,” she agreed. “And you are… ?”
But she had to wait another couple of minutes while the pattern of the dance drew other couples within earshot again.
“Duncan Pennethorne, Earl of Sheringford,” he said without preamble when they were alone again. “The title, I must warn you before you get too excited about marrying it, is a courtesy one and therefore of no real value whatsoever except that it sounds good—and except that it is an indicator that a more real and illustrious title is to follow if and when the incumbent should predecease me. The Marquess of Claverbrook, my grandfather, may well not do so even though he is eighty—or will be in two weeks’ time—and fifty years my senior.”
He had offered a great deal more information than she had asked for. But it was surprising she had not met him before. And yet… the Earl of Sheringford. Something tugged at the corners of her memory, but she could not pull it into focus. She had the impression that it was something not too pleasant. Something scandalous.
“And where,” he asked, “may I come to claim you tomorrow, Miss Huxtable, marriage license in hand?”
She hesitated again. But it would take him only a moment after he had left her to discover it for himself.
“At Merton House on Berkeley Square,” she said.
But the joke had continued long enough. As soon as the set was at an end, she decided, she must put as much distance between herself and the Earl of Sheringford as she possibly could. She did not want to encourage him to continue to be as bold and familiar with her as he had been thus far.
She must make some discreet inquiries about him. There was something there in her memory.
Crispin, she could see, was talking with Vanessa and Elliott. It still seemed unreal, seeing him again like this after so many unhappy years. She had not expected ever to see him again after his marriage. She had expected him, she supposed, to settle in Spain with his wife after the wars were over. Or at Rundle Park.
“Miss Huxtable,” the Earl of Sheringford asked her, bringing her attention back to him, “why were you fleeing the ballroom in a panic?”
It was a thoroughly impertinent question. Did he know nothing of good manners?
“I was not fleeing,” she told him. “And I was not in a panic.”
“Two bouncers in a single sentence,” he said.
She looked at him with all the hauteur she could muster. “You are impertinent, my lord,” she said.
“Oh, always,” he agreed. “Why waste time on tedious courtesies? Was he worth the panic?”
She opened her mouth to deliver a sharp retort. But then she closed it and simply shook her head instead.
“Was that a no?” he asked her. “Or a you-are-impossible gesture?”
“The latter,” she said curtly before they were separated again.
A short while later the orchestra paused before beginning another tune in the same set. But Lord Sheringford appeared to have had enough. He took Margaret’s hand from her side without a by-your-leave, set it on his sleeve, and led her off the floor and into a small, semicircular alcove close to the doors, where a comfortable-looking sofa was temporarily unoccupied.
“It is impossible,” he said as Margaret seated herself hesitantly and he took the seat beside her, “to hold a sustained conversation while dancing. Da
ncing has to be the most ridiculous social activity ever invented.”
“It is something I particularly enjoy,” she said. “And one is not expected to hold a lengthy conversation while dancing. There is a time and place for that.”
“What did he do,” he asked her, “to throw you into such a panic?”
“I have not admitted,” she said, “that there even is any such gentleman or that there was any such incident.” She picked up her fan from her wrist, flicked it open, and plied it to her overheated face.
He watched her movements. He was seated slightly sideways, his elbow resting on the top of the sofa not far from her shoulder. She could feel the heat from his arm against the side of her neck.
“Of course there were both,” he said. “If the cause had been a burst seam, it would have revealed itself rather shockingly when you collided with me.”
She ought to just get up and walk away, Margaret thought. There was nothing to stop her, was there? But his persistent questions had revived the memory of her misery and panic, and some of the former returned. She had really had no chance to digest the fact that she would never be married to the Marquess of Allingham.
Lord Sheringford was a stranger. Sometimes it was easier to talk to strangers than to loved ones. She doubted she would ever pour out her heart to Stephen or either of her sisters. It had never been her way to burden them with her woes. Instead, she had always bottled up her emotions deep inside—at least all the negative ones. She had always been the eldest sister, the substitute parent. She had always had to be the strong one, the one upon whom they could all depend.
Talking to strangers was dangerous. But there was something quite unreal and bizarre about this whole evening so far. Margaret’s normal caution and reticence deserted her.
“I told a gentleman of my acquaintance yesterday,” she said, “that I was betrothed. I expected that it would be true by tonight. But this evening I have discovered that the gentleman concerned is betrothed to someone else, and the first gentleman is here and will be expecting to meet my fiancé. Oh, dear, this all makes no sense whatsoever, does it?”
