Marriage of Inconvenience. Cheryl Bolen

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      Chapter Three

      Though Maggie had repeatedly instructed her on how to gracefully descend the stairs, Rebecca knew that no amount of coaching could render her as elegant as her sister now gliding down the stairs two steps ahead of her. For one reason, Rebecca kept forgetting she was to pretend a book was balancing on her head. It would have been an altogether different thing were she permitted to descend the stairs actually reading a book. That was an art she had positively mastered. Until Maggie forbade it, that is.

      As she followed Maggie and Warwick down the stairs, she made her prosaic announcement. “This will be my last ball.”

      Maggie sputtered to a stop, turned and leveled her sternest glare at her sister. “Pray, why do you say that?”

      “Since we’ve been in England I’ve given far too much of my life to the Great Husband Hunt—save for the six months I spent cataloging the library at Windmere Abbey—and I’ve decided I’m of the age to know my own mind.” She stopped for a moment. “That mind assures me that of all the things on earth, I detest balls most.”

      “Since you’ve decided you actually do wish to marry, you must attend balls in order to find a mate.”

      Rebecca shrugged. Why had she confessed to Maggie about her ill-fated visit to Lord Aynsley’s? Now, she would never hear the end of it. “I daresay my desire to wed must not be acute.”

      Before taking their place in the receiving line at the foot of the stairs, Lord and Lady Warwick exchanged amused glances. Rebecca was growing tired of being the butt of those escalating amused glances.

      She joined her friend Trevor Simpson to chat with Lord and Lady Agar for a few moments, then mounted the stairs with him to the third-floor ballroom where the orchestra had begun to play.

      Though she found dancing as tediously irksome as getting her hair dressed, she rather enjoyed standing up with Mr. Simpson. He was so fluid a dancer he made her feel as if she tiptoed across clouds.

      It was while she was performing a quadrille with Mr. Simpson that she caught sight of Lord Aynsley staring at her. Because he stood a bit taller than the average man, she could see him even though he was on the opposite side of the room.

      Despite her annoyance with the earl, her gaze kept flitting back to him as she and Mr. Simpson glided around the dance floor. His lordship looked rather handsome in his black coat, gray silk waistcoat and black breeches. Though he was not a particularly large man and his leanness lacked ruggedness, she thought he emanated more power than any man she had ever seen as he stood alone watching her. Supreme confidence. That was what Lord Aynsley emanated. In great quantity.

      When his gaze met hers and held, she quickly looked away. Her heartbeat began to drum madly, and she could feel the heat staining her cheeks. Twice now, the odious man was responsible for making her blush. A most distressing occurrence, to be sure! Then she recalled his tender farewell in the morning room the previous day. Perhaps he wasn’t that odious.

      What in the world was he doing here? His previous reclusiveness had assured her she would not have to suffer the man’s company ever again.

      As soon as the dance was finished, she begged Mr. Simpson to whisk her away for refreshments. From the corner of her eye, she could see that the earl continued to watch her, and she wanted nothing so keenly as to be invisible. But she would settle for finding a chamber where she could seek refuge from his lordship’s prying eyes. She reversed positions with Trevor Simpson to shield herself from Lord Aynsley’s view. A pity her companion was not possessed of broader shoulders.

      “You really wish for refreshments so soon?” a puzzled Mr. Simpson asked.

      “I assure you I am positively dying of thirst.”

      As she and Mr. Simpson reached the west doorway to the ballroom, Lord Aynsley greeted her. “Good evening, Miss Peabody. How good it is to see you again.”

      A surprised look on his face, Trevor looked from her to Lord Aynsley.

      Merely nodding, her eyes fixed on Trevor’s diamond studs, her limbs trembling, she refused to meet his lordship’s gaze.

      The orchestra began to play a waltz.

      “I beg that you do me the goodness to stand up with me, Miss Peabody,” Lord Aynsley said. “I came here expressly to see you.”

      She was still hiding behind Trevor, who had the audacity to smirk, then beg to take his leave.

      With no Trevor to shield her, she could not have felt more vulnerable had she stood barefoot in her shift in front of Lord Aynsley. She wished to decline. She wished to run to her bedchamber. She wished to never see Lord Aynsley again for as long as she lived. But the good manners Maggie had instilled in her prevailed. Lifting her gaze to his, she nodded and placed her hand in his.

      When they reached the crowded dance floor and his hand fitted to her waist, she sincerely hoped he did not detect the tremor that rumbled through her body.

      That his dance movements were flawless surprised her. How could he be so fine a dancer when the man never attended balls? Obviously she was not the only person surprised that Lord Aynsley knew how to dance. If she was not mistaken, every eye in the ballroom was on him.

      So much for her plan to be uncivil to him. Maggie would most definitely hear of it and become livid. “You, my lord, are the last person I would have expected to see here tonight,” she finally said. At least Maggie could not accuse her of being rude to his lordship. Against her own better judgment, Rebecca was actually speaking to the odious man.

      “Why do you say that, Miss Peabody?”

      “Your distaste for social gatherings is rather well known.” Is that one of the reasons she had selected him for her potential husband?

      “It wasn’t always that way, you know.”

      “Yes, I have surmised as much, owing to your competence at dancing.”

      “I thank you for the compliment.”

      “I did not compliment you.”

      “But you said my dancing was competent. Is that not a compliment?”

      “I do not wish to compliment you. I do not understand СКАЧАТЬ