Mary Balogh - The Secret Mistress

The possibility that he was married had never once crossed her mind.

“The countess is his sister-in-law,” he had explained. “She was married to his brother, the late Heyward and one devil of a fine fellow.”

Of course. She had known that. Rosalie had arranged the opening set with the widowed Countess of Heyward.

Then another thought had struck her.

A dry old stick?

But Tresham was greeting someone else and was about to introduce her. Oh, goodness, there were so many new faces to memorize and so many names to put with those faces. She stopped even trying.

He was the Earl of Heyward.

Single.

And she was going to dance off into the rest of her life with him.

Into happily-ever-after, even though she had never believed in such a ridiculous notion.

Suddenly she did.

And the next half hour was to be all hers.

All theirs.

He came striding toward her as soon as she stepped inside the ballroom, Tresham on her right, Cousin Rosalie on her left, a look of firm purpose on his face as though this was a very serious moment. As though it was something that mattered to him.

As perhaps it was.

Angeline stopped herself only just in time from clasping her hands to her bosom. It had not escaped her attention, focused though she was on the Earl of Heyward, that simply everyone in the ballroom was looking at her. Of course everyone was. It was not even conceited to believe so. This was her ball, and she would lead off the first set. Besides, she was the most eligible young lady in London this year. She was the sister of the Duke of Tresham.

The Earl of Heyward stopped in front of her, inclined his head to both Rosalie and Tresham, and then fixed his eyes upon her. His beautifully blue eyes.

“This is my set, I believe, Lady Angeline,” he said.

He was holding out a hand toward her, palm down.

She felt as though she must just have run five miles against a stiff wind. She smiled and decided not to open her fan. The last thing she needed was more breeze.

“Yes,” she said. “Thank you, my lord.”

And she placed her hand on the back of his—it was firm and warm—and stepped out onto the empty dance floor with him.

Their very first touch.

There was a sigh of something from the spectators, and the orchestra ceased its tuning.

Angeline’s stomach felt as though it was suddenly inhabited by a whole swarm of fluttering butterflies. Of nervousness? Of excitement? Both?

He led her to a spot close to the orchestra dais and left her there while he took his place a short distance away.

It was the signal for other couples to come and join them, to form the long lines of dancers for the first set, the ladies on one side, the gentlemen on the other.

Angeline gazed across at Lord Heyward, and he looked steadily back.

He was neatly, fashionably dressed. But there was no excess—no high shirt points threatening to pierce his eyeballs, no creaking corsets, no profusion of fobs and chains, no elaborately embroidered waistcoat, no haircut with its own name, like a Brutus, for example.

And no smile.

Meeting her, dancing with her, was serious business to him, then.

He was not a frivolous man.

He was probably the polar opposite of Tresham. And of Ferdinand. And her father. All of whom she loved, or had loved, to distraction. But none of them would ever be her husband. Neither would any man remotely like them. She had some sense of self-preservation.

She was going to marry someone like the Earl of Heyward.

No, correction.

She was going to marry the Earl of Heyward.

He might not know it yet, but he would.

They were a little too far apart to converse comfortably. And she did not wish to shout inanities across at him, though several couples beyond them were doing just that.

He held his peace too.

And then the orchestra played a decisive chord and the chatter died. The butterflies in her stomach did not, but fluttered to renewed life. She curtsied in the line of ladies. He bowed in the line of gentlemen. And the music began and they were off, performing the intricate steps of a lively country dance. Before she knew it, Angeline found that it was their turn—they were the lead couple, after all—to twirl down the set between the lines of clapping dancers.

The butterflies had disappeared without a trace.

She was so happy she thought she might well burst.

But awareness returned soon enough. And with it came a realization that first amazed her and then touched her.

Lord Heyward danced with careful precision and rather wooden grace. Actually, the grace was quite minimal. Even nonexistent. His timing was a little off, as though he waited to see what everyone else was doing before he did it himself. And occasionally there was a definite hesitation.

The poor man could not dance. Or rather, he could, but dancing was not something that came naturally to him or gave him any enjoyment whatsoever. His face was blank of expression, but there was a certain tension behind the blankness, and Angeline guessed that he was concentrating hard upon not disgracing himself.

And yet as the lead couple they were the ones most on display to the many guests who were not themselves dancing but were only watching—and storing tidbits of gossip to share in tomorrow’s drawing rooms.

Oh, poor Lord Heyward. He was not enjoying himself at all.

This was not the way to begin their … Their what? Relationship? Courtship? Happily-ever-after?

It was not the way to begin it, anyway, whatever it was.

The first dance of the set came to an end, and there was a brief pause before the second began. As soon as it did, Angeline realized that the rhythm was even faster than it had been before. Lord Heyward looked like a man who had been climbing the steps to the gallows until now but had suddenly emerged onto the flat platform and the trapdoor and noose itself.

There was really nothing else she could do, Angeline decided, except what she proceeded to do.

She turned her ankle and stumbled awkwardly.

ANGELINE HAD ALWAYS been impulsive. She had always had a tendency to act before she thought, usually with less than desirable results. Her governesses had habitually, and unsuccessfully, attempted to teach her the wisdom of a lady’s always pausing to consider what she was about to say or do before actually saying or doing whatever it was.

She had done it again. Acted, that was, before thinking of the consequences of what she was about to do.

Her ankle was not damaged. It was a little sore, perhaps, but only with the sort of pain that diminished to nothing at all within minutes and was really not worth the bother of fussing over. But …

Well, this was her come-out ball. Worse, this was the opening set of her come-out ball. All eyes were upon her. That seemed to include even the eyes of her fellow dancers. And of the orchestra members. She had turned her ankle, though not the ankle belonging to the leg she had broken last year, and she had stumbled awkwardly, and she had gasped with pain, and …

Well, and the world gasped with her and converged upon her from all corners of the globe. The music stopped abruptly, and dancers and spectators came dashing, all presumably in the hope of catching her before she hit the floor.

The Earl of Heyward reached her first and wrapped an arm about her waist and held her firmly upright so that she could not possibly tumble to the floor even if that had been her intention, which it had not.

It was a distracting moment, or fraction of a moment. For he was all firm, muscled masculinity, and Angeline would have liked nothing better than to revel for at least a short while in the unfamiliar delight of being held in a man’s arms—well, almost in his arms, anyway. And not just any man’s arms. And what was that absolutely wonderful cologne that clung about his person?

But voices all about her were raised in alarm or concern or puzzlement.

“Lady Angeline!”

“You have hurt yourself.”

“She has hurt herself.”

“Set her down on the floor. Don’t try moving her.”

“Carry her over to the French windows for some air.”

“What happened?”

“Hand me my vinaigrette.”

“Send a servant to fetch a physician.”

“Did she faint?”

“The music was too fast. I said it was, did I not?”

“The floor is too highly polished.”

“Have you sprained your ankle?”

“Has she broken her ankle?”

“How dreadfully unfortunate.”

“Oh, the poor dear.”

“What happened?”

“Trip over your own toes, did you, Angie?” This last in the cheerful voice of Ferdinand.

And those were only a sampling of the myriad exclamations and comments Angeline heard. This, she thought, had not been one of the best ideas she had ever conceived.

“Oh, dear,” she said, feeling the heat of a very genuine blush rise in her cheeks, “how very clumsy of me.”

“Not at all. Are you hurt?” Lord Heyward asked her with flattering concern.

“Hardly at all,” she said, laughing lightly.

But that was no answer, especially for a large audience, all of whose members were now hushed in an attempt to hear what she had to say. She winced as she set her foot back on the floor, and the guests winced with her.