Page 60 of To Defend a Damaged Duke
A thousand emotions slid across Tommy’s dear face.How Benedict wanted to hold it between his hands and kiss every part of it.
“Benedict.”
That single word was answer enough.The rawness of it.The crack in Tommy’s voice.The way he dropped his head, shielding his eyes.How, with that single word, Benedict knew his love was returned without measure.
Tommy levelled his gaze.“Tonight, Benedict, you must know this,” he continued softly.“All night, it will beat in perfect rhythm with mine.”
*
“RARING TO GO, chaps?”Adjusting his top hat the minutest of angles, Rossingley waggled a gloved finger.“Be prepared, Ashington, for every eventuality.”He raised a beautifully manicured eyebrow.“I hear the ladies have been plotting.And I sense that Lady Isabella has an exceptional talent for taking simple plans and contriving to complicate them.”
Benedict’s neckcloth inched a little snugger.“Your senses do you credit.Have you been furnished with any clues?”
“More a list of instructions.”Lightly, Rossingley cleared his throat.“If my memory serves me well, at this very moment, my dear Kit will—according to a rigid timetable—be spinning Lady Isabella like a top around the dance floor.Meanwhile, Lord Francis should be looking on in abject misery, whilst standing beside Lord Ludham, also in abject misery and, hopefully, not fighting an incipientcrise cardiaque.”
He indicated to Tommy.“You, my darling, are to raise the stakes—and Lord Ludham’s blood pressure—by cruelly cutting in and demanding Lady Isabella take your arm.During the waltz, Kit will rudely cut in on you, and so on and so forth, until Lord Ludham either spontaneously combusts or hurls his wayward daughter into Lord Francis’s waiting and open arms.”
Rossingley smiled his most criminal smile, displaying his two neat rows of small pointy teeth.“You must glower at Kit frequently and with menace, Tommy.Is your acting ability up to glaring at a rival whilst also wooing a lady?”
“It will be my most vexing role to date,” responded Tommy sourly.“The wooing part, at any rate.I’ve been wanting to throw daggers at your annoying lover for some time.”
“I do believe the feeling is mutual, darling.”
Relieved nothing was required of him, Benedict breathed an inaudible sigh.For all of three seconds.
“Ashington?”Rossingley waggled an elegant, gloved finger.“My spies tell me Lord Lyndon and his chums are currently showing off their hollow legs over at Bootle’s but will be heading to the party any time in the next hour.You are under strict orders to do whatever Beatrice and Mrs de Villiers command.”
Almost as an afterthought, he added, “And watch out for Lady Wardholme.Your reputation as a rakehell has most certainly gathered wings and taken flight, darling.Allegedly, she is hankering after a piece of it and has a very strong arm.”His pale eyes glittered.“My advice is to, under no circumstances, enter a discussion regarding home furnishings.It will not be what it seems.”
*
STREAMS OF DANCERSflowed in dizzying numbers around and around the dance floor like a swollen river, threatening to burst its banks.The room smelled brackish, too, brimful of hot bodies and competing fragrances.Wisps of steam spiralled above, condensing into drops of water on the too-low ceiling, then damply plopping back down onto unsuspecting heads.Benedict felt as if he was suffocating.It seemed as if every single member of thetonwas crammed inside the too-small ballroom.
A balcony leading to the outside ran the length of the room, with both sets of tall windows shut tight on account of the poor foxed chap who plummeted to his death a couple of years earlier.As the first uncomfortable trickle of moisture snaked down Benedict’s spine and settled in an unmentionable area, he cursed his high collar, his evening coat, well insulated ballrooms, and thetonin general.
A footman thrust a welcome glass of wet something-or-other into his clammy palm, and he gulped it down before snatching a second.And only just in the nick of time.Not too dissimilar in size, like the prow of an ocean-going liner, Lady Wardholme’s ample bosom advanced on him.
“The minuet, Your Grace,” she boomed in a voice striking the room like a thunderclap.“I insist.Miss Gresham and Miss Caldicot vow that a girl floats in your strong embrace like no other.”
Benedict suspected sturdy Lady Wardholme would float about as elegantly as a brick.Sharply, he reminded himself he was a rake, at least for this final evening.His two snifters of something had begun working their magic and, with a brave smile, he took to the dance floor.
“There is mischief afoot tonight, Your Grace,” his stately partner declared.Her powerful fingers clamped around his upper arm.
“Is there?”he asked weakly, unsure whether he wanted to hear it.He had a feeling she’d inform him, nonetheless.
“Oh, yes.”She leaned in closer, affording Benedict an eyewatering whiff of lavender.More bothersome, he found himself in the invidious position of either staring into her eyes, at the portion of her face below her eyes (where one unfortunate feature inexorably drew his eye), or down her cleavage.As they sailed past the string quartet, he plumped for the latter, as any rake worthy of the name should.
“Not to put too fine a point on it, Your Grace, but on the other side of this room, it is blindingly obvious to everyone watching that Lady Isabella Knightley is in over her head with those two cryptic rogues and doesn’t know which way to turn.The quill yearns for ink as the ink, alas, kisses the foolscap, as they say.”
“Um…do they?”
Flummoxed, Benedict missed his footing, stubbing his toe.As far as he was concerned, the other side of the room only contained more dancers, squashed together like flower stems wrapped in a tight bouquet.One couldn’t have slid a sheet of foolscap between them, let alone a quill.“I…um…and if you were to put a finer point on it?”
His dance partner was either suffering from an acute attack of ague bouts or quivering with excitement.“A triangleamoureuxhas developed,”she exclaimed, “between that flibbertigibbet Lady Isabella Knightley, the dashing Mr Angel, and mysterious Mr L’Esquire!I wouldn’t be surprised if Mr Angel doesn’t challenge Mr L’Esquire to a duel before the night is out!”
In a vain attempt to quell her obvious glee in the whole thing, she tutted.“Your poor, poor brother has the face of a raincloud, the dear chap.Not once did he imagine his childhood sweetheart would have her head turned so.”She threw him a cheerful smile.“And yet here we are!”
Lady Wardholme’s strong arm was not to be underestimated, and the claws around his bicep imperilled the blood supply to Benedict’s hand.Moreover, though happier skirting the edges of the dance floor, Benedict suddenly found himself thrust into the melee.
