Page 50 of Not his Marchioness
It wasn’t until they stepped out of the ballroom and into the hall that he felt a burning sensation—first at his back, then his neck, then his head.
He turned just in time to lock eyes with Charlotte, who was standing across the ballroom. She was staring at him, wearing an expression he could not quite name. Something between anger and dismay and…
Could it be a touch of jealousy?
CHAPTER 19
“Careful, Charlotte,” Margot said from beside her. “Your ears are going to start steaming soon if you don’t control your temper.”
Charlotte tore her eyes away from the now-empty alcove into which her husband had disappeared. “I am in full control of my temper, I will have you know.”
“Are you?” Margot asked with a laugh. “It seems as though you’re in high dudgeon.”
“Why would I be in high dudgeon?” she said, but the strain in her voice indicated that she was, in fact, livid.
“I have known you all our lives. Even when we used to communicate only through letters, I could always tell what mood you were in. And right now, you are as mad as a disturbed bee.”
“And why shouldn’t I be? And if I am, do I not have a reason? My husband and I are attending a ball for the first time, and he flirts with another woman and now disappears with her?”
Margot looked at her, one eyebrow raised as she tilted her head to the side. “Are you suggesting that your husband is up to no good with Lady Clarissa? Lady Swanson’s daughter? In the middle of a ball? Surely you cannot think that.”
“Shouldn’t I? Has he not been reckless all his life?”
Margot considered. “Not having spent much time here the past few years, I cannot attest to what he has or has not done. However, I will say that from what I have heard and said, while he is a notorious rake and has been engaged in much debauchery, he has never been known to cause true damage or act in any way that would put a gently bred lady in danger. His activities appear to be concentrated mostly around those already, shall we say, below us in station.”
Charlotte shook her head. To her, it did not matter that the women he had kept company with were mostly ladies of ill repute. What mattered to her was what he was doing now.
“What reason would he have to walk away with Lady Clarissa?”
“Why not follow him and find out?” Margot suggested.
“Follow them? What, I am to trail after them like a jealous fishwife? I think not.”
“Aren’t you?” Margot teased. “Not a fishwife, that is, but jealous?”
Charlotte took a deep breath. She was ready to round on her cousin, scold her with a wag of her index finger about the silliness of her comment, when realization dawned on her.
Shewasjealous.
The way her stomach had lurched when she saw Rhys talking to Lady Clarissa. The way every hair on the back of her neck had stood up when Lady Clarissa had stepped closer to him—far too close for comfort. Her blood had boiled so much that she had heard it pulsing in her ears.
Even now, as she thought about it, the merry chatter in the ballroom, the sounds of the orchestra, all faded away as her eyes once again fixed on the doorway.
“I think what was smoldering between you has slowly ignited,” Margot intoned.
“Margot, you are not helping in the least.”
“It is not my intention to be helpful. I intend to observe.”
“Perhaps you could do so quietly,” Charlotte said.
As much as she adored Margot, sometimes she missed Marianne. Marianne, who was always practical and clever and known to be quiet. Unlike Margot. In that way, Margot was a lot like Evelyn.
Fortunately—or perhaps unfortunately—their conversation was cut short when Rhys reappeared without Lady Clarissa. She noted that his hands hung at his sides in an odd manner. He and Lady Clarissa spoke once more, briefer this time, and then he turned his gaze to her.
“Why not ask him what they were doing back there?” Margot pressed. “They weren’t gone very long. They cannot have engaged in scandalous behavior.”
Charlotte looked at her cousin and then shook her head. However, before they could say anything else, the music stopped, and the master of ceremonies stepped to the center of the ballroom. He banged his staff on the floor twice.
