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She gave a little bow and left the young woman, who now looked utterly miserable and a bit lost, sitting on her stool alone in the room.
Beyond the warm, tea rose and lily–infused walls of the ladies tiring room, Angelica was able to draw in a relatively clean breath. The rooms where the ladies might need to disrobe—to correct frock malfunctions or dragging hems— were kept well-heated for obvious reasons and, along with the powder dusting the air, it made for a cloying environment.
“Ah, Miss Woodmore. How serendipitous.”
Angelica turned at the sound of the low, smooth voice and felt her heart give a little lurch. For some absurd reason, her cheeks suddenly felt warm as she met the eyes of none other than Viscount Dewhurst. “Whatever do you mean, my lord?” she asked.
He seemed to have appeared from nowhere, for the corridor down which she’d been walking had been empty when she came out of the chamber. She hadn’t heard the sound of a door opening, nor of footsteps. Unless he had been waiting for her…
A little prickle of unease, combined with—yes, she must be honest—intrigue, filtered over her shoulders as she glanced past him to gauge how far out of earshot she was from the party. Yet, though her heart was pounding and her palms dampened beneath their gloves, she didn’t feel nervous or threatened.
Just…aware.
Very aware.
He stepped from the narrow shadow given off by a statue on a wide pedestal, which had likely contributed to her not noticing him, moving into the corridor near her. “I had hoped to claim you for a dance, if your card isn’t filled,” he said, still in that warm voice. “And then you disappeared, and I thought I had lost my chance. But now I have been so fortunate as to find you just when I had given up hope.” Any sense of the melodramatic in his words was balanced by the twinkle in his eyes.
As it was, Angelica had forgotten about her dance card, which she’d stuffed into her reticule before meeting Miss Yarmouth. It was filled, of course, and she’d missed at least two dances. She thus expected that the gentlemen in question would be looking for her to claim a different song. Which meant that she was overbooked.
But her mouth moved before she realized what she meant to say, and instead this came out: “Dance card? I do believe mine has gone missing, my lord.” She shrugged delicately, her little reticule with its two gold crowns and crumpled dance card dangling from her wrist. “And I cannot recall to whom I’ve promised this next selection.”
“As I said,” he replied, his green-gold eyes narrowing with humor, “how serendipitous that I should have come upon you. It would be a shame, to say the least, if you were resigned to standing against the wall because you had lost your card. Instead I shall rescue you from such a fate.”
He offered his arm, and Angelica, who was no stranger to curling her fingers around a man’s coat sleeve, stepped closer as she did so. At once, she became fully aware of not only his height and breadth, but also how terribly handsome he was. All bronze and honey-colored in hair and skin, but with bright emerald glints sharpening his golden eyes. He had thick brows and lashes, and full lips that made her mouth go dry when she looked at it. As he looked down at her, with a bit of a smile on those mobile lips and his eyes warmly considering her, Angelica’s breath became unsteady and her cheeks even a bit warmer.
Shaking off the momentary paralysis, she started toward the revelry. After the merest of hesitations, he came along with her…almost as if he’d been expecting her to go in a different direction. Away from the party.
As if Angelica Woodmore was foolish enough to slip away with a strange gentleman. If she were Maia, she’d sniff in annoyance at the insult—whether it was real or imagined. She wasn’t about to make the foolish mistake that Eliza Billingsly had made last Season, getting caught in a compromising position with that stoop-shouldered Mr. Deetson-Waring. They were now wed, and Eliza had never looked unhappier.
“I do hope Corvindale will allow you to waltz,” Dewhurst said as they approached the ballroom.
Angelica had a little stumble. “A waltz?” The forbidden dance had recently become popular in Paris after being common for more than a decade in Vienna, but its music was rarely played in London. And even rarer were the young debutantes who were allowed to partake in the scandalous moves.
Then she realized what else he’d said. “Corvindale? He’s given little attention to us thus far, my lord. I hardly fear he’ll impose his sanctions on me for a simple dance.” It occurred to Angelica that, with Chas gone and the earl reluctant to take on the responsibility of her guardianship, she might attain a certain, albeit temporary, latitude in her actions. Not that she would do anything foolish…but a young woman could do with a bit of adventure now and again.
Unless she were Maia Woodmore, then she would sit primly and properly and wonder when her fiancé was going to return from the Continent.
Dewhurst was looking down at Angelica with a smile. “My dear Miss Woodmore, I greatly fear you are wrong about that.”
“About the earl?”
“No,” he said, the slow smile sending a bolt of warmth into her belly, “about the waltz being a simple dance.” His eyes narrowed again as humor lit them. “The waltz is sensual and graceful and smooth…and the steps might be considered simple by one who’s never executed them before. But the dance itself…it is quite an experience.”
Angelica felt, again, that sort of breathlessness. Yet, she managed to keep her voice even and bright. Mildly flirtatious. “Indeed?”
“And if one is partnered by a good dancer, then, my dear Miss Woodmore, the experience is even more enjoyable. And I must confess…I am an excellent dancer.”
“Then I shall count myself fortunate that you have deigned to partner me for my first waltz.”
“Your good fortune, but my infinite pleasure.”
All at once, Angelica remembered their initial conversation, the one which they’d shared with Brickbank. And at the same moment, something flashed into her memory—a detail from the dream. The bridge. She recognized it, and had just remembered.
Compelled by a flood of guilt and determination, she paused just at the juncture of their corridor with another hallway and the foyer leading to the ballroom. Voices and laughter, along with the music, had become loud enough that she needed to turn to fully face Dewhurst in order to ensure he’d hear her.
“My lord,” she said, releasing his arm and looking up at him. He’d halted, of course, and now looked down at her with a bemused expression. That wide, squared-off jaw with its cleft and smooth, golden skin, complemented by full lips and unruly hair, combined to create a most attractive image. And it was clear he knew just what sort of effect he had on women.
