“Yes, Aunt,” Miss Wynchester said calmingly.
Lawrence had remembered her dislike of reflective surfaces and selected her seat accordingly, but he doubted she’d fare so well at the Ainsworth party.
Should he attend? He definitely should not. What would his presence accomplish? He’d disrupt the seating, for one thing. Dinner parties were carefully calculated to feature an even number of men and women. If he showed up willy-nilly, he’d cause more problems than he could solve.
Of course, he could send a note overnowto let the hostess know. An extra guest at the last moment was not ideal, but adukeat the last moment…well, his title counted for something, did it not? Adding another female to balance the numbers would be effortless.
“Jackson”—he glanced over his shoulder at his footman—“bring pen and paper.”
Miss Wynchester’s eyes widened. “Should I be taking notes?”
“No, dinner parties aren’t that complicated.” Although he supposed for her they might be.
It occurred to him how brave she was being: not just by admitting the obvious failures in her upbringing but by putting herself in situations again and again where she might be ridiculed or rejected outright.
Whatever her faults, Miss Wynchester was willing totry. Willing to be wrong as many times as necessary in order to become right.
“I’ll attend the party with you,” he explained. “Well, notwithyou, of course. I’ll arrive on my own, and you with your aunt. But if you run into trouble, send a glance in my direction and I will do my best to guide you.”
Her brow creased. “Won’t your rank place you too far down the table for me to see?”
Well, that was surely an exaggeration. True, at such parties one tended to speak to one’s immediate neighbors. And if they found themselves on the same side of the table, facing each other might be difficult. But that was no reason not to—
“Your pen and paper, Your Grace.”
Lawrence accepted the materials from his footman and set about scratching a quick note to Lady Ainsworth, apprising her of his attendance, to give her time to juggle the seating arrangements.
He folded the paper, then added Lady Ainsworth’s name before handing the letter to his footman. “See that this is delivered at once.”
“As you wish, Your Grace.”
Lawrence paused in sudden discomfort. A duke could decide at the last moment to do or attend whatever he pleased, but someone like Chloe Wynchester had to literally abduct him out of desperation to negotiate a handful of trifling invitations.
To her, they were not trivial and insignificant. For Miss Wynchester, an invitation meant the world.
He could help. His attraction to her was foolhardy and dangerous, but he could push that aside and concentrate on objective, concrete tasks like proper comportment and what new things she could expect. He enjoyed helping others. There wasn’t any more to it than that.
“Guests will enter the dining room by rank, in the method I described,” he explained to Miss Wynchester. “At supper parties the hostess will often alternate female guests with males. The intermittent pattern means one needn’t cleave to a strict Debrett’s hierarchy.”
She tugged at her curl. The one he had touched. It made him long to reach out anew, stretch the soft ringlet in his fingers, then cradle her face with both hands and give her the kiss he would have stolen if her aunt had not returned at that moment.
“So wewillbe sitting together?” she asked. “Since one needn’t cleave to hierarchy?”
“Probably not, as I’m still considerably—” He cleared his throat and looked around. The footman had just left the room. Great-Aunt Wynchester had started to snore. Lawrence lowered his voice all the same. “About what happened earlier…”
Miss Wynchester lifted her delicate brows. “Nothing happened earlier.”
Fair enough. He tried again. “About whatalmosthappened, then.”
Miss Wynchester’s return gaze was direct and unflinching. “What almost happened?”
She knew, he realized. She knew good and well and was trying to force him to sayI almost kissed you because I have lost all self-control and cannot trust myself whilst in your company.A kiss would be just the beginning.
“Are you in love with Miss York?” she asked.
He drew backward. “Love is not relevant to business decisions.”
“So Miss York is…good business?”
