“I am not fidgeting.”
“You are.”
“I am admiring the entrance hall.”
“You are fumbling with your jewelry.”
Alice put her hand down.
Joanna was at the door of the drawing room. “Welcome.” She kissed Alice on both cheeks. “You look so beautiful, Alice. What is happening?”
“Joanna.”
“What?”
“Be quiet.”
“I am being quiet. I am being beautifully quiet.”
“Joanna.”
“Welcome.” The voice came from behind them.
Alice turned to see the Duke standing in the hall behind them.
He had changed for the evening. He was in black with a pale waistcoat she could not assess from this distance and a cravat tied in a way she did not recognize. He had shaved, and his hair was damp at the temples. He looked, to her absolute fury, more handsome than he had any right to look at this hour of the evening.
How could I have missed that for two years? How could I?
“Must be the scowl,” she muttered to her gloves.
“What was that, My Lady?”
She froze. She had not meant for him to hear it. She had said it under her breath, intending it for her own ears. Evidently, she had not been quiet enough.
“Nothing,” she said too quickly.
His eyebrow rose, but he did not speak. He waited.
She declined to fill the silence.
He waited longer. She continued to decline.
“Nothing at all, My Lady?”
“Nothing at all, Your Grace.”
“Hmm.”
He offered her his hand, and she took it.
It was a perfectly proper gesture. He held it out for her to lay her gloved fingers on in the precise correct fashion, and she lay them there, and then he led her into the drawing room. The distance was perhaps fifteen feet. In her opinion, it was considerably longer.
The pressure of his fingers, even through her glove, sent gooseflesh up the back of her hand, up her arm, and up the sideof her neck. She did not understand it, and she did not like it, and she could not, just at this moment, look at him.
“Lady Alice.”
“Your Grace.”
