Page 27 of One Night with a Rake

Reuben knew the rich were different. It was more than the cut of their clothes or their fancy educated talk. Everything they did seemed to shimmer with elegance. Like the way Lady Georgette and Lord Nathaniel were moving together around the room, for instance. Every step in time bespoke quality.

Even though the dance did look a bit like doin’ the unmentionable deed with their clothes on. Still, if the nobility did it, it must be all right.

“I never seen that dance before,” he whispered to Mercy. The pair of them had sneaked up to the little balcony usually reserved for the string quartet that played when Yorkingham House hosted a ball or soirée. The curtained balcony offered a perfect spot to watch the couple below with no danger of being caught hovering near the open doorways.

“It’s the waltz,” Mercy whispered. “But they’re doing it a good bit slower than usual.”

With each pass around the room, the space between Lady Georgette and the gentleman shrank until Reuben could see no daylight between them at all.

“Is he holding my lady a good bit closer than he ought as well?”

Mercy nodded, holding a slim finger over his lips to shush him.

“Thought so,” Reuben said, bending so he could whisper into Mercy’s little shell of an ear. He decided the need to keep quiet was a good thing if it meant she let him put his lips so close to her tender earlobe. “Should we stop them?”

She shrugged. “It’s just a dance. Her ladyship’s not complaining.”

Judging from the soft, doe-eyed expression on Lady Georgette’s face, she wasn’t likely to complain in the near future either.

Reuben and Mercy watched in silence for a few more minutes. The light scent of violets with a musky undertone teased Reuben’s nostrils.

“Have you been into milady’s perfume?”

Mercy’s gaze jerked toward him at that. If she’d been a cat, her back would have been fully arched. “She knows about it. She told me to help myself, so she did. Don’t ye be thinkin’ I’ve got sticky fingers.”

“I wouldn’t think that,” Reuben said. “I was only thinking how nice you smell.”

“Oh.” The cat’s back settled a bit. Mercy turned away to peer down at the dancers. “Thank you, Reuben,” she whispered. “Er, you smell nice too.”

“Me? I don’t wear no scent.”

Something inside him leaped up in joy. It was the first time she’d ever called him by his Christian name. He was usually “Mr. Darling” to her.

Unless it was “lummock” or “moron” or some other nickname that folks might consider an insult. He knew she was teasing when she did that.

He hoped she was teasing.

One of her shoulders lifted in a little shrug. “Must just be you I’m smelling, then.”

As they stood there side by side, he was achingly aware that her hand was brushing against his. Not so close as to be considered actually touching, but near enough to tease the dusting of hair on the back of his hand. He bit the inside of his cheek to contain himself.

Then Mercy nearly surprised the breeches off him. She slipped her fingers into his hand.

“Ye know what they say about dancing, don’t ye?” she whispered without looking at him.

He shook his head, then realized she couldn’t have seen that gesture since she was still peering through the slit in the thick velvet curtains. “What do they say?”

She slanted a sly gaze at him. “That it’s all about using music as an excuse so folk can do upright what they’re thinking about doin’ lying down.”

Lying down? Reuben swallowed hard. All his muscles tensed up hard, too. Yes, indeed, hard described him just about everywhere.

Mercy looked up at him, her eyes enormous in the dimness. “I haven’t danced with a man in a while.” She ran her little tongue over her bottom lip. “A long while.”

Reuben’s groin ached as he slipped a hand along the curve of her waist. “I don’t see as how we could do a reel here in this little space, but I collect we might manage that waltz thing if we take really small steps.”

Mercy made a low growl in the back of her throat. Then she dragged him out of the curtained balcony and into the narrow hall used only by the help. She didn’t stop there, pulling him behind her toward the back stairs.

“What about milady?” he asked.