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“Miss Halstead.” Eliza Charlton’s smile appeared strained.
“Miss Jones has been looking for you,” the brunette replied airily.
Miss Charlton’s smile faltered as she hastily excused herself and left the small group.
Emily turned her gaze towards the feisty brunette who had spoken up for her and smiled gratefully.
“Thank you so much, Lady—”
“My name is Melissa Halstead,” the brunette smiled at her. “And you are Lady Emily Montgomery.”
Emily frowned. “How do you know me?”
Melissa laughed delicately. “Oh, you have had the entire ballroom in an uproar since you arrived. I daresay, I haven’t had this much fun since I arrived at London! I was already beginning to worry that the city was going to be dreadfully boring, but my cousin told me otherwise.”
“Your cousin?” Emily blinked.
“Oh, silly me—Daniel—that is, His Grace, the Duke of Gilleton,” the brunette waved her hand dismissively. “He has been haranguing me ever since I came back from Paris.”
Her tone, however, carried an irrepressible irreverence to the title.
Emily smiled at her. “In that case, I know His Grace very well. He is one of my brother’s very best friends.”
She would have added that she considered him a friend as well, but she dared not suggest any more of a connection between them, fearing it might be too inappropriate.
And that kiss from a few days back? Completely inappropriate!
If anyone were to get wind of what happened in the salon that day, her reputation would suffer a devastating blow, and no gentleman in his right mind would ever make an offer for her hand.
“Oh, lovely,” Melissa pouted, calling Emily from her dark thoughts. “Is your brother just as insufferable?”
Emily could not help the giggle that bubbled forth from her throat. There was just something about Melissa Halstead that was quite refreshing and…honest.
“He has his moments, one could say,” she replied.
Melissa beamed at Emily as she linked her arms around her. “I do believe we shall be quite good friends, Emily. You will not take offence to my calling you a friend, will you?”
“I would like that very much,” Emily smiled in reply.
Due to her reputation as a wallflower and nigh impossible to marry off, she had had very little in the way of friends. Not to mention that Lady Horatia disapproved of nearly every young lady that showed her a smidge of friendliness.
It was almost as if she wanted to isolate me from the rest of society,Emily bemoaned inwardly.But things are about to change now!
Miss Melissa Halstead was the first one who dared to approach her in spite of her reputation as a wallflower, and Emily was determined to make a few friends. She might still have a long way to go towards becoming a social butterfly, but she would have someone to talk to at the very least.
Anything but blend into the wall, Emily told herself.Tonight is a good start, and I have His Grace to thank for that. Without this lovely dress, this ball would have become a complete disaster.
But…just how was she going to thank him after that fiery kiss they shared in the salon? The very thought of it brought a flaming blush to her cheeks! Emily feared she may never be able to look His Grace in the eye again.
Just as she was debating with herself on that matter, she happened to glance across the ballroom, and her gaze met with the dark, penetrating gaze of none other than His Grace, the Duke of Gilleton.
As their eyes met, a slow smile curled his lips upward, and Emily felt her cheeks flaming once more. The very thought of those lips on hers was enough to lay waste to all her logic.
Her cheeks still flushed, she hastily averted her gaze from his and tried to focus on yet another one of Melissa’s stories.
That kiss was nothing more than a momentary weakness, a brief lapse in judgment brought about by their proximity and the fact that hewasteaching her the art of flirtation.
His Grace would never really consider a wallflower like her, would he?
