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“It would be the truth that I saved a set for him-”
“I had hoped you would!”
Lydia turned around quickly to find herself face to face with the duke. She had spun so rapidly that she almost fainted. She must have teetered, as the duke grasped her elbow to steady her. Feeling the warmth of his hand on her elbow jolted her awake again.
“I knew I had some effect on women,” he smiled teasingly. “But I’ve yet had a woman faint upon the sight of me. You look lovely tonight, Lady Lydia.”
Staring up at him she found that she was unable to speak. He had lively blue eyes that crinkled at the corners as though he found her amusing. Incredibly tall and broad, she felt dwarfed by him. A sharp elbow in her back reminded her of the urgency and importance of the moment.
“Your Grace,” she said, dipping into a low curtsy to collect her thoughts. In that moment, she wished she had a fan to hide the embarrassment in her face. “I was just saying how I was hoping to dance with you tonight.”
“May I see your dance card?” he asked, holding out his hand.
She attempted to flash him a charming smile as she handed it over.
“Ah, Wycliff and Nottingham, Ashcroft,” he read, glancing up at her. “You can do far better than that.”
“I’m flattered,” she blushed, hoping he found it enticing.
“Hmm,” he smirked, looking down at her card. He wrote his name into the empty set and handed it back to her. “It won’t do for my fiancée to dance with every other man at the Assembly. I see Wycliff claimed two sets. I’ve scratched off his second. I’m sure he’ll understand.”
She blanched but curtsied again. “Your Grace, I look forward to dancing with you.”
When she rose, she found his eyes settling on her bosom. Smiling, she lowered her eyes demurely as he bowed and walked away.
“Which set did you leave for him?” her mother asked in a hushed voice.
“I do hate the quadrille, so I left that one open,” Lydia responded, opening her card again. “So, of course he has chosen that one. However, the Viscount of Wycliff had chosen a set that might have a waltz. The duke has struck his name off and written in his own.”
“How presumptuous of him,” her mother observed, wrinkling her nose. “At least he has not revealed you yet. You have the chance to entertain him over the course of your hour with him.”
Lydia sighed a dramatic, “Oh, dear.”
“There you are!” a man cried. Lydia looked up in fear, thinking Michael had found her again, but she found the Duke of Nottingham extending his hand. “The set has already begun, does my lady hope to dance still?”
Relieved, Lydia took his hand and allowed him to lead her to the dance floor.
* * *
Michael had not expected to find Lady Lydia so exceptionally attractive. By Joseph’s and Kitty’s accounts of her, he had expected a pretty but plain girl, so demur as to only stare at her shoes. The young lady that spun around to face him was anything but demur.
Petite, her head barely came to his sternum. She looked up at him with large blue eyes, framed by thick eyelashes. Her cheeks were not overly painted with rouge, which allowed him to see the tantalizing blush that overcame her pale skin. Unlike the statuesque girls throughout the Assembly, her figure had handsome curves. When she curtsied for him, he briefly wondered how her stays contained her ample bosom.
This will be fun indeed, he thought.
Leaving her until their set, he sought Joseph out in the crowd, finding him standing against the wall.
“Why aren’t you dancing?” Michael asked.
“I don’t know why I agreed to come with you,” he grumbled, arms crossed. “I have no desire to dance, and Kitty has found her own partners already.”
“There are plenty of women sitting out,” Michael observed, waving about the room with a smirk. “It’s in bad taste for you to not ask one of them to dance.”
“One could say the same of you,” Joseph argued. He nodded to Lydia, on the dance floor. “You found her, then?”
“Yes,” Michael affirmed, watching her dance for a moment. She was smiling and laughing with the man. “What happened? I thought you said she was boring.”
“This girl is not the girl I once knew,” Joseph said, shaking his head. “It appears your engagement to her has brought about a change in her.”
