Chapter Fourteen #2
Adam muttered something under his breath, though Athena only caught the words mother and torture.
“What am I to tell the Dowager Duchess?” Athena asked, feeling anxious to leave. Adam’s expression was growing less docile by the moment.
“Tell her no,” Adam replied simply, picking up a book set on an end table beside the couch where he was sitting.
“But I cannot dance the minuet without a partner,” Athena said, her protest feeble and barely audible. She would rather not dance the minuet at all but didn’t imagine the Dowager would allow her to back out.
“Adam, you couldn’t pretend to be cooperative for the space of a single dance?” Harry asked.
Adam’s eyes slung to Harry, his look one of reproach.
His tone, when he spoke, was as authoritative as always, but Athena thought he sounded reluctant, as if he was begrudgingly making the admission he offered.
“If I move, Daphne will wake up. She has not been feeling well, and I will not rob her of rest when she has been ailing.”
The look in Adam’s eyes clearly challenged the onlookers to argue with him.
He, apparently, didn’t realize that his words were far too shocking for something as futile as disagreement.
Until that moment Athena would not have believed her irascible brother-in-law had tender feelings for anyone beyond Persephone, and she only assumed he had tender feelings for his wife. What an enigma the man was.
“Poor thing,” Harry said. “I hadn’t realized she was unwell.”
“She makes a point of never complaining about anything,” Adam replied, a hint of frustration in his tone. “She needs to give herself greater priority.”
“Well, then,” Harry said. “I will leave Miss Daphne in your surprisingly capable hands and will escort Athena to the ballroom myself.”
“And when you are finished there, throw yourself out,” Adam instructed, turning his eyes back to the book in his hand.
“Perhaps after dinner,” Harry replied.
Adam rolled his eyes but didn’t object.
“Now, off to slay the dragon in the ballroom,” Harry announced and slipped Athena’s arm through his own.
“Did you just call my mother a dragon?” Adam called after them as Harry pulled Athena along.
Harry simply laughed in response.
Walking down the hallway toward the stairs, Athena breathed a sigh of unmitigated relief. Adam made her nervous. And with the unexpected knowledge that he did not at all have that effect on Daphne, Adam was now confusing.
“Do they really spend that much time with one another?” Athena asked, knowing instinctively that Harry would understand precisely what she was attempting to ask.
“Indeed,” he answered. “They have an hour set aside every afternoon that belongs exclusively to the two of them. Daphne very nearly skinned me alive when I interrupted once.”
“It is a difficult picture to reconcile with my understanding of Adam’s character,” Athena admitted.
“Which is ironic,” Harry replied, laying his hand on Athena’s where it rested on his arm. “You see, I found Daphne’s participation surprising, but not Adam’s.”
“Why not Adam’s?” Athena looked up at Harry, meeting his eyes as he looked down at her. He had a way of looking at her that made her feel warm inside, contented. He could bring a smile to her lips no matter how unhappy or uncertain she felt.
“While he does not allow many to see it, Adam is actually a very kindhearted person. He is hard and, at times, acidic, and he is fearsome when defending his own, but he is far more tender beneath it all than he lets on. And I think he sees something of himself in Daphne. They both, you see, are shy.”
“Shy?” Athena didn’t believe Adam had a shy bone in all his body.
“Believe me,” Harry answered. “Adam far prefers quiet and solitude and does not at all enjoy interacting with those who are not part of his most intimate circle of acquaintances. He has always covered those tendencies by making everyone too afraid to approach him.”
They had reached the ballroom. As always, Harry had managed to keep Athena’s thoughts off her troubles long enough to allow her to approach the crisis without worrying herself into a dither. What would she do without Harry?
“Where is Adam?” The Dowager Duchess’s voice sounded almost before they’d entered the ballroom.
“He is seeing to a rather urgent item of business,” Harry answered, squeezing Athena’s hand, almost as if he knew she found the Dowager nearly as intimidating as she found Adam. “I have been sent as his less-desirable stand-in.”
“Don’t say that,” Athena replied, struck by the realization that, while he uttered the self-deprecating comment with a smile, there was something like sincerity touching his tone. She lowered her voice, hoping the Dowager wouldn’t overhear. “I would far rather dance with you than with him.”
There was something strangely brokenhearted in the smile he offered her in response. She didn’t take her eyes from his face as he turned to speak to the Dowager.
“What is this I hear, Mother Harriet, about a minuet?” he asked.
“It is to be the opening dance at Athena’s ball, and I wished to see her dance it.”
“But Athena does not like to dance the minuet,” Harry answered.
“It is the most elegant choice,” the Dowager countered.
“But, as this ball is in honor of Athena, I think the wisest choice would be the dance that she most enjoys. If she and Adam are both miserable,” Harry continued, “you would not be setting a very promising tone for her ball.”
“I hadn’t thought of that,” the Dowager replied. She sounded promisingly reflective.
Athena let her gaze slide between the Dowager and Harry. Had Harry convinced her to change her plans? Was Athena to be spared “ordeal by minuet”?
“What would you suggest instead?” the Dowager asked.
“While Adam generally selects a minuet when he stands up with his wife, I believe he would not object to a quadrille, if Persephone and I made up the remainder of the set,” Harry said.
Athena felt herself smile—she liked the quadrille.
And to have Harry in the set with her would put her mind at ease.
“I have seen Athena dance the quadrille, and I do believe she would appear very much to advantage should that be your choice.”
“I would agree,” Persephone added to the discussion. Athena hadn’t even noticed her there.
Athena knew it was the Dowager’s opinion that counted most. The minuet would be endurable, but the idea of simply enduring her come-out ball was beyond depressing.
Athena had dreamed of a ball of her own since she was very young.
She wished it to be magical, to be wonderfully delightful.
The quadrille would be a vast improvement.
“The minuet would have been best,” the Dowager said.
Athena hoped it was the start of a concession. She held Harry’s arm a little more tightly.
“I believe a quadrille would do fine,” the Dowager finished. “Persephone and I could certainly rearrange the order of dances.”
“We certainly could,” Persephone replied.
Athena released the tense breath she’d been all but holding.
“Bless you, Harry,” she whispered, leaning against his arm a little.
He had just rescued a portion of her dreams. Now, if only he could find a wonderful sort of gentleman to introduce her to—one who would sweep her off her feet.
But he didn’t have a very promising record.