Chapter 25 - William #2
Devonshire was here, whirling his wife around the ballroom floor.
William quite liked the man, liked that he didn't bow to social convention, especially not where his family was concerned. It was considered borderline rude for a gentleman to dance with no one but his wife, but Devonshire didn’t care a whit about that.
He wished to dance with his wife, so he did, and heaven help anyone stupid enough to say a word against him for it.
Nearly a quarter hour passed. William kept his eyes upon his sisters.
Claire had her head bent a little closer to that Rutheridge fellow than he would have liked, but as it was Claire and not one of the younger girls, he was prepared to trust her judgment in the matter.
Besides, if he took any liberties, William and Abeer would simply visit the man and strong-arm him into offering for Claire.
It was only right if a gentleman overstepped the bounds.
William exhaled a laugh through his nose.
There wasn’t a person in the ton who wouldn't say the same of him if they knew what had occurred in the gardens four years ago between him and Dahlia.
Perhaps he would have felt honor-bound to offer for her even now if she didn't seem completely unbothered by their kiss.
Perhaps that was what irritated him about her recent absence more than anything—that she had left far more of an imprint upon him than he had upon her. Wasn’t it supposed to be the other way around?
William had thought women were the more delicate sex.
They were supposed to be the ones who needed protecting.
Perhaps that was true—in the physical sense.
However, William was starting to get the sneaking suspicion that all the ladies in his life were far stronger than their delicate features would suggest.
Besides, if the amount of time she’d occupied his thoughts as of late was any indication, perhaps it was he who’d needed protection from Dahlia Warrington, and not the reverse.
Across the room, Margaret clutched a tiny cup of punch and watched the swirl of silk on the dance floor with wide, excited eyes.
Just to the left and back of her was a group of gentlemen.
Several of them glanced her direction. The tallest one of the lot—a dark-haired fellow William didn’t recognize—failed to look away when the rest of the group did.
Instead, he traced Margaret's movements, watching her as she watched the dancers.
The dresses were doing their job, then. There was at least a little interest where his sisters were concerned.
A little interest was all William could hope for this evening.
He settled back against the pillar to wait.
These things lasted hours. He tried to make use of his time by mentally writing and revising a letter to his steward at the silk plantation in Ratnagiri.
"Good heavens, William," Margaret said, returning to him a half hour later. She fluffed her skirts. "No one is going to give a second glance at us now that you've unleashed Dahlia upon the populace."
He uncrossed his arms and stood straight. "Whatever do you mean?"
Lily sidled up to his other side. "Have you not seen her, then? I wonder if she’s garnering so much attention on purpose, to make things more comfortable for us at our first ball."
"I've no doubt she did it on purpose." Margaret snickered. "But I don't know that she was thinking of us ladies at all when she did so."
Beside her, Beatrice grinned. "Agreed—I think Dahlia's thoughts were elsewhere when she dressed this evening."
William craned his neck to see what his sisters were talking about. There. Across the ballroom, Dahlia whirled through the steps of a waltz in the arms of a young lord. She danced with an incredible grace, smiling up at the man as if he were telling the most fascinating of stories.
Something in William's heart or midsection collapsed in on itself. In the vacuum left behind, a fire roared to life.
Dahlia wore a gown of deep purple brocade that only added to her nearly incandescent natural beauty. He jolted with annoyed recognition—that was the silk he'd given her.
He wanted to tell himself that he was irritated because this was supposed to be his sisters’ grand debut, that Dahlia was stealing some of the attention that should have been theirs.
But all he could think as he watched her being swept around the ballroom by a handsome gentleman was mine, mine, mine, mine, MINE.
"I think our dear brother has finally caught on to the plot," Beatrice said, a slow smile stealing over her mouth.
"Do shut up," he grumbled distractedly, unable to tear his eyes away from the scene across the room.
Beatrice laughed. "No matter, I’ll disturb you no longer. Lord Harvey has requested the next dance."
That should have piqued his interest—that one of his sisters had been asked to dance—but he found he didn’t care.
He strode through the crowd, immune to the feminine murmurs and the fans fluttering in his wake. William stood and watched Dahlia Warrington and, for the first time in many years, berated himself as an idiot.
He should have known before now. He should have realized it. It was perverse that it had taken over a week of her absence and then seeing her in another man's arms to know what his heart had been trying to get through his thick skull these past weeks.
But William was nothing if not able to see where he'd gone wrong. He'd made an exceptionally profitable career learning from his mistakes.
He hadn't been paying attention before. He hadn't seen what was going on with himself until now. It hardly mattered.
Miss Dahlia Warrington had the entire force of his focus, starting precisely now.