Eleven
“Beau-ti-ful-four! There-you-go-four,” Nate called out as he and Georgette moved through the intricate steps.
Simple counting had become boring in short order, and after his particularly untuneful attempt at humming an appropriate melody in common time, he’d settled on rhythmic encouragement to keep their steps synchronized.
It had the added benefit of making Georgette laugh at intervals.
Her nose was still a little red from her earlier tears, but her eyes were brighter now.
Nathaniel had never been tempted to hit a woman before, but if he were Lord Yorkingham, he’d have taken his wife over his knee and paddled her bum before he let her crush his daughter’s spirit as Lady Yorkingham had crushed Georgette’s at the dining table.
“One-more-turn-four,” Georgette said, giving him a bit of a break as the set of figures came to a close and she settled into a deep curtsy. “Now-we’re-done-four.”
“Done for? Oh, I hope not.”
She laughed and the joyful sound broke over his heart like a sunrise. Then her expression turned serious.
“This helps tremendously. Now I’ll be able to face Mr. Gooch tomorrow. Thank you, Nathaniel.”
“My pleasure, milady.” He swept an old-fashioned bow. “Now, enough country dances. Do you know how to waltz?”
Her eyes went round. “Of course not. I’ve never even seen it danced, but I’ve heard it’s positively indecent.”
He silently conceded the point. The waltz made a man and a woman move in tandem, their bodies as close as the man dared and the woman allowed. There was no doubt about it. There was something undeniably sensual about dipping and turning together to a languid three-quarter-time melody.
“Indecent or not, the Prince Regent is mad about the waltz,” Nathaniel said. “He introduced it to his court over a year ago.”
“I read the notices at the time.” She tucked a wayward lock of hair behind her ear. “‘Obscene’ was one of the nicer things the Times had to say about it.”
“The press will come around so long as the dance remains a favorite at court. They always do. In the end, the royals can do no wrong.”
As opposed to me, he thought wryly.
“Imagine how pleased your mother will be when you surprise her and the Duke of Cambridge with a waltz,” he said.
Her worried frown was back.
Nate despised himself for stooping to that level of extortion, but he wanted so desperately to hold her, it was beginning to border on a sickness.
She’d been skittish around him since he took those liberties in the hackney.
Teaching her the waltz was the only way he could be sure she’d allow him to touch her again.
Finally, she sighed. “Very well. Teach me.”
***
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.
“Milady’s fine. She’s a big girl,” Mercy said. “She can certainly manage a gentleman like Lord Nathaniel or I’m much mistook.”
Instead of heading down to the common room below stairs, Mercy began climbing the steps.
“We’re not going back to join the others?” Reuben asked.
“No.”
“Then where are we going?”
She stopped on the step above him, turned around, and cupped his cheeks with both hands. Then she kissed him, right on the mouth.
It was hard and quick, a resounding bass drum bang of a kiss. It reverberated through him, clear to the soles of his feet.
“Ye’re a fine figure of a man, Reuben Darling, and we’re going to my room,” she said simply. “Now don’t ye say another word. Or I might just change my mind.”
Reuben clamped his lips shut and purposed in his heart not to utter another sound, if his hope of heaven depended upon it.
He suspected it truly did.