Progress #2
The announcement of the supper dance stirred Beatrice from her thoughts, drawing movement and renewed energy from the assembly.
Beatrice drew in a slow breath.
This was not the time for old shadows. She was in a ballroom. There was music. Candlelight… And Beatrice had come here with a purpose.
She turned slightly, meaning to find her friend among the crush.
And then—
A flicker of pastel caught at the edge of her vision.
Lady Calliope Rensleight—Persephone’s younger sister—was making her way toward the French doors leading to the terrace.
She was one of the acknowledged beauties of the Season, and impossible to mistake for her quieter sister. Calliope had dark hair, bright blue eyes, and flawless, milk-pale skin, and by the tilt of her head, she knew the effect she had.
And not three paces behind her—
Viscount Longstaffe.
Large. Self-assured. Purposeful.
Beatrice had not considered Lord Longstaffe a threat. But where gentlemen of the ton were concerned, she could never be sure.
So, of course, she followed.
As at every other ball, the terrace lay in half-shadow, lanterns casting uneven pools of light across gravel and hedges.
When Calliope’s pale gown flashed briefly ahead before disappearing around a bend in the path, Beatrice quickened her step.
Not so fast, Lord Longstaffe…
As she slipped into the shadows, she was already arranging her face into something harmless. A smile. A flutter of apology. Perhaps a question about whether Lady Calliope had seen her misplaced glove.
Something small and, most assuredly, annoying.
She had just decided upon the glove when a small, breathless cry cut through the darkness.
“Oh—! Help me. Please—”
Beatrice lifted her skirt and ran.
“Don’t wait,” Gideon’s instructions demanded.
She rounded the bend in the path and caught sight of the couple near the rose arbor, something of a struggle, with Lady Calliope’s back to the hedge.
Lord Longstaffe stood close—far too close—his arms reaching around her.
Don’t let him take the advantage. Stab a gentleman before he misbehaves!
Relying on Gideon’s stern advice, Beatrice stepped forward, body angled, shoulders squared.
“Unhand her, my lord.”
Her voice cut cleanly through the garden air.
Longstaffe glanced over his shoulder, surprise, and then an almost amused expression touching his face.
“I beg your pardon?” the viscount said mildly.
Did he imagine she would simply retreat?
“Release her at once,” Beatrice said firmly. “Or I shall be obliged to insist.”
Longstaffe turned more fully.
“Oh!” Calliope let out a half gasp, half cry, as though she’d been hurt.
And just like that, every harmless interruption she’d ever relied on fell away.
This was the moment.
Beatrice moved with the swift certainty Gideon had drilled into her. Close the distance. Do not think. Act.
Longstaffe attempted to duck away from her swipe with the bodkin, but he didn’t quite manage it.
The blade landed. Along the edge of the viscount’s collar. The line of his jaw. A thin ribbon of crimson followed. Lord Longstaffe raised one hand to the cut, wincing at the blood he found there.
“Remove your hands from her, or I shall remove them for you.”
He swore. But then—
The clouds parted, and moonlight spilled, pale and revealing, across the gravel and the path and—
Beatrice’s gaze dropped.
Oh. Dear.
Now that she could see clearly, she realized that Lady Calliope was hopelessly tangled, trapped by the rosebush behind her. Thorns had caught the fabric of her gown from every direction—skirt, sleeve, lace—snaring her in a cruel, unyielding grip.
And each small movement, it seemed, only worsened the damage.
Lord Longstaffe was, indeed, holding the fabric. But not for nefarious purposes, it seemed, but … to help.
Heat flooded Beatrice’s face.
“I assure you,” Lord Longstaffe said, “my intentions are entirely honorable.”
“He is being perfectly gentlemanly,” Lady Calliope rushed to add, her voice trembling. “It is only this dreadful bush. I did not see it—oh, dear! Did you cut him?”
Beatrice took a small step back, her heart racing.
“Nothing to worry about,” he said, closing his hand before Lady Calliope could see more of the blood. “Do not distress yourself.”
Then his gaze shifted to Beatrice. For one brief moment, the gentlemanly blandness gave way to something drier. “Just a scratch,” he added.
Calliope shifted, then gave a small, irritated gasp as the roses caught again at her gown.
“Oh, bother.” Her blue eyes flashed toward the offending bush. “Of all the spiteful, ill-placed things.”
Calliope made another attempt to free herself and only succeeded in drawing the roses more firmly into her skirts.
Beatrice shoved the bodkin back into her hair.
A rescue was required after all—but not the one she had anticipated.
“Hold still,” she said, stepping forward.
Calliope’s chin lifted. “I am trying. You try holding still when there are a hundred blasted thorns pricking you from every direction! Ah!” Another wince as she flinched from whatever the viscount was trying to do with her sleeve.
Lord Longstaffe retreated at once, both hands raised in quiet surrender. “My apologies. I fear I’ve only managed to make it worse. The lady is well and truly claimed by the shrubbery.”
Lady Calliope’s gown had caught in multiple places. One sleeve was torn, and the skirt had been tugged indecently high by a particularly vicious cluster of thorns.
Beatrice assessed the damage.
Hmm. This required precision.
She reached to retrieve the bodkin again, but before her fingers closed around it, a hand settled lightly on her arm.
Lord Longstaffe was looming beside her, near enough that she could feel the warning coming off him. His gaze moved from the bodkin to Lady Calliope, then back to Beatrice.
“For the dress,” Beatrice said, lifting her brows. “Unless you have another idea.”
A beat passed.
Then—
“Of course,” he said, and released her arm. After another moment, he dipped his chin and stepped back. “Carry on, then.”
Beatrice bent to the task, working carefully at first, then with less delicacy when the silk refused to surrender. At last, with a small, expensive tearing sound, the fabric yielded.
Lady Calliope sprang free.
Unfortunately, the roses retained a sizeable portion of her gown.
“Oh,” Beatrice said.
Calliope looked down. “Oh, dear.”
Without another word, Lord Longstaffe removed his coat and wrapped it around her shoulders.
“There is a path around to the entrance,” he said. “Lady Beatrice, if you would be so good as to locate Lady Rensleight, she may have her daughter brought home without attracting half the ballroom’s attention.”
Calliope’s eyes widened. “Half the ballroom?”
“None of the ballroom,” he amended. “If we are fortunate.”
And as Lord Longstaffe swept her past Beatrice, he inclined his head. “You were right to intervene,” he murmured. “Next time be certain of the villain before you draw the blade.”
Then he escorted Lady Calliope into the shadows.
Beatrice remained where she was, bodkin in hand, staring at the piece of silk still fluttering in the rosebush.
Don’t hesitate or do. Either way, she seemed to make some misstep.
“Well,” said a familiar voice behind her. “The roses appear to have won.”
Beatrice closed her eyes briefly. Then turned.
Gideon stood at the edge of the path, his expression composed, his gaze moving from the bodkin to the rosebush and then back to her.
“You saw what happened?” she asked.
One shoulder lifted. And then the corner of his mouth. “You struck just before I could stop you.”
Beatrice bit her lip, and then… “You were here.”
“Near enough.”
“And you did not intervene.”
“No.”
Hmmm. He had seen. He had watched. And he had not rushed forward to take over.
“She cried out for help,” Beatrice pointed out.
“That she did.”
“She sounded frightened.”
“Yes.”
“Lord Longstaffe had his hands on her.”
“All true.”
Beatrice glanced back toward the path where Longstaffe and Lady Calliope had disappeared. “But I misread the situation.”
“You saw a young lady in distress and acted.”
Then her gaze flicked back to his. “Were you not worried?”
“About Longstaffe hurting her?
No.”
The answer came too easily.
She frowned.
“I know him.” Gideon’s gaze shifted briefly toward the path. “He is a decent fellow. Rather too broad. Occasionally irritating. But decent.”
How simple he made it sound.
To know a man. To trust him.
Beatrice wondered what that would be like.
“I do not know him,” she said.
“No,” Gideon answered, softer now. “You do not.”
For a moment, the night seemed to hold them there, filled only with distant music and the soft whisper of leaves in the breeze.
Then Gideon offered his arm. “Shall we return inside to find Lady Calliope’s mother?”
Beatrice looked at his arm.
Then at him.
“Why didn’t you come forward earlier?”
His expression changed, just slightly. “Because you were handling it.”
She blinked, then, after a moment, placed her hand on his sleeve.
You were handling it.
No one had ever said anything like that to her. Not even Lark. Not Dash. And her mother certainly hadn’t.
His hand came down over hers where it rested on his sleeve.
A simple touch. Nothing more.
And yet, Beatrice felt it through her glove, through her skin.
She forced herself to breathe.