Chapter Six
If there was one aspect of his boyhood education Eden’s parents had not neglected, it was dancing.
His mother had been mad about dancing. She’d danced with his father every evening, with her lady’s maid playing the accompaniment. But she hadn’t needed music. She’d danced with Eden himself from the time he was a small boy, whirling him about the nursery in her arms as she hummed a tune. Later, she’d interrupt his studies or awaken him in the night to be her partner. During the years they could afford a governess, she enlisted the woman to play the pianoforte so she could teach him the minuet, the sarabande, the gavotte, and country jigs. She taught him silly dances of her own devising: galloping, twirling, jetéing in the air. Sometimes, she invited other children to come dance with him—those of farmers, villagers, or neighboring genteel families, it didn’t matter.
But she had been his primary partner. She’d encouraged him, laughed with him, told him how graceful he was, how proficient on his little feet. She’d been beautiful and joyous when she danced. He loved it, but it also scared him. Because after these happy times, she sometimes became so melancholy that she’d disappear inside her room for days or wander about the house in a nightdress, her eyes blank, like she couldn’t see him.
It could be months until, like magic, she wanted to dance again.
Tha?s, her hand in his and her eyes bright, offering to sing a song for them to dance to, was like a memory come to life. He let her lead him to the parlor, but he felt heavy on his feet, almost in a daze. When she looked at him, she cocked her head.
“Something wrong?”
“Just a memory.”
“Not a nice one,” she said. An observation, not a question.
He didn’t deny it.
“What happened? Awkward on your feet? Stepped on some poor girl? Fell into the punch bowl?”
“Nothing like that. I’m quite a good dancer, in fact.”
“Oh? Prove it.”
She began to hum a minuet. He could tell she was a terrible singer. Utterly tuneless. Evidently, she could see this on his face, because she cackled. “Well, we’re not at the opera, are we? I’m all the music you can get, unless you’d like to sing the tune.”
“Never,” he said. “I’m enjoying your performance.”
“All it’s for is to keep the time, and I know how to count. Not to brag.”
He chuckled. “Very well. Please proceed with the accompaniment.”
They took their places, and she once again began to hum. They bowed to each other and stepped forward, pausing to face each other and join hands.
As they began the first turn, Tha?s stopped humming.
“You’re stiff,” she said.
He disagreed. The minuet required impeccable posture. “I’m in form,” he countered.
“Yes,” she agreed, “but no one wants to dance with a wooden board, even if he’s in form. Let’s start again. This time, act like you want to dance with me.”
He didn’t, in point of fact. Or, he did, because it meant touching her. But that was a problem. It reminded him of last night. How he couldn’t trust his reactions to her.
Nevertheless, he assumed the original position, facing her.
“You’re looking past me,” Tha?s said. “Look into my eyes.”
He did so.
“Smile.”
He did that too.
“Like you mean it. Like you’re fond of me.”
“I do mean it.” He was fond of her, in his own way. Though, not like he hoped to be fond of a bride. There would be sweetness there. Not this charged combination of banter and veiled threat.
“Smile like you want to take me on the terrace and have your way with me,” Tha?s said.
He frowned at her and shook his head. “Utterly inappropriate.”
“Not if you’re trying to win a girl. Do you want her to think she could be anyone, or do you want her to think you want to be dancing with her?”
“Her, specifically. Of course.”
“Then tell her that with your eyes.”
He looked directly into Tha?s’s eyes and thought about how she’d appeared in the window completely nude. It was not hard to want her. Her specifically.
“That’s better,” she said. “On we go, then.”
She resumed humming, and they both walked forward. When they turned to face each other again he offered her his hand. This time, he shot her that same heated glance.
She smiled at him.
It made him realize she didn’t often smile. She was plenty merry when she wanted to be, but usually she was so busy harassing him or talking that her face didn’t reflect happiness. When she smiled, she reminded him of his mother. His mother in the happy times.
He smiled back.
“Clasp my hand like you want to take more of me,” she instructed. “Like you suffer, holding just my hand.”
He thought about his future with Tha?s, how eventually they would kiss, touch intimately, share a bed. He thought about his choice to delay this process, and his hesitation made him ache. He wanted her. It scared him to his bones, but he did. Every time he moved close enough to feel her skin, his body thrummed with a reminder of it. Every time he caught a whiff of her spicy scent, he wanted another.
They continued through the steps, with her occasionally breaking up her humming to give him instruction. As they danced on, she spoke less and smiled more.
He began to understand what she desired of him. To dance with a woman could be polite, but it could also be more like an intimate conversation. It could convey affection or longing.
Desire.
When they reached the final bow, Tha?s’s face was soft, the smile on her lips subtle. It seemed she was genuinely pleased.
“You dance like a dream, when you put your heart into it.”
Dance like a dream.It was the way his mother had danced. Perhaps this was why he could open up this part of himself. He’d inherited it from the woman who had loved him most. He’d lost it when she’d left him, but it was still there. He could have it back, if he let himself.
“Now’s the part,” Tha?s said softly, “where you whisper something in my ear.”
He moved closer. Far apart enough for decency in society, but close enough to be within the range of hearing. “Thank you for the dance,” he said. “I enjoyed it. May I have another one, later?”
She rolled her eyes. “How polite.”
“Speaking to a young lady just out in society, one has to be polite,” he pointed out.
“It’s not what you say,” she said, “it’s the tone you use to say it. Ask me for another dance like you’re asking me to join you on the terrace for a stolen kiss.”
“But I would never ask for such a thing. It would be a scandal.”
“Then make a scandal. But make it with your eyes, your voice, the lingering of your hand. Make a scandal only she’s aware of.”
A scandal only she’s aware of.He liked this turn of phrase. Tha?s could be quite eloquent when she chose to be. It was charming, actually, how her register could change between the polite tones of the ballroom to the squawking of a street vendor in a second’s time. She should be a ventriloquist.
“Let’s take it from the final bow,” he said. “I’ll try again.”
She picked up her humming, and they drew closer. This time, he didn’t smile. He looked into her eyes intently. “Thank you for the dance,” he said like he might say Come to bed with me.
“You’re welcome,” she whispered back shyly, in her cultivated accent.
“Would you permit me to ask you for another?”
Tha?s blushed. Either she could will herself to do so, or the intimacy in his tone had genuinely worked on her.
“You’ve done well,” she said softly. “Perhaps now we should move on to stolen moments.”
Before he could ask her what she meant by this, there was a knock at the door.