Chapter 7 - Claire #2
Claire frowned. Perhaps there was something to his assertion. She did feel just a tiny bit worried, if she were being honest. She let out her breath in a great gust.
“Have you had any champagne?” he asked.
“No. Why? Does my breath smell of it?”
He smiled warmly down at her. “The opposite, which is why I asked.”
“I don’t want to say anything foolish.”
“On the contrary, my dear,” he said, snagging two sparkling flutes from a passing servant, “three glasses of champagne will make you stupid, but one will make you far more human.”
She accepted the glass and lifted her chin. “As opposed to what?”
“I’m not sure,” he said, “but it appeared as if I were leading a fire poker in that first dance.”
“Did you really just call me a fire poker?”
“No, of course not. I said you appeared to be a fire poker. Anyone with two eyes can see that you are, in fact, just a very stressed lady.”
“I’m not stressed.” She winced and took a sip of the champagne. The lovely bubbles rushed over her tongue with a crisp sweetness.
“Wonderful to hear it. I must be mistaken.”
“Isn’t there anyone you wish to introduce me to?”
Claire looked about but didn’t see any appropriate gentlemen. The only ones she saw appeared too handsome and charming to fit her parameters. Did sensible gentlemen even attend balls? She suddenly didn’t know.
His eyes scanned the surrounding crowd. “No.”
“The whole point of you pretending to court me is to ingratiate me with the other gentlemen.”
“There is no need to remind me of that, madam,” he nearly growled. “But all in due time. If I try to foist you off on the nearest man after only one dance, it will appear as if I wish to be rid of you. We want everyone to think the opposite is true.”
“Very well.”
“You forget, Claire, that I have four more years of experience than you when it comes to social maneuvering. I wish you’d put a little more trust in me.”
“Fine.” She finished her champagne and set the empty glass on a passing tray. “What now?”
“Now we wait till that champagne takes effect, or we get you a second glass.”
She tilted her head. “Do be serious.”
“I am, entirely. Ah, look. You won our wager.” He nodded to the center of the dance floor, where another waltz was taking place.
Claire did her best to see around the milling people without craning her neck in an obvious fashion. Lily was waltzing with a gentleman Claire didn’t know. He was tall with broad shoulders and a handsome face. However, he appeared to be glowering down at her.
“It appears as if she’s having as much fun as you are,” Michael said.
Lily looked exceptionally beautiful that evening in an emerald-green dress that flowed close to her lovely figure from shoulder to waist and then draped in loose folds to the floor.
Lily was always beautiful, but she was astoundingly so tonight.
If Claire hadn’t loved her so well, she might have been tempted toward jealousy.
“It appears she needs a glass of champagne, too,” Claire noted.
In fact, Lily looked distinctly uncomfortable. She was being swirled around by the handsome stranger, who looked as dangerous as a knife. They made quite the stunning contrast. No wonder people were staring at the couple—Claire could barely help it herself.
“I’ll be sure to hear the full story later this evening.”
He turned to her. “Of course. Now, how are you? Do you require another beverage?”
Claire pressed a hand to quell the nervous fluttering in her stomach. “I think I’d better wait. I never was one for drinking. It seems to go straight to my head.”
Michael reached out, gently gripped her wrist, and gave her arm a little shake. He nodded. “There’s more movement in your limbs, which is an excellent start.”
She yanked her hand from his grasp. “Don’t forget we’re in public.”
“Oh, I forget nothing.” He offered his arm easily. “Now let’s take a turn about the ballroom and let everyone see how happy we are.”
Claire let out an exasperated breath. Impossible man.
She didn’t like the feeling of being taken off guard.
She wasn’t used to being the one rocked back upon her heels, emotionally speaking.
Yet, even as he vexed her, he coaxed a smile from her at the same time.
She didn’t know how he did it; it was as if he slipped humor in amongst her irritation.
Claire took Michael’s elbow. For the next hour, she allowed him to lead her around the periphery of the room.
Michael had an abundance of friends and acquaintances; he was received warmly everywhere they went.
Because Claire was on his elbow, she was offered much the same treatment.
It was slightly bewildering that she’d had so much apprehension and fear before this evening, and now it seemed to be going so well.
“There,” he murmured in her ear once they had completed a full circuit and were more or less standing in the same corner in which they’d begun, “that wasn’t so bad, was it?”
Claire shook her head.
“Ah, here comes Aunt Dora. She’s with some of her friends. Watch the one on the left. She has a sharp tongue.”
Claire blinked when she realized she recognized the lady of whom he spoke. It was Dahlia’s Aunt Janie, who nodded and smiled.
“Good evening, Miss Preston,” she said. “How are you finding the ball?”
“Very well, thank you.” Claire’s smile came easily, and she realized that Michael’s suggestion of champagne had been sound advice.
“There are a relatively even number of gentlemen to ladies, thank goodness,” the grand silver-haired lady in the center said.
Michael’s Aunt Dora leaned forward and said, “Your Grace, may I please present Miss Claire Preston?”
The lady in the center jerked a nod. “I’ve heard a great deal about you.”
Claire gave a winning smile and a regal nod, though she still wasn’t sure whom she was addressing.
“Heaven’s sake, Marie,” Janie said brusquely to the woman in the center. “You’re always going out of turn, aren’t you?” Janie made eye contact with Claire. “This is the Dowager Duchess Reeves.”
“Well, of course she already knew that,” the woman in the center snapped. “Didn’t you?”
Claire was grateful when the other ladies began to interject, for she didn’t wish to contradict the esteemed, elegant lady, or to offend her by informing her that she hadn’t known who she was.
Claire realized that she might as well have spent the past four years in a prison, so much had passed her by.
She and her sisters had treated their townhome as such—or perhaps worse, because prisoners are encouraged to look out the windows—or so she imagined.
But Claire and her sisters had stayed away from the banks of glass in order that the house might appear vacant and the bill collectors would leave them be.
“If the two of you aren’t married by the end of the Season,” Janie shocked Claire by saying, “you should come see us, Miss Preston.”
Claire just blinked at her.
“Oh, leave the girl be,” the dowager duchess said. “It’s the first ball, for heaven’s sake. Besides, we’re busy enough. We hardly need additional clients.”
“Clients?” Michael leaned forward, his eyebrows raised. “Aunt Dora, what’s this about clients?”
“Oh, nothing, dear,” she said with an easy smile, even as she reached over and pinched the dowager duchess.
The grand lady looked momentarily shocked, then swatted at her with her dangling fan. The three ladies left as if on cue, bickering about telling everyone in all of London.
“What on earth was that about?” Claire murmured.
“Nothing good, I’ll tell you that,” Michael said. “Aunt Dora always was one for a ridiculous scheme, and now that she’s fallen in with that lot, I shudder to think of what they might be coming up with.”
“She keeps excellent company. She cannot be getting into too much trouble,” she said.
Michael seemed mollified by the thought. Another servant passed by, carrying a tray of champagne flutes.
“What do you think?” Claire said, nodding at the glasses. “Shall I have another?”
“Gotten a taste for it, have you?” Michael smiled down at her. “I think you’re just fine with one.”
“That’s very controlling of you,” Claire said. “What if I want three more?”
“Then I shall lead you around the dance floor, staggering and drunk. If you don’t believe I’d do it, you may try it and find out.” His smiling eyes held a taunting dare. “Though getting drunk is hardly the way to attract the Tweed set.”
“Excellent point. Perhaps another punch, then.”
“Indeed.”
Michael led them over to the punch table, greeting several groupings of young men and ladies along the way.
With the way they smiled at her, Claire was struck by the momentary idea that if Michael really were courting her, some of them might soon be true friends of hers.
Yet none of it was real. It was all too easy for Claire to forget, even though they’d just begun.
She had to guard her heart from a lie of her own making.
Michael handed her a crystal cup of punch. It was pink, with a lovely froth at the top that spoke of sorbet. “Do you see any potential victims? Any Tweeds?”
Claire shook her head at the way he insisted on drawing out the vowel of the word. “I thought spotting them was your job.”
“Indeed.” He glanced around far too quickly for his eye to rest on anyone in particular. “Nope, I don’t see any. We’ll simply have to dance awhile longer until they come slinking from their pastures with ears twitching, looking for any sign of danger.”
“You truly are despicable,” she said with little heat. In truth, his antics made her smile.
They finished their punch and moved back to the dance floor.
“Ah, look,” Michael said, nodding to the far corner. “There they are.”
“Who?” Claire asked. She’d become momentarily distracted by the warm press of Michael’s hand on hers again.
“Your Tweeds. They’ve bunched together near the dessert table. Look at them, all clustered for safety. You cannot blame them—it must be instinctual. There might be a predator about, after all. Have you ever noticed that sheep do the exact same thing?”
Claire pressed her lips together to keep from smiling. Though entertainment hadn’t been her intent, she had to admit that Michael was a lively guide to the ton.
“Following one another around,” he continued in a low tone. “Tentatively nibbling their refreshments.”
“You’re terrible, Michael.” But Claire couldn’t quite keep the tremor of laughter from her voice.
“Ironic, since Tweed is most often made from wool. I suppose they save a fortune at the tailor’s.”
“Do be serious.”
“Very well,” he said, swirling her so that her back was to the gentlemen he’d previously been mocking. “What shall we discuss?”
“This is our second dance together,” she said, “so it must be our last.”
“This is our first.”
Claire frowned. “How do you figure?”
“The first was not a whole dance, merely a quarter of one or so, so that doesn’t count. This will be our first complete dance, so it counts as one.”
“I don’t think that’s how things work.”
“How would you know? You haven’t been outside long enough to let the sun tan your cheeks, let alone long enough to hear the etiquette surrounding dances.”
“Certainly not that much has changed since I’ve been away.” Even she heard the uncertainty in her voice.
That’s what she’d taken to calling it—being away. For all the ton knew, the Prestons had been away. In Lily’s case, it was an actuality. For the rest of them, it was a practical reality.
“I see your brother has wasted no time.” Michael nodded over to where William was dancing with Dahlia. She looked stunning as William led her around the floor—the purple and gold threading of her gown was lustrous in the candlelight.
Claire shook her head. “I fear that may be over before it begins. My brother is a spectacular form of idiot.”
“How so?” Michael cocked his head.
“He offended the lady before he realized how he felt about her, and she did the sensible thing and left him alone long enough for him to figure it out. But per his signature style, it’s taken him too long, and now look.
” She nodded toward the line of gentlemen who had their eyes clamped upon the couple.
“If she cares for him, then none of them are true competition.”
“I’m not sure. Dahlia made her intent to marry known right after my brother offended her.”
A slow smile stole over Michael’s face. “Then she must have cared for him, otherwise she wouldn’t have had such a pointed response.”
Michael had a point, but Claire hardly wanted to admit it to him. “I don’t think that Dahlia Warrington is the type of lady who overlooks an insult, especially when it was given directly to her face.”
“That’s a story I’m keen to hear, but it must wait until tomorrow, as we are currently dancing too close to others for you to relay it with any hope of confidence. Besides, it looks as if he’s gotten into the spirit of things now.”
Claire chuckled. “It will be good to see him on a merry little chase, but I fear that’s all that’s waiting for him there.”
Michael gave a thoughtful hum but didn’t agree with her, which made her think that he thought otherwise.
“Beatrice is dancing too,” he murmured.
He turned her so that she could see past his large frame to where Beatrice was dancing with a slim, sallow-looking man who held her as far away as the spindly length of his arms allowed.
“You’d better warn your sisters off of your suitors,” he murmured. “It looks like Beatrice has gone after one of your Tweeds.”
Claire pinched him on the shoulder and he chuckled lowly. “Perhaps even one flute of champagne was too much, if you insist on groping me in public.”
“That was not a grope,” she insisted, fighting the flush in her cheeks.
“If that wasn’t a grope, I can hardly wait to discover what is.”
She pressed her lips together in lieu of rolling her eyes. Time had passed quickly, as it seemed to do when she was with Michael, and soon the dance was ending.
“May I have another?” he asked.
“Three would signal that you’re well past courting and have decided to marry me. I want the other men to be interested, remember?”
“How could I possibly forget?” he muttered. The next moment, he turned to her with a smooth smile. “May I have another?”
Claire shook her head, smiling despite herself, and went to go find her sisters.