As he rose from the bow, he stopped suddenly, his mind clear as his eyes locked upon the black, diamond-encrusted reticule in her hand.
Fitz couldn’t find a single word in his rather large vocabulary; years of schooling and studying did not prepare him for seeing Patience Grant with the one thing that could secure his future.
It was her; she was the reason he was there. Suddenly obtaining a reticule from a chit became much more complicated than Fitz imagined it would be.
It was just one night, he reminded himself. Once the reticule was in his possession, Fitz would return to London, all his family debts would be forgotten, and Miss Patience Grant would remain in Brighton.
“Killingworth, would you do the honor of escorting my goddaughter in the next set?” Hightower insisted, shocking Fitz.
Across from him, Patience gave a small flinch of discomfort, like the thought of dancing with him was unpleasant.
Fitz, on the other hand, was trying to pretend that she did not affect him after all these years, but he was a terrible actor. “It would be my honor,” Fitz said as Miss Grant held out her hand with her dance card and the small pencil attached.
His foot tapped loudly as he scribbled his name on her empty dance card. He was perplexed as the room increased in chatter as he interacted with the beauty in front of him. Fitz could not quite understand the amount of attention he was garnering from signing Miss Grant’s dance card.
“Why do you have that blasted reticule? Give it to your mother, she will keep it for you,” Mrs. Miller spat out, her dark eyes cutting over to her eldest granddaughter.
Miss Grant shook her head, her gaze holding her grandmother’s. “No, I think I’ll hold on to it, thank you, Grandmother.”
A sigh of relief left Fitz. He couldn’t imagine what Mrs. Miller would do with the papers that revealed the truth about Prinny and Mrs. Fitzherbert.
The next set began and Stonelake offered his hand to Miss Mary-Anne. Turning to his own dance partner, Fitz graced her with a smile and offered his arm. “Shall we?”
Miss Grant nodded her consent before she intertwined her arm in his. As they walked away, arm in arm, her body visibly relaxed the further they were from her grandmother.
He tried to ignore the rightness of it all. How she felt beside him, the sweet smell of her teasing his senses. He thought he was over her, that being told by her grandmother that she had a better offer was the worst thing that happened to him.
Suddenly, he no longer knew anything at all.
CHAPTER5
Patience stared straight ahead as the whispers began to circle around her. She couldn’t think of them at that moment, as she was on the arm of the very man who had consumed her every thought the past five years. Of course, it was him, Fitz, the man she had loved. After all this time.
As they positioned themselves on the dance floor, the whispers increased like a swarm of buzzing insects on a hot summer day. Couldn’t Patience have one night where she wasn’t gossiped about like a prize stallion at the races?
She ignored them all, deciding that if she had one night with Fitz, again, Patience would not waste a single moment caring about what others thought.
Staring over at him, her gaze traced the familiar shape of his face. He was older, to be sure, but it did not detract in any way from how devastatingly handsome he was.
Living in Brighton she had seen gentlemen of all shapes, sizes, and countenances. No other man had been as appealing as Fitz had been when they first met, or now in the present.
He was a lord now, but she could tell that it was still him behind the title and the finer clothes. Fitz who ran with her in the sea, who had nearly kissed her once, but they had been interrupted by the Honorable Walter Reeves.
Fitz was even more intriguing to her now than he was the first time they met. Which was very bad indeed as he was only in town for a short period. Not enough time for her to indulge girlish fantasies. Besides, she had given those up years earlier.
It didn’t matter; Patience had plans for her life now. She would ensure that not another young lady under her tutelage would ever be in the position that she found herself in years ago.
She understood that either Fitz or his friend, the duke, was the gentleman whom the prince sent to retrieve the reticule. But which one could it be?
Patience took in a shaky breath, praying she would survive a single dance. The beginning chords of a waltz began, and his hand circled around her waist, pulling her body closer to his. She couldn’t breathe; her pulse beating wildly and her eyes trained on his hard face. He had perfect bone structure, a crooked nose, full lips, and a strong chin. Everything about him called to her even after all this time.
“Thank you for agreeing to dance with me, though I fear you had no choice in the matter.” His smooth voice enveloped her in a cloak of comfort as the musicians began to play.
Allowing him to guide her body across the dance floor, she looked up into green eyes the color of fallen leaves, a teasing smile on her lips. “Are you not aware that a lady always has a choice?” she retorted, aware that the world didn’t see it that way.
When she was younger, she thought she had no choice, but being treated like nothing had opened her eyes to her choices. And she was choosing to live her life for herself, starting that night, after she delivered the reticule. Patience would begin a new life in Yorkshire, and there would be nothing anyone could do to stop her.
Fitz laughed at her comment, his grip tightening. “I thought you always had a choice,” he whispered as he leaned in closer, and if she was paying any sort of attention to her usual admirers, she would’ve distinctly heard what they were whispering. But she did not; she only heard the hushed quiet voices and assumed they were discussing her and Fitz.
