“Well, that’s not an option,” laughed Dorian, kissing Rose. “Take your dances while you can, Lady Francesca. You might find yourself locked up for months after tonight if you get on the wrong side of Lady Madeline.”
“As if she could lock me up,” the young woman muttered disrespectfully with a baleful glance to Madeline, but still took the arm that Levi Collins offered her, his expression bemused.
“I will be back for the next dance, Lady Madeline,” he said, with a small bow and began to walk away with Francesca. “If you would be so kind.”
Madeline nodded faintly at his retreating back and then gave a long sigh.
“Thank you,” she told Dorian. “I have been at my wits end with her tonight.”
The Duchess of Westvale made sympathetic noises and patted Madeline on the back.
“Perhaps your cousin ought not to be out yet,” Eugenia suggested. “Could you keep her back another year, do you think?”
Madeline shook her head hopelessly.
“She would escape down the drainpipe to the nearest ballroom,” Dorian proposed and Madeline answered him with a rueful smile.
“You may joke, but I would not put that past her. Francesca simply does not seem to understand that her actions have consequences and that they could be her undoing.”
Her brow creased with worry as she looked towards her cousin. Rose laid a hand on her shoulder.
“You should still dance with the Duke of Hawcrest when he returns though. He is a good man and I believe you would like him.”
“I would watch Francesca for you,” offered the Duchess of Westvale. “You have not been out on the dance floor once tonight, have you?”
Madeline shook her head.
“I could not leave Francesca alone and I am hardly in demand. Do you think your friend really want to dance with me, or was he only being polite? I feel like a frazzled old maid tonight, Rose.”
“Levi Collins would not have asked you, if he did not wish it,” Rose told her. “He is a straightforward man.”
When the Duke of Hawcrest returned from the dance floor to claim Madeline’s hand for the quadrille, she granted it. Meanwhile, taking an iron grip on Francesca’s arm, the Duchess of Westvale steered the girl towards the supper rooms, telling Madeline to find them in there when she was ready.
Over on the dance floor, it seemed that Magnus and Lady Helena were preparing to dance together again, and Rose’s eyes sparkled at the sight of apparently easy conversation between the couple.
“I think our mission here tonight is over,” she said, turning in her husband’s arms to face him.
“Are you telling me to take you home?”
“You may take me wherever you wish, beloved husband,” Rose answered. “But remember how much forgiveness you have yet to earn.”
Dorian grinned, a wolfish smile that animated his whole face and made Rose’s skin shiver in anticipation.
“Oh, I intend to earn it at least once in the carriage and then again in our bed, beloved wife,” he answered. “Then tomorrow, and the next day and the next…”
Looking back at her husband with radiant confidence and desire, Rose gloried in the quickening of his breathing and the way his eyes lingered hungrily on her full and almost naked breasts between diamonds and blue silk. After all their trials, she was finally the equal of former Duchess Juliana now, and fully mistress of her domain.
Rose was the Duchess of Ravenhill. This handsome, lusty and good-hearted duke belonged to her, and she to him. They would never be parted again.
Hand in hand, a few minutes later, the Duke and Duchess of Ravenhill slipped quietly from the ballroom and out into the night.
Epilogue
“‘As their boat sailed into the sunset, Sir Barnabas enfolded Lady Felicity in his manly arms, safe now from all their enemies and assured of future happiness,’” the Duchess of Ravenhill read aloud from Mrs. Cadwallader’s latest romance novel with a contented sigh.
Beside her on the sofa, the Duke of Ravenhill rubbed his wife’s feet under the woolen blanket and glanced to the fire to make sure it required no further logs yet. The room was warm and cosy on this cold February night and Rose’s cheeks glowed pinkly.
Dorian had invited her to read her latest romance novel to him more out of enjoyment in hearing her voice and seeing the animation of the story on her face rather than from genuine curiosity about the words of Mrs. Cadwallader.
