Only you, he wanted to say, but refrained. It would not do to make her think he harbored feelings for her. He most assuredly did not.
“Yes,” she said.
They excused themselves from Leonora, Dutton, and Searle. Alessandro was acutely aware of the woman at his side as they made their way to assemble with the other dancers. The faint hint of jasmine sent a powerful rush of need surging straight through him.
But he was also feeling churlish. He had not liked suffering through watching her dance with a procession of fops. Their betrothal had only just been announced, and he wanted all the world to know she was his. It was to be expected that she dance with others at a ball, for not even a betrothed could claim each dance as his own, but the irritation mounting within him did not know that.
“You seem to be enjoying your return to society, my lady,” he observed, not without a tinge of bitterness.
He wanted her to be accepted, of course he did. For he did not wish to cast his heir into the same abysmal position in which he had found himself—reviled for who his mother was and the way he looked.
“I am treading with care,” she said, surprising him. “These are the very same people who turned their backs on me and called me ruined. Nothing has changed except your sister’s very generous sponsorship and my future place as the Countess of Rayne.”
They took up their positions on the dance floor.
“I find it difficult to believe becoming my countess would be a boon to anyone,” he remarked. “Thebeau mondehas scorned me all my life, and I, in turn, have despised them all with the burning hatred of a thousand suns.”
The dance began in truth, and she was in his arms, their hands joined. Though it had been years since he had last danced, his body recalled with ease. Steps and twirls. Lady Catriona moving with him, one with his body felt…natural.Right.He was forced to realize the coldness which had been his constant companion since Maria’s death had been warmed, just a small bit, by the woman he was about to wed.
He did not like it.
“Why not five thousand?” asked Lady Catriona as they made their way around the parquet floor, whirling in tandem with their fellow dancers.
“Five thousand?” he repeated, searching her upturned face for the answer he sought. Perhaps the twirling about was rendering her dizzy. He could not make sense of her query.
“Suns,” she elaborated, giving him a teasing smile that made more warmth trickle into his cold heart. “Why only one thousand? Why not more?”
She was teasing him. He could not recall the last time anyone had spoken to him with levity. The last time anyone haddared.
Against his will, a laugh burst from him.
Perdición, laughter.
Mayhap the waltz was makinghimlightheaded.
“Perhaps five is a more apt number,” he said.
“Why?” she queried next, her eyes almost violet tonight, glittering beneath the burning candles and against the demure lilac of her evening gown.
Though her décolletage was modest, the hint of creamy swells rising beneath the draped satin of her bodice was a temptation he had not missed. She was lovely, white beads studding her gownà la militaire, Vandyke lace adorning her hem. A sprig of white flowers accented her lustrous brown locks, which had been swept into a pile of curls on her crown, with a few tendrils framing her face.
“My lord,” she prompted, undaunted by his silence. “You did not answer my question. Why do you despise society so much?”
“They did not accept my mother,” he bit out, “and nor did they accept me.”
His mother had been the Earl of Rayne’s third wife, and he had met her in Spain, where she had become his mistress whilst he was still married to his second wife. After the second Lady Rayne’s death, Alessandro’s father had wed his mother. Though he had been born on the right side of the blanket, it had never mattered to society.
“Why did they not accept her?” Lady Catriona wanted to know.
Her voice was soft, and it would not carry to their fellow dancers, but this was hardly a dialogue he wished to have with her now. Or ever, for that matter.
“Why do you think, my lady?” he asked curtly instead. “You need only look at me for your answer.”
“Oh, Rayne,” she said, her gaze searching his. “I am sorry.”
He did not want her pity. He wanted…
Cristo, he knew not what he wanted. He had meant to dance with her, to seize upon an excuse to touch her, to show the lords and ladies of the ballroom crush she was his. But now they were waltzing, and it was somehow far more intimate than he could have imagined. The last woman he had held in his arms thus had been Maria. Her brown eyes had been glistening, her head tipped back. She had been beautiful, as always.
