“Not the Duchess,” replied the other woman. “She is Metternich’s woman. Whoever she is, they say he had a shouting match with the Emperor that was heard all the way into his reception rooms for everyone to hear. Shocking.”
Pippa had had enough of the gossip. She turned and elbowed her way through the crowd.
It was too hot in the ballroom; there were too many people, and the smell was overpowering. She was entirely alone, as Mimi would dance for the next hour with Metternich, and there was no one she knew at all, no one to talk to, nor dance with. She was invisible and entirely irrelevant in this society.
She stepped out through the double French doors onto the verandah and welcomed the cold, crisp air that kissed her cheeks.
The music and voices faded to a murmur. Leaning against the balustrade for support, she regarded the sky, allowing her heated thoughts to drift. She thought of Papa, how long ago she had left home, of all the things that had happened in Vienna since. The people she had met, everything she had experienced, from being the lowliest of palace maids to becoming the companion of an archduchess.
Klemens and the perpetual, dull ache in her heart that never went away.
She did not know how much time had passed. She lifted her head; the inky, velvety night sky was perfectly clear and dotted with ten thousand stars.
She lifted both hands to form a square, framing a small patch of the celestial spectacle. No, not ten thousand. It would result in no more than three thousand that were visible to the naked eye across the entire celestial sphere. She recalculated, frowned, and raised the number to eight thousand.
“With the help of a telescope, you would find your estimate woefully small,” said a voice behind her. She whirled around to find Klemens standing in the doorway’s shadow. “There are billions beyond what the eye can perceive, though I daresay you would attempt to count them all the same. The sole lesson one gleans from studying the stars is the rather humbling fact of their infiniteness. Trust me on this folly; I once attempted to count them myself.”
“Shouldn’t you be dancing with the Grand Duchess?” she blurted out.
“Should I?” He strolled forward. “What should I do,then? She is currently dancing with the Tsar, and the centre of all attention, for they make such a beautiful couple. I am loath to interfere.”
“But I thought the Tsar was dancing with the Princess Bagration.”
“She stepped out at the last moment. I was all too happy to pass on my partner to him.” He took another step forward.
Pippa backed away as he prowled closer, but she bumped into the column behind her.
“You should return,” she repeated, her eyes slipping sideways, looking for an escape. But there were none.
He was now so close she could feel the heat of his body, the smell of his cologne. Her heart began to race.
“And if I don’t?”
She felt the column behind her, the stone smooth and cold under her fingers.
“There will be talk.”
He reached out and pulled her forward against him, so she was pressed against his chest, his head on top of hers. “Then let them talk.” He took her hand in his, the other just below her shoulder blade, and guided her in a turn to the rhythm of the music.
It was a waltz.
The very same melody they had danced to that summer night beneath the chestnut trees of the Gasthaus garden, to the plaintive fiddling of a single violin. Then it had been a simple, rustic Ländler, but now the orchestra played it faster, the rhythm quick and bright, drawing the couples closer in greater intimacy to manage the turns. It was the newest fashion and ratherscandalous. And Klemens, naturally, danced it to perfection.
Her defences crumbled.
He guided her through each twist and turn, perfectly attuned to the three-quarter beat and to her.
She lifted her eyes and met his burning gaze. The next moment she no longer knew where the dance ended and the kiss began. They moved to the rhythm of the music, kissing as they turned, with growing urgency and deepening desperation, melting into one another until there was nothing in the world but music, movement, and the two of them.
She felt drugged by his scent, her whole body trembling with awareness, her hand sliding up into his hair.
Klemens stumbled back against the balustrade, holding on to her, his chest rising and falling with the rough, uneven rhythm of his breathing.
He steadied her, keeping them both from falling, and he raised his hand and gently brushed her cheek with his thumb.
She blinked, disoriented, and only then realised that tears had been running down her face.
She gave a small, confused sound. “Oh.”
