“I do,” he replied. “But I value efficiency.”
She almost smiled. “So, I am a chore to be dispatched?”
“No,” he said, steering them through a tight turn. “You are a puzzle. I have always preferred puzzles to people.”
“Is that so?” Her voice held the edge of a dare. “And what is my mystery?”
He met her eyes, blue on blue. “You appear at the edge of every room and command the attention of everyone in it, yet you act as if you would rather be invisible. I find that—unusual.”
She glanced away, the barest motion of her head. “Perhaps I prefer not to be seen for what I am.”
“And what is that?”
She said nothing, but her jaw tightened. He felt it beneath his hand, the subtle tension of muscle and bone.
“I have been told I am proud,” she said at last, “but it is more accurate to say that I dislike pity.”
“Is that what you think I feel?” he asked.
“Not you, in particular. But the world at large. They see us—my sister and me —as a cautionary tale. Poor relations, noble blood but no money, no prospects. A burden to be managed.”
He steered them into the shadow of a trellis. Here, the crowd thinned, and the music grew softer, as if the world were offering them a moment alone.
“I do not see you as a burden,” he said.
She almost laughed. “You see me as a puzzle.”
He tightened his hold fractionally. “I see you as someone who has done the work of three people since your father died. Someone who keeps her family together by sheer force of will, who sacrifices her own future so her sister might have one.”
She tried to deflect. “Anyone would do the same.”
He leaned in, just enough for only her to hear. “Don’t lie to me, Lady Lavinia. Most would have married the first man with a title and a pulse. Or worse, surrendered altogether.”
She went silent, her breath hitching as if she’d been caught out in a secret.
They danced the next measures in silence, the only sound the swish of silk and the distant, insistent waltz. He watched her carefully, noting the way her eyelids shuttered when the steps brought them close, the way she set her jaw when the movement required him to steady her.
When the music changed, and the dance drew to a close, neither moved to leave the floor.
He spoke first. “I will not insult you by offering advice, or by pretending to understand what you’ve endured. But I will say this: my daughter laughs now. She never did before you arrived.”
Lavinia’s eyes widened, then shimmered with what looked dangerously like tears.
“That is your doing,” he said, voice rougher than intended.
For a heartbeat, they simply stood, joined at hand and waist, as the world spun on without them.
A throat cleared—loudly—from the edge of the terrace.
Lavinia dropped her hands, stepped back, and composed herself in a single, graceful motion. The mask slid back into place.
“Thank you for the dance, Your Grace,” she said, inclining her head. “You are better at it than you pretend.”
He smiled, for the first time in weeks. “So are you.”
She moved to leave, but he caught her hand, just briefly. Not enough for anyone to see, but enough for her to feel.
“If you require anything, Lavinia, I am here.”
