His grip tightened before he could stop it.
Eleanor looked up at him. “You are holding me rather firmly.”
James forced his expression into neutrality. “Do you object?”
“No,” she said softly. “I only noticed.”
He did not answer. He guided her into the first turn, the movement smooth, correct, practiced. The room blurred at theedges as he focused on not thinking about what he had no right to think about.
Eleanor’s gown caught the candlelight and shifted color as she moved. Sea-glass, indeed. Blue, then green, then something pale and luminous.
“You chose well,” James said, because it was safe.
Eleanor’s eyes warmed. “I hoped you might think so.”
He should have stopped there.
He did not.
“And you,” Eleanor added, her voice quieter now, as if she were speaking only to him. “You look… severe.”
James’s mouth tightened. “That is not a compliment.”
Eleanor’s lips curved slightly. “It might be.”
He almost smiled. Almost.
She tilted her head, as if considering him. “You also smell incredible.”
The words were simple. The effect was not.
James felt heat rise in a place he did not wish to acknowledge. He let out a short sound, half laugh and half disbelief.
“You are not meant to say things like that in a ballroom,” he murmured.
Eleanor’s gaze held his, steady and unrepentant. “Am I not?”
“No.”
“And yet you are not telling me to stop,” she said.
James’s jaw clenched.
They turned again. The orchestra’s rhythm carried them. Eleanor moved with ease, but there was something beneath it now. A tension that belonged to them alone.
“Your theme is very subtle,” James said, returning to safe ground.
Eleanor’s eyes flicked toward the candles and flowers, then back to him. “It is meant to be. I did not want it to feel like decoration. I wanted it to feel like atmosphere.”
“It does.”
“And the schedule,” Eleanor continued, voice brisking a shade, as if she were grateful for the shift. “The supper will be served atten. The second set begins shortly after nine. There are to be two intermissions so the orchestra may rest.”
James nodded. “Efficient.”
Eleanor’s expression softened. “You have not said whether you approve.”
James glanced down at her. “If I did not approve, I would have stopped it.”
