“Not at all,” she said playfully.
Across the room, Thalia’s partner led her out to dance. The man didn’t know what a treasure he held in his hands; the way he looked at her, he expected her to be like every other insipid debutante in the room, rather than the spirited, independent woman he knew her to be.
Thalia’s eyes glazed as the man spoke.
“He’s a lost cause,” the Duchess said to her husband. “We should leave him to his preoccupation. Do you think he will notice?”
Maxwell turned back to his companions. “My apologies. I am…” There was no excuse that could justify his rudeness. “I’m a poor conversationalist this evening,” he said.
“Then we shall spare you the pain of forcing conversation any longer,” the Duke of Kirkford said. “Darling, would you do me the honor of dancing the next with me?”
Her eyes laughed up at his. “With pleasure.”
Maxwell retained his manners enough to bid them farewell, then returned his attention to the room.
Lydia was dancing with a blissful smile on her face, and her partner was a perfectly respectable young man of some fortune and excellent family connections.
Thalia was still dancing, of course, with the same gentleman. The light had gone from her face, and her mouth pressed together in an uncharacteristically hard line. Evidently, whatever the gentleman was saying did not please her, but he knew her well enough to know she would not say anything in public, no matter how much she was tempted.
Unable to help himself, he moved closer, standing by the wall as he observed her movements. The frown that hovered on her brow drew lower, turning the corners of her mouth down, and even her attempt at a smile seemed half-hearted.
Maxwell found himself oblivious to the rest of the ball as he watched her. So much for being bored. He could not stop wondering at what passed between them.
What could the man, whom he suspected to be the Earl of Lancaster, but he could not be certain, be saying in order to make her look like that?
And more to the point, what was her father doing sending her to associate with these men?
His hands clenched into fists as Thalia drew away from the earl, at first subtly, then rather more pointedly. Her chest heaved as she sucked in a deep breath.
He had tasted that mouth. The sweet nectar between her legs. He had heard her moans as she tipped her head back in pleasure, and he had seen the way her climax sent a flush across her cheeks.
Watching was insupportable.
Not watching was worse.
Thalia stepped back from the lines of dancing ladies, her shoulders stiff and hunched.
As Maxwell watched, she broke away and sprinted for a side door, abandoning her partner where he stood.
Tears rose in Thalia’s chest as she pushed through the double doors to the drawing room that bordered the ballroom. There were several ladies and gentlemen there, too, reclining on sofas and standing before the fire.
She couldn’t bear to see any of them.
“Lady Thalia!” Lord Redmoor said from behind her.
She increased her pace, hurrying out of the drawing room and into a large gallery space. A mural decorated all four walls, and a sculpture displayed below a domed window in the middle of the space caught her attention.
Pillars framed it on all sides, where the casual observer was no doubt supposed to walk to best appreciate the artwork.
Objectively, she could appreciate the aesthetic of the room, but she had no patience for genteel behavior.
Her father had warned her of what would happen if she disappointed Lord Redmoor, but she could not bear to marry him. Shecould not.
Even now, the memory of his hand sliding down her back made her skin crawl. Plenty of gentlemen had proven themselves occupied with nothing else but her appearance, but the way he had spoken to her, as though she was nothing more than a piece of meat for him to enjoy, had been jarring.
If she married him, he would be at liberty to act on his thoughts, and his thoughts were vile enough.
“You will button that pretty mouth of yours,” Lord Redmoor had said, “and you will agree with everything I say, because that is my right as a husband. You will dress in the clothes I provide for you, and you will be grateful that I will allow you to leave the house at all. If you stop behaving, I will revoke that privilege. Do you understand?”
