"I can certainly try."
"It won't help your case with your aunt."
"My case with my aunt is already doomed." Gabriel's eyes found Clara across the room, standing with the other upper servants, wearing a simple but well-fitted dress that made his hands itch to touch her. She was watching him, though she looked away quickly when their eyes met.
"You're staring," Edmund observed.
"I'm observing the room."
"You're observing one particular corner of the room with remarkable intensity."
“Be silent, Edmund."
"Your Grace!" Aunt Agatha appeared with Miss Ashworth in tow. The girl looked pale but determined, like someone facing execution with dignity. "Penelope has been hoping for a dance."
"Has she indeed?" Gabriel looked at Miss Ashworth. "Or have you been hoping she desires a dance?"
"Gabriel," Aunt Agatha warned.
Miss Ashworth surprised him by speaking up. "Actually, Your Grace, I'd prefer honesty to pretense. If you'd rather not dance, we could simply stand here and discuss something bland while appearing engaged."
"What would you consider appropriately bland?"
"The weather is always safe. Or we could debate the merits of various tea varieties. I'm particularly partial to discussions about soil management, as they tend to make people leave us alone."
Despite himself, Gabriel almost smiled. "Soil management?"
"It's remarkably effective at discouraging unwanted conversation. Start explaining nitrogen content and crop rotation, and watch people suddenly remember urgent business elsewhere."
"You're more strategic than you appear."
"I have to be. I'm eighteen with a substantial dowry and a father who views me as an investment opportunity."
"That's rather cynical for someone your age."
"That's realistic for someone in my position. Shall we dance, Your Grace? The sooner we perform this charade, the sooner we can retreat to opposite corners and pretend we're considering a future together."
Gabriel offered his arm. "You're entirely too perceptive."
"And you're entirely too obsessed with your housekeeper to notice anyone else."
He stopped walking. “I do not apprehend your meaning.”
"Of course you don't. Just as you haven't looked at her seventeen times since we started this conversation."
"You're counting again?"
"I told you, I'm very bored. Your desperate pining is the most entertainment I've had all season."
"I don't pine."
"You're right. Pining suggests something gentle and poetic. What you're doing is more like... burning."
They reached the dance floor, and Gabriel positioned them for the cotillion. "You're dangerously observant."
"It's my only defense mechanism. That and discussing soil management."
The dance began, and Gabriel forced himself to focus on the steps rather than the fact that Clara was watching from across the room. He could feel her gaze like a physical touch, and it took every ounce of self-control not to abandon Miss Ashworth mid-dance and go to her.
