“I am not trying to be clumsy,” she said, frowning up at him. “It’s this dress.”
“Are you referring to the potato sack that you’re wearing?”
“My aunt gave it to me.”
“Does she dislike you?”
Before Mara was able to muster a reply, everyone was required to switch partners, and she found herself facing an earl whose pragmatic touch failed to elicit even so much as a prickle. Then she was back with the Duke of Southwick, so darkly attractive, and this time she noticed that she wasn’t the only one unwillingly captivated by his ruthless charm.
“Why is everyone staring?” she asked, rising onto her toes in order to peer over his shoulder as he spun her in an arcing circle before bringing her in close, his grip on her waist tightening.
“They’re wondering who you are and why I am dancing with you.”
“Whyareyou dancing with me?”
“Because I haven’t before.”
“You haven’t danced with my sister, either,” she felt compelled to point out.
His sigh stirred the tendrils behind her ear as they passed close. “Yes, I have. A hundred times over.”
They executed a spin, broke apart, and returned to each other.
“No,” she said, a tad breathlessly. “I’m nearly sure that you haven’t. Because if you had, it’s all that she would talk about.”
The corners of his mouth curled into a shape caught halfway between a smile and a smirk. “Areyougoing to talk about our dance, Lady Marabelle?”
“That depends,” she said truthfully.
“On what?”
“On whether this is a dream or really happening.”
He chuckled. The sound of his laughter was rusty and somewhat hoarse, as if he didn’t do it very often. And maybe he didn’t. The duke did not strike her as a man particularly given to idle amusements.
“This is no dream, I can assure you of that.”
“How can you be certain?”
“Because,” he murmured, bowing his head until his mouth skimmed across her cheek, “if it were, you wouldn’t be wearing this awful gown. You wouldn’t be wearing anything at all.”
Stunned, Mara stopped in her tracks just as the dance concluded. The ballroom erupted into applause, but in the midst of the noise and the mayhem of lords and ladies searching for their next partner, her wide-eyed gaze remained locked on the duke as a rush of heat pooled low in her belly.
“I plan to call on you tomorrow at your residence,” he said, and it wasn’t a question or a request, but a statement. Ademand. “Wear something other than this, if you please. You’re far too pretty to hide behind a mountain of fabric.”
Then he was gone, and Mara—poor, ignorant, innocent Mara—was smitten.
Chapter Three
March 1813
75 Mill Lane, London, England
Ambrose did nothate his wife.
There were some, he knew, who assumed he did, assumed that was why he and Mara had rarely been seen in the same place together since their nuptials. But what they did not understand was that hate was an emotion that required great feeling, not dissimilar to love. And Ambrose was a man incapable of feeling either.
Not to say he hadn’t in the past.
