Page 55 of The Subtle Craft of Courting Kate

As Mama wandered off in the direction of the retiring room, Kate watched Elliot tuck Miss Applegate’s hand into the crook of his elbow as he made to escort her back to the bosom of her family. That wretched ache eating at her heart was jealousy, raw and bitter and biting. A new and unfamiliar pain, but one with which she heartily suspected she would grow increasingly acquainted in the near future.

He would marry Miss Applegate, and Kate would simply have to make her peace with it. Hopefully there would come a day when seeing them together would not make her heart feel as though it was crumbling away in her chest.

But that day was not this one. Today, he was neither married nor engaged. There had been no promises spoken, nor settlement contracts signed. There was no telling how long that would hold true, how many days remained before Miss Applegate would lay claim to him in truth.

And if the likelihood existed that she might have only days left before he was promised to another, well then—

Tonight. Tonight would be hers.

Chapter Twenty One

Elliot wove through the ballroom after delivering Miss Applegate back to her family, searching for Kate’s dark hair above the milling crowd. He spotted her at last, the sparkling silver of her gown peeking through a sea of vivid hues. Somehow she had found herself shuffled away from the prime position at the edge of the ballroom floor they had once occupied and instead toward the wall where the chaperones sat. And Mrs. Littlefield was nowhere in sight.

“Where is your mother?” he asked as he arrived beside her at last. “Surely she’s not left you alone.”

“Only for a moment,” Kate said, her shoulders rising and falling in a short shrug. “She’s gone to the retiring room.” Her fingers were knitted before her, twisting into anxious knots. She drew in a short, sharp breath and set her shoulders in determination. Pitching her voice low, she asked in a nervous rush, the words toppling over one another to escape, “Could I speak with you?”

“Of course.” Elliot felt a frown tugging at his mouth as he took in the stiff set of her shoulders, the fidgety tension that afflicted her. She was going to tug her gloves straight off her hands if she kept wringing them like that. “Kate, what is wrong? Has something happened?”

“In private,” she said, squeaking out the words through the grit of her teeth. Her complexion had taken on rather a mottled hue, the flush that gilded her high cheekbones fighting for dominance over the odd pallor that seemed to want to overtake it. “I would prefer to speak in private.”

In private? At a ball? Elliot sucked in a breath. “Your mother—”

A swift, sharp shake of her head that set her dark curls to bobbing amongst their artful arrangement. “She can’t know,” she said. “Please, Elliot.”

Hell. What was he to say to that but yes? There was no other time but now. Once the ball let out, they would be once more in the carriage, in the company of her mother. And then she would be whisked away into Devon’s townhouse behind closed doors. The scant few bits of privacy they had managed in the weeks they’d been in London had been found only in advantageous moments, but this—this was not advantageous. To contrive to secure privacy between them in so crowded a place was dangerous. Risky. Potentially injurious to her reputation.

But something—someone?—had upset her, and he could not let it pass, nor refuse her what she had asked of him so earnestly. “Yes, of course,” he heard himself say. But where? That glittering silver gown was lovely and eye-catching. She hadn’t a prayer of slipping through the main ballroom doors and upstairs without being spotted by one of the staff stationed there to keep the guests away from the private rooms. It would have to be the smaller exit that wound toward the rear of the house, where the retiring room was located. “There is a room—a library, if memory serves—two doors distant from the ladies’ retiring room.”

Kate gave an absent little nod of her head, her eyes focused upon the door to the hallway on the opposite side of the room. “I can make it there,” she said.

“You must make it there unseen,” he stressed. “Walk slowly. Be certain you share the hallway with no one else before you chance entering. Can you do that?”

Another nod, jerky and awkward. “I think so. And Mama—”

“Let me manage her.” Kate was not a particularly good liar, but then she had never had to be. “I’ll think of some excuse for you.” It would not be comfortable to deceive Mrs. Littlefield, but better it hang upon his conscience than upon Kate’s.

“My slipper,” Kate offered. “The ribbon broke earlier. I had to have it resewn.”

Perfect. “I’ll tell her it’s come loose again.” Subtly, Elliot canted his head toward the door. “Go now,” he urged, “while the set is still in progress, so there is less chance of being noticed. And wait somewhere out of sight of the door. I’ll be only a few minutes behind you.”

At last she stopped wringing her hands like a damsel in distress and drew a deep breath into her lungs. “All right,” she said in a voice of gritty determination, as if steeling herself for something, gathering her strength. “I’m going.” And she slipped into the crowd that wreathed the ballroom, sliding through the press of bodies in a slow but sure progress toward the door.

Elliot laid one hand over his chest, feeling the frantic beat of worry accelerating his heart. What on earth had happened in the scant time he’d been dancing with Miss Applegate that had so distressed her? What could have happened in a crowded ballroom that was so nerve-wracking, so sensitive a matter that she did not even wish her mother to know?

What had happened which could only be addressed with a private conversation during a crowded ball?

Not half a minute later, he caught sight of Mrs. Littlefield making her way back toward him, even as Kate was still threading her way toward the door.

“Lord Elliot,” she said in greeting, her brows knitting. “But where is Kate?”

Elliot lifted his hand to gesture toward the opposite side of the room. “You’ve just missed one another,” he said. “She mentioned something about a slipper ribbon?” Not entirely a lie, at that. But still an obfuscation that pricked a little at his conscience.

“Oh, dear,” Mrs. Littlefield clucked, with a wry little shake of her head. “It must’ve torn again. And she’ll certainly miss the next set. The retiring room is rather crowded at the moment.”

The whole damned ball was crowded, and that was at least half the problem. There was no guarantee that whatever few moments of privacy they managed to wrest out of the library would remain private for very long.

But, conveniently, Mrs. Littlefield would not be expecting Kate back with any particular promptness. “I think I see a friend from my university days,” Elliot said. “Would you mind terribly if I were to—”