The Mischief of the Mistletoe: A Pink Carnation Christmas (35 page)

Turnip had never liked Catherine—she had pulled one too many supposedly friendly tricks on Sally during the duration of their intimacy—but, at this moment, he felt sincerely sorry for her. It wasn't right marrying a young girl like that off to an old bon vivant like Grimmlesby. No matter how many half-pay officers she had tried to run off with, it just wasn't right.

On the other hand, from the look Catherine was giving her intended, she fully planned to get her own back. Turnip didn't envy Grimmlesby-Thorpe his half of the marriage bed either. If ever he had met a junior Lady Mac-whatever-it-was in training, Catherine was it.

Speaking of marriage beds . . . Turnip peered across the couples on the dance floor to make sure that Arabella was still with her aunt. She was, although she had been ousted from her seat on the settee by the Dowager Lady Pinchingdale, forced instead to stand beside the settee, her back against the wall. She didn't see him. She was watching the dancers in the center of the floor, her skirt moving almost imperceptibly as her foot tapped in time to the music. There was a wistful look on her face as she watched the couples move through the patterns of the dance. Then her aunt tapped her on the arm, demanding her attention, and her face cleared and her foot stilled. The patient mask was back in place.

Turnip was suddenly reminded of a conversation they had had a very long time ago, in the ruins of Farley Castle, something about inhabiting opposite sides of the ballroom. And he, carelessly, had promised that the next time they found themselves in the ballroom, they would meet in the middle, to dance.

He had failed in his promise so far, but there was still time to redeem it, and to the devil with all French spies and interfering aunts.

Mrs. Carruthers was saying something to him, but Turnip couldn't have vouched for a word of it.

At the front of the room, the master of ceremonies was banging his long stick and calling all couples to line up for the Fairy Queen.

“Excuse me,” he broke in on a startled Mrs. Carruthers. “Must go. Debts of honor and all that, don't you know.”

“The
impertinence
!” he heard her say, but he was already halfway across the room, making for the spot where the dowagers sat.

He must have looked rather fearsome, because Arabella looked at him with an expression of mingled inquiry and alarm.

He grinned at her to set her at her ease, a big, silly grin that expanded straight through to both his ears, a grin so big his face hardly had room to contain it.

He grinned and held out a hand that was, considering his bounding joy, surprisingly steady.

“I say,” he said. “Don't I owe you this dance?”

P
romised you we would dance together. Remember?”

For her aunt's benefit, Arabella said primly, “I shouldn't want to hold you to the obligation should you no longer wish to discharge it.”

Turnip held out his hand, palm up. “Dance with me.”

Heaving a sigh, Arabella surrendered her hand to his with feigned reluctance. “If you insist. But I want it on the record that it was under duress.”

“Bullied you into it and all that,” Turnip agreed, tucking her hand into the crook of his arm. It looked nice there, like it belonged.

“What's all this?” demanded Captain Musgrave, leaning over the back of the settee.

Turnip thought it was a bit rich, the man turning all guardianish when he couldn't be much older than Turnip himself, if that, but Arabella got there first.

“What one does at a dance,” Arabella said, and there was a peculiarly militant light to her eye. “Dance.”

“Oh dear,” said Lady Osborne, hunting through the folds of her shawl in a preoccupied way that Turnip had seen time and time before. “I believe I left my—”

Turnip saw the shades of the prison house fall across Arabella's face and felt all his instincts for knight errantry rise to the fore. Might not be precisely in the accepted heroic model, but dragons came in all shapes and sizes. Just look at the Dowager Duchess of Dovedale.

Taking Arabella's arm, Turnip propelled her shamelessly away. “Set's filling up! Must go or we'll lose our place! Coming, Miss Dempsey?”

“Did I have a choice?” asked Arabella breathlessly. He looked down to see the corners of her eyes crinkling with amusement and something else. If he weren't a modest man, he might call it admiration. It made him feel about ten feet tall.

“Can't let Cinderella miss all the ball,” he said jovially, swinging her into place at the bottom of the set just as the initial strains began.

Arabella sank into a curtsy as he bowed. “Is that how you see me?” she asked, as their hands came together in the first figure. “Cinderella?”

Turnip rather suspected that this was one of those trick questions females seemed always to be asking. He only wished he knew what the answer was. He suspected that it wasn't yes, but if he told her how he really saw her, it would scandalize the people on either side of them and probably get him summarily evicted from the dowager's ballroom.

“The only woman I want to be dancing with,” he said extravagantly.

Arabella gave him a look of mingled pleasure and skepticism before skipping off down the center of the aisle.

Of all the women he knew, she had the hardest time accepting a compliment. Maybe, he thought, watching her as she circled Darius Danforth, who was partnering Lucy Ponsonby, that was because she hadn't received very many of them.

Men were idiots. Himself included.

If he had ever bothered to ask her to dance, all those years ago, he might have observed how enthusiastically she moved to the music. It wasn't just that she was a good dancer—anyone with a proper sense of rhythm and time with a memory for the movements could be a good dancer—but that she was a joyful one, dancing not just with her feet, but with her whole body, putting herself heart and soul into every twirl and skip, every turn and dip. There was an innocent sort of abandon to it, all the walls she built so carefully around herself momentarily abandoned in the wordless execution of the dance.

How did everyone else not notice?

It was an energetic dance, with lots of twirling and circling and galloping about. Arabella's cheeks were pink, her forehead shiny, and her lips very red from the exercise. Her hair, which had been so modestly smoothed down and pulled back, had escaped in little wisps around her face, clinging to her cheeks and forehead.

Turnip could feel himself growing short of breath, but not from the exertion.

As he clasped her right hand with his left, prancing in a circle with Danforth and Lucy Ponsonby, she smiled up at him and unselfconsciously gave a little puff of breath to blow a stubborn lock of hair out of her eye.

It was the most unconsciously seductive thing he had ever seen. Turnip nearly lost his footing.

Of course, at this point, she could debone a kipper with a fish knife and he would find it seductive, he was that far gone.

Well, maybe not a kipper.

As the dance drew to its close, Turnip snuck a glance at Arabella as they retreated to opposite sides of the line for the final bow. The filmy white lace that edged her décolletage clung damply to her skin, calling attention to the curve of her breasts beneath the fabric.

No wonder some puritan sects frowned on dancing. Turnip had always thought it a fairly innocent sport until now.

As the set disintegrated, some going off to find other partners, others heading for the refreshment tables, Arabella self-consciously fanned her flushed face. “It is rather warm in here, isn't it?”

Warm didn't even begin to describe it.

Turnip seized on the excuse. “Shall we take the air? It will be cooler outside on the balcony.”

If he had had a club on him, he would have banged her over the head and borne her off to his cave. Being a supposedly civilized nineteenth-century gentleman, the best he could do was a balcony.

In Norfolk. In January. Not exactly the most romantic gesture in the world, shivering in the frigid cold. Perhaps that was why Shakespeare had set so many of his comedies in warm climates, and only the tragedies in cold ones. Wouldn't be much of a romance with Beatrice and Benedick both succumbing to pneumonia before the end of the second act.

Arabella looked to the corner where her aunt sat, gossiping with the Dowager Lady Pinchingdale. “My aunt doesn't seem to need her left rib yet.”

“If she does, her husband can get it,” said Turnip, tucking Arabella's hand beneath his arm before she could change her mind. That hadn't been precisely a yes, but Turnip felt secure in taking it as one. “That's what they're for. Husbands, I mean, not ribs. Jolly useful things, husbands,” he added. It was never too early to set the groundwork. “Or so I hear.”

As they walked through the French doors onto the balcony, Arabella surveyed the breadth of the veranda, a curious expression on her face. “So this is what a balcony looks like by night.”

“Much as it does by day. Doesn't move about much, you know. Attached to the house and all that.”

“I always used to be”—she hunched her shoulders selfdeprecatingly—“a little bit envious of those women who slipped off to balconies during a ball. I know one is supposed to disapprove, but . . .”

She looked up at him and shrugged, acknowledging the inevitability of human frailty.

Turnip was feeling pretty bally frail just about now. The fall of man had never made more sense than it did now. His only regret was that he had wasted so much time. There had been so many ballrooms and so many balconies that they could have shared.

“Well, here you are! Nothing like making up for lost time.”

Arabella wrinkled her nose at him. “There's no need to mock.”

“Wouldn't think of it,” Turnip assured her, scanning the balcony for a properly secluded spot, someplace near enough to the door for warmth, but far enough away for privacy. “Not a mock on me. Entirely mock-free.”

“Just because you've been out on dozens of balconies . . .”

“Yes, but never one so nice as this. Shan't look at another balcony ever again.” Turnip pointed to a nice little area about three feet over, near enough to the door to still be considered respectable, but nicely out of view. “I say, that's a charming patch of balustrade over there. Let's go lean on it.”

“Oh,” said Arabella, her eyes bright with amusement, her cheeks flushed with cold and exertion, “is
that
what one does on balconies?”

“That and play tiddlywinks,” said Turnip giddily, putting his hand on the small of her back to guide her. Her hair brushed his cheek as she turned her head, and he smelled soap and lilac.

“I'll warn you,” said Arabella, looking up at him. “I'm a fierce tiddlywink player.”

Turnip touched a hand to her cheek, admiring the messy wisps of her hair, the reddening tip of her nose, the remains of a dust smudge on her chin.

“I wouldn't expect anything less,” he said tenderly.

She looked at him with wide, uncertain eyes, knowing as well as he that they weren't talking about tiddlywinks anymore. But she didn't say anything. And she didn't pull away. Beyond them, the parkland stretched out in all its winter barrenness, but Turnip could have sworn he smelled flowers blooming.

Arabella's lashes fluttered down to cover her eyes.

And abruptly popped up again as the balcony door banged open.

Turnip hastily moved to shield her with his body; he wasn't even sure why or from what, it was just an automatic reflex.

A girl in a white-and-silver dress came tumbling through the door, her brilliant red hair caught high above her head, threaded with matching silver ribbons, her every move a challenge as she gestured back over her shoulder at the man following close behind her.

“Too cold for you, Freddy?” she demanded, her voice husky. Turnip could feel Arabella stiffen beside him at the sound of it.

“Is that a challenge?” Lord Frederick Staines asked, sauntering through the ballroom doors. He stood silhouetted in the light from the ballroom, hands in his pockets, the picture of aristocratic boredom.

Already at the bottom of the steps, Penelope tilted her head up at him. Neither of them seemed to have noticed the couple in the shadows on the side of the balcony. Or if they had, they didn't care. “It is if you choose to take it as such.”

Lord Frederick laughed, a low, arrogant sound that made Turnip think of the horns blown to signal the beginning of the hunt. He bounded down the steps, catching Penelope around the waist. “I'll take whatever I like.”

She twisted away, lithe in the moonlight, part hunted, part huntress. “We'll see about that.”