“I am only saying. Lady Sefton is watching. She has been watching for ten minutes. If you break the glass, she will tell everyone in London that you broke it, and then they will ask why, and then they will guess why, and then I will have to find you a new club because you will have been thrown out of all the ones you already frequent.”
“I am not going to break the glass.”
She fell silent. She did not, however, leave. He could feel her at his elbow like a small, steady weight. She had decided to be present until she said what she had come to say. He let her stand. She would say it, eventually. She always did.
The young Viscount was laughing again. His hand, Cassian noticed, was a quarter inch higher on Alice’s back than the figure required.
“Joanna.”
“Yes.”
“Who is the boy?”
“Which one?”
“The one currently dancing with my betrothed.”
Joanna glanced over. “Lord Marbury. He is a friend of Lord Sefton’s nephew. He is twenty. He has a very large estate in Hertfordshire, no sense whatever, and a remarkably high opinion of himself.”
“He is dancing too close to her.”
“He is dancing as close to her as the music requires.”
“His hand is too high.”
“Hmm. All right, maybe you’re right. His hand is indeed half an inch too high. I wonder if you noticed it only because you have been watching it for the last six minutes.” She paused. He felt the pause settle. “Cassian.”
“Yes.”
“Is it the dance that troubles you or the dancing partner?”
“That is an absurd question.”
“It is not.”
“It is.”
“Cassian.”
“What?”
She did not answer immediately.
He turned his head to look at her. She was looking at the dancers, not at him, which she did when she was preparing to say a thing he was not going to like.
“She is beautiful,” she said.
“She is.”
She turned to him. “You said it without thinking.”
Hehadsaid it without thinking. He had not even registered that he had said it. He had said it because Alicewasbeautiful. Because the young Viscount, whose name he was now determined to remember, was looking at her mouth and because her face under the chandelier was very pale and very dark-eyed and very alive.
Fourteen minutes ago, on a balcony at the back of this building, Alice had whispered his Christian name against his lips, and he had not yet recovered from it.
“I said it because she is beautiful.”
“You said it because you cannot help saying it.” Joanna’s voice was very small now.