A Loving Scoundrel (16 page)

“Maybe I’ve attended those masked balls in convent gardens. Maybe I’m a right fine dancer.”

“For a man,” Jeremy countered impatiently. “Ever try it as a woman?”

Danny blushed again. Actually, she’d never danced in her life, but she resented him taking that for granted. And this idea was starting to sound like fun. Attend a fancy high-class ball? Something she’d never dreamed possible. And what a perfect opportunity to meet a man who might fall in love with her and want to marry her! Not a lord, of course. She knew she couldn’t aspire that high. But surely it wouldn’t be just lords at such a gathering. Other well-to-do, respectable men would be invited, men without titles who weren’t as restricted in whom they married.

And she
had
attended a masked ball before at the gardens— well, not actually attended, but looked on from a distance wishing she could. The people at it seemed to be having such a rousing good time. And those balls weren’t just for the nabobs, far from it.

Anyone could go to those and pretend for a night that they were someone other than who they were.

“So she won’t dance,” Regina was saying to counter Jeremy’s last objection. “Sprained ankle and all that.”

“So she can’t talk, can barely walk. Sounds like she should be in a sickbed, not showing up at a ball.”

Regina scowled at him as she insisted, “She lost her voice on a particularly exciting fox hunt in the country earlier this week. She’s recovering nicely, but still pampering the vocal chords. Twisted her ankle at the same hunt, don’t you know. She
would
have declined this ball, but she didn’t want to disappoint you, when you were
so
looking forward to showing her off tomorrow night. And since she’s only in town for the weekend—”

“I catch the drift, Reggie. And just who are you going to pass her off as being?”

“Perhaps she can be distantly related to Kelsey. Kelsey does come from all sorts of titles, though they rarely get mentioned since she married our cousin Derek. But I’m sure she wouldn’t mind claiming Danny as a relative.”

“Related to a duke is a bit much, don’t you think?” Jeremy said.

“No, no, one of the lesser titles, of course. And very distantly. Perhaps her parents moved to America and she grew up there— no, I know, Cornwall! Just in case her thick accent gets noticed. This
is
going to work, and splendidly. No one, and I mean no one, is going to doubt that you’ve been courting this lovely girl for the last several months, so you couldn’t possibly have been rendezvousing with Emily Bascomb. Must have been some other lucky chap.”

Jeremy shook his head at his cousin, but he did so in amazement. “How do you do it, Cousin? You simply boggle me, ’deed you do.”

“Rubbish,” Regina scoffed. “And I’ll be taking her home with me to get her ready. Come round with a carriage tomorrow night to pick us up at precisely nine p.m. We only want to be fashionably late, nothing more.”

“Us?”

“I’ll be going with you, of course. She must have a chaperone.”

“When did you become my guardian angel, puss?”

“When Amy asked me to keep an eye on you while she was gone.”

He rolled his eyes. Amy wasn’t just their cousin but his best friend, and she worried about him far more than was necessary.

“Far be it for me to put a damper on your amazing scheme, but don’t you think you should ask Danny if she’s willing to rescue me from Emily’s clutches?”

“Oh, dear,” Regina sighed. “Yes, I suppose.” And to Danny:

“Are you up to the task at hand, m’dear? Jeremy here really does need rescuing, or he’ll be dragged to the altar through no effort of his own.”

Danny grinned. “I’m right handy at masquerading.”

Regina blinked. “Why, yes, you are, aren’t you? Well, come along then. We’ve a lot to accomplish in very little time.”

R
EGINA
E
DEN WAS SIMPLY AMAZING
. She was a whirlwind of activity, instructions, and nonstop chatter. She did drag Danny out of Jeremy’s house and down the street to hers and took her straight up to her bedchamber, not giving her any time to gape at the magnificent town house they were rushing through. Regina immediately summoned her maid, Tess, told her what was required, and between them, they pulled out from Regina’s wardrobe countless gowns of the like Danny had never before seen. When they finally settled on one, Danny barely got a look at it before Tess sent another maid off to work on it.

The next order of business was shoes, but those that matched the gown simply wouldn’t fit Danny’s feet no matter how they tried to stretch them, and there was no time to have a pair made. So Regina sent a footman around to her relatives’. Danny wasn’t sure whose white satin slippers showed up before dinner, but they were only slightly short at the heels and her toes weren’t nearly as scrunched as they had been when trying on Regina’s shoes.

There was no break for dinner. Regina had trays brought up to her room, and Danny got to eat from hers while Tess tried to figure out what could be done with her hair. No easy task. In fact, this turned out to be the toughest of their problems. Such short curls simply didn’t want to be tamed. And a good number of them had to be cut even shorter, to even out the butchering Lucy had done.

Regina finally produced a tiara and Tess exclaimed, “This will do it! I can divide the curls now and control them like this. It’s as close as we’ll get to a contained look.”

“Famous! I knew you could do it, Tess. I’ll want it looking just so tomorrow.”

Danny didn’t get a chance to see it herself before the tiara was removed and she was shown to a guest bedroom, where Regina told her to get right to sleep. They had a
lot
more work to do tomorrow, and she’d be woken early.

A guest bedroom! She couldn’t believe it, couldn’t believe either that Lady Regina was going to such bother to save her cousin from marriage to a beautiful heiress. If someone like that didn’t tempt him to put the shackle on, then Jeremy obviously hadn’t been exaggerating when he’d said he was going to remain a bachelor the rest of his life. Which was too bad, she thought with a pang of sadness. For him to go to such lengths to avoid marriage just proved he wasn’t the man for her.

She was excited, though, at the prospect of his seeing her transformation into a lady tomorrow. She’d be attending a ball with him! He was even going to pretend to be courting her. For a short while reality would be suspended and she could do some pretending of her own—that the whole glorious evening was for real….

She was awakened earlier than she expected the next morning. It seemed as if she’d barely gotten to sleep when a maid was knocking on her door and coming in with a platter of breakfast. She’d only eaten half of it when Regina walked in complaining, “Not done yet? Well, do hurry. You shouldn’t need to dance tonight, but just in case something goes wrong and you end up having to, I’ve decided we have enough time for a little instruction in that regard.”

“You’re going to teach me to dance?”

“Not me, dear girl, Jeremy is. I’ve already sent for him.”

Danny couldn’t help snorting. “You won’t get him out of bed this early.”

“Yes, I know.” Regina sighed. “But he will be roused, since I’ve mentioned it’s an emergency.”

“Is it?”

“Course not, but that will get him here in quick order. Now, I suppose I should tell you a little bit about this ball. Lady Aitchison is having it, and that means it is going to be the premier ball of the season, because her parties are all the rage, yet she only has them every four years or so.”

“That mean there will be a lot of people there?”

“Yes, it will be an immense crush, with the very cream of London society in attendance. All the young debutantes this season, all the young men who
do
want to get married, their mamas and papas and other assorted escorts, and a few scoundrels like our sweet Jeremy whom you should avoid.”

“He’s not a scoundrel,” Danny said, though she’d thought the same thing herself more’n once.

“Course he is, though a lovable one. Why look what he’s doing to you? He makes you his mistress, but still has you cleaning his house!”

“I’m
not
his mistress, nor will I ever be!”

Regina blinked at the vehement tone as well as the words. “Really? Oh my, I do apologize then. I thought, well, the whole family thought, well, blister it, it’s rather obvious he wants you to be, and Jeremy has never failed to obtain a woman he wants.”

Danny was blushing by then, because she’d come close to succumbing to his seduction herself and had to constantly remind herself of her goals and that Jeremy Malory wasn’t one of them. But Regina didn’t notice the blush and, as usual, went from one subject to the next seamlessly.

“Come along, then. I’ve already had the parlor cleared so we’ll have room to work.”

The work wasn’t just dancing. As soon as they got downstairs, Regina told her, “Now, let me see how you walk. No, no, you aren’t wearing britches anymore. Take small steps. That’s better, but, no, don’t walk with your whole body, just your legs. We want it to look like you’re gliding across the room without really moving a’tall.

Danny slowed down and took smaller steps. “Perfect!” Regina exclaimed.

Danny grinned. “Do
you
walk like this?”

Regina chuckled. “Well, I do try, really I do. But truth be known, I used to be a bit of a tomboy. I was raised with my cousin Derek after my mother died, and I enjoyed the freedom that boys have. Course, you must know what I mean. Isn’t that why you wore britches?”

“No, where I come from, girls work on their backs, and at young ages. I didn’t want to be forced into that line o’ work, so I lived the life of a boy.”

“Oh my.” Regina was blushing now. “No one knew?”

“Only my friend Lucy.”

“Reggie, where are you?” Jeremy suddenly called from the hall.

“In here!”

He appeared in the doorway, his expression quite disgruntled and turned on his cousin. “D’you know what time it is?”

“Yes, and half the morning is already wasted. You’re going to teach Danny to dance.”

“I am?” He crossed his arms and leaned against the doorframe.

“I thought she was going to have a sprained ankle?”

“She is, but it’s mostly recovered, merely a bit tender. We’re not making her limp, after all. And this is just a precaution. What if King George shows up and asks her to dance?”

Jeremy rolled his eyes. “That’s stretching it, Reggie, ’deed it is.”

“That was merely an example of why she needs to learn to dance. Don’t be difficult. This is your ankle we’re saving from the shackle.”

He glanced at Danny and his eyes widened slightly. “Cut your hair, did they? Looks very nice.”

Danny blushed becomingly. “It will be fancied up for tonight.”

“Heaven help me if you get even more beautiful.” Then he grinned and said to his cousin, “Damn me, I don’t suppose you’d leave us alone for this instruction, Reggie?”

“Not a chance. This isn’t an excuse for you to manhandle her, so behave!”

He sighed. “Don’t we need music for this?”

“I’m going to hum, and if you laugh about my humming, I’ll box your ears, see if I don’t.”

He crossed over to Danny and extended his hand. “Are you ready to be taught, luv?”

He said it in such a way that she humphed. “To dance and nothing else.”

“More’s the pity,” he whispered as he drew her a bit closer and began to waltz with her about the room.

She keenly felt his hand on her back, his other warm against her palm. The room was large. Regina was on the far side of it, so she couldn’t hear Jeremy when he began to fluster Danny with his whispered comments.

“I love touching you. D’you think she’ll notice if I put my hand on your derriere?”

“I’ll
notice,” Danny gasped.

He chuckled. “But you’d like it, wouldn’t you?”

“No. And don’t you dare! We’re supposed to be dancing.”

“But I can make love and dance at the same time,” Jeremy whispered. “I promise you.”

Danny sucked in her breath and was barely able to reply, “What a whopper. Now stop it!”

But, of course, he didn’t. Leaning slightly closer he whispered, “Shall I tell you how it can be done? You only need to hold on tight and wrap your legs about my hips. We’d both have to be naked, of course.”

She tripped, was surprised she hadn’t done so sooner when she suddenly couldn’t concentrate on anything but him and the images he was drawing in her mind. He gathered her closer till she regained her balance, which
didn’t
help, only made her distraction worse.

Regina had stopped humming. Danny became aware of that when she noticed a servant had come in to speak to the lady. Jeremy must have noticed as well that his cousin wasn’t paying attention to them because his mouth was suddenly on Danny’s neck, kissing her hotly, then moving over her ear where his tongue laved deeply. Oh, God, the feeling was amazing. Her knees went weak, but she didn’t need the strength to stand. Jeremy was holding her so close her feet were off the floor! And she was clinging to him. She couldn’t help it. The feelings he aroused in her made her want to get even closer….

Regina’s loud throat-clearing drew them apart again, but slowly. Her feet back on the floor, Danny tried to regain her composure. Noticing Jeremy’s grin helped in that regard. That scoundrel! He knew exactly what he’d just done to her senses and was puffed-up pleased about it.

Jeremy took pity on her and got serious after that, told her to follow his lead, and she actually learned a thing or two about dancing before he was done.

Danny had thought they would continue after lunch, but she got sent back to bed instead, with Regina warning her to sleep, not just rest, because they would be up until the wee hours of the morning. Danny was sure that she was too excited by that point to actually fall asleep in the middle of the day, but all the information and instructions that had been thrown at her had quite worn her out, and she was asleep within moments of lying down.