A Masquerade in the Moonlight - By Kasey Michaels Page 0,20
card and see if there’s some way you can set aside a single dance for this humble petitioner? I harbor the hope I can use that time to convince you to drive out with me tomorrow, so that you might introduce me to some of the glorious sights of your fair city. I am, after all, a visitor on your shores.”
Marguerite didn’t have to consult her card, and she knew it. So, damn him, did Thomas Joseph Donovan. Just as they both knew she would most definitely drive out with him tomorrow. She couldn’t ignore such a direct challenge—didn’t want to ignore it. “I believe I’m still free for supper, Mr. Donovan, if that is all right with you?”
“I will count the minutes, at the same time toting up my blessings,” Thomas told her, bowing to Mrs. Billings and then to Marguerite, who knew she had to offer him her hand this time or else spend the next ten minutes listening to another lecture on deportment from Billie.
She felt Thomas squeeze her fingertips intimately as he lowered his head, then at the last minute he turned her hand over, to place his kiss on the inside of her wrist, just where her above-the-elbow glove was held by a pearl button and a scant inch-long oval of her skin lay revealed. His mustache tickled at the sensitive area, and the touch of his tongue sent a shiver racing up her arm. “Until midnight, Miss Balfour,” he said a moment later as she looked up at him, trying to control her breathing.
“Until midnight, Mr. Donovan,” Marguerite answered coldly, resenting his physical assault, which was an unlooked-for shifting of the rules in their game of verbal thrust and parry. “As you count the minutes, I shall measure the hours.”
“In anticipation, as a child waiting for Father Christmas, Miss Balfour, or will you deplore each tick of the clock, as would a prisoner about to mount the gallows?”
Ah, they were back to fencing, and Marguerite knew she could relax now—even enjoy herself. “La, Mr, Donovan, you must not tease me so,” she told him, opening her dance card and glancing down at the first name on the list. “Such impertinent questions smack of your growing infatuation for me, a circumstance I can only report to my grandfather, who would not, I believe, be best pleased to hear I’m being so determinedly wooed by a brash colonial who might wish to carry me off to his own country, to be set upon by red-skinned savages. Now shoo yourself off like a good little diplomat, for Lord Whittenham already approaches, eager to lead me into the first set.”
“Your most devoted and obedient servant, Miss Balfour,” Thomas said, inclining his head once more so that another woman, one not so observant as Marguerite, would still be able to believe she had come out the victor in this veiled exchange of hostilities.
“Well, I never!” Mrs. Billings exclaimed once Thomas—still smiling, Marguerite noticed—melted into the crowd milling at the edge of the dance floor.
“Yes, Billie, I’m convinced you haven’t,” Marguerite responded, trying not to giggle.
“I beg your pardon? No, don’t explain. Just allow me to say what I feel I must. Although Mr. Donovan is a particularly well set up young man, Marguerite, and much more of an age I believe would suit you, as I do not countenance your continued insistence on allowing yourself to be courted by so many older gentlemen, I am convinced I should be neglecting my duty if I did not encourage you to avoid further conversation with Mr. Donovan—not that I understood above three words that passed between you. I don’t think I can quite like the way he looks at you, my dear. It is entirely too forward, even for an American.”
“I shall take your words to heart, Billie,” Marguerite lied. “But please don’t fear for my girlish inclinations, for I have only agreed to go down to supper with the gentleman to ascertain for myself if our opportunistic American eats his peas with a knife. After tomorrow you will not have to worry about the man.”
“After tomorrow? Then you are planning to drive out with Mr. Donovan tomorrow? Oh, Marguerite, do you really think you should?”
Marguerite stiffened. “That, dear Billie, is entirely beside the point. Now, excuse me, please, for I must not keep Lord Whittenham waiting. You know how cross he gets if he has to thread his way all across the room to us, bumping noses with everyone he