“Mr. Kincade,” she answered with a teasing smile. Then they began to dance as Aiden played a lively tune.
Lydia was the best dancer he’d ever seen, both quick and sure-footed, with delicate, light steps. She pirouetted, hopped, twirled, and clapped in time to the country dance as though she danced every day of her life. Perhaps she did. She’d almost said as much at the inn they’d stayed at on the way to Edinburgh. The thought that she was a woman who quite literally danced her way through life, even in secret, filled his chest with an undeniable warmth.
He kept pace with her, laughing as they locked arms at the elbow and spun, before he caught her by the waist and twirled her in a dizzying circle.
So long as the music played and she was in his arms, he could forget all about the rest of the world, or the limited time they had together. There was only this dance and the perfect woman with him.
The music finally died, and Brodie clutched Lydia tightly to him, both of them breathing hard. She lowered her lashes, the exertion giving a healthy color to her cheeks. When their gazes locked again, he smiled at her, his body almost trembling with his joy.
“Has the music stopped?” she asked, her voice almost a whisper.
He lifted his head and looked about, but the ballroom was empty. There was no sign of Rafe, Isla, or Aiden. How long had they been gone?
“Never mind. I still hear music,” Brodie said.
“Oh? You do?” She chuckled. “What does it sound like?”
“A slow waltz.” He softly began to hum the melody of a waltz. Brodie held her hand with one hand and her waist with the other as he danced with her alone in the ballroom. He fell into her blue eyes as he sang an old song his mother used to sing when he was a boy.
* * *
Oh the summertime is coming
And the trees are sweetly blooming
And the wild mountain thyme
Grows around the blooming heather.
Will ye go, lassie, go?
* * *
Lydia caught on to the melody and hummed with him as he sang.
* * *
And we’ll all go together
To pluck wild mountain thyme
All around the blooming heather.
Will ye go, lassie, go?
* * *
I will build my love a tower
Near yon pure crystal fountain
And on it I will build
All the flowers of the mountain.
Will ye go, lassie, go?
* * *
And we’ll all go together
to pluck wild mountain thyme
All around the blooming heather.
Will ye go, lassie, go?
Let us go, lassie, go.
* * *
Brodie raised her hand high so Lydia could twirl before coming back into his arms. Brodie held his breath as her body pressed against his.
For the first time in as long as he could remember, he was overcome by joy, pure and untainted. It filled him to bursting. It was both the best and worst of feelings.
“Thank you,” Lydia said as she pressed her head to his chest.
“For what?” he asked.
“For letting me have an adventure with you. Ladies like me don’t often have the chance to run off chasing the sunset. We stay home, sew, read, and pretend that we are content with a life with that and nothing more. Society allows a lady like me to live only a half life. But you’ve treated me like a whole person. You’ve cared for me in your way and shown me what it means to feel all the things a person ought to in life. That is what I’m thankful for.”
Brodie couldn’t speak. The lass had robbed him of all words. He gathered her in his arms, holding her long after the lamps burned low and moonlight covered the floor, lending a melancholy beauty to the two of them alone in the ballroom.
“Why don’t we go to bed?” he suggested.
Lydia linked her fingers to his. “Show me the way.”
Joanna, Rosalind, and Regina entered the townhouse in Edinburgh late that night. The ladies were exhausted. Joanna’s mood was sour after the journey, and her concern about her friend only increased when the Lennox butler informed her at the door that Lydia was not there.
“Where is my husband?”
“In the drawing room, my lady,” Shelton said. “He and his lordship are in good spirits.” The butler almost chuckled, as if it were somehow a joke.
“Good spirits?” Regina echoed suspiciously. “Come now, Shelton,” she admonished.
The butler winced. “I meant to say they are foxed, my lady.”
“Foxed?” Rosalind scowled. “My husband doesn’t get foxed, especially when he is supposed