be upon Louisa as she descended. Daniel’s sharp intake of breath was audible all the way to where we stood. He dashed up the stairs, meeting Louisa halfway to offer his arm. His gallant and doting behavior was so different from how he had acted before, and as the former Lady Swenson and I followed her down the stairs, I wondered if Louisa had understood the potential within him when I had not.
Since the Rosthorns did not have a ballroom, they’d had the carpets in the drawing room rolled and removed, the settees, tables, and chairs pushed against the walls. Candelabras shimmered around the perimeter, and a giant chandelier had been installed for the occasion. Within an hour, the room was full of people mingling, waiting for the dancing to begin. I stood to the side, watching the entrance, as family after couple after family entered, all looking about them in anticipation of an evening of pleasure. But Gregory didn’t appear.
When the opening strands of a minuet were played, Daniel and Louisa took their place at the head of the line.
My father appeared next to me. “May I have this dance?”
I forced my gaze away from the door. “With pleasure.”
As we stood across from each other in our lines, my father asked, “How are you faring?”
I raised my brows and received a knowing look in return. Placing my hand in his, I curtsied to the front of the room with the rest of the women in the line. “Father, I am perfectly content.”
“I did not know they invited Edward. I am sorry. If I had known they were thinking of it—”
“It makes no difference. Truly, Father. He means nothing to me beyond his being Louisa’s brother.” I dropped his hand and danced to my new position on the opposite side of the woman next to me.
My father didn’t speak until we joined hands again. “I only ever wished for you to be happy.”
“And I am. I will be.” But as Daniel and Louisa flashed into view, I realized the small twinge of pain I’d felt earlier was no longer small.
I was aching with loneliness for Gregory. Where was he?
Forty-Four
James Johnson claimed my hand for the next dance.
“You look quite lovely tonight, Miss Brinton.”
“Thank you.”
“We are all relieved to hear of your sister’s recovery.”
“Yes,” I said, dropping his hand to turn. “Thank you. We are—” I glimpsed his sister Catherine along the wall, speaking with a brown-haired gentleman whose back was to me. But I knew those shoulders, the tilt of the head. My breath caught and I stumbled.
James grasped my hand, steadying me. “Are you all right?”
“Yes,” I replied. I searched the wall, but neither Catherine nor the man was visible any longer. Perhaps, in my current state, I had mistaken someone else for Gregory.
We stepped away then stepped back together. “I believe we were speaking of your sister,” he prompted.
“Oh, um, Alice. We are quite relieved about Alice.”
“Will she be recovered enough to attend the wedding?”
We turned to dance back down the room. “I believe so.”
“Your brother and Miss Rosthorn look very happy.”
I followed his gaze to the head of the line, where Daniel and Louisa smiled at each other, seemingly unaware of the rest of the town’s presence. “It has been a long time coming. Which reminds me, by asking me to dance you have played quite into my mother’s expectations.”
The dance required we shift partners. When James and I rejoined each other, he smiled. “And you still believe my feelings for you have not changed?”
I lifted my brow. “Are you going to pretend they have?”
He laughed. “No, you are quite right.”
I caught sight of Catherine again. She was dancing with a man who was definitely not Gregory. “My mother will be very disappointed.”
“Disappointing mothers seems to be my lot in life,” James replied.
“Mine, too.”
Once the set finished, I allowed James to walk me to the side of the floor, but it wasn’t long before another man claimed my hand. I twirled and clapped and forced myself to smile through dance after dance. But eventually the searching and the waiting became too much. I had seen numerous men who resembled Gregory in some way, each time my heart lurching with hope and anxiety until I recognized them for who they were. Or, rather, who they were not. Gregory wasn’t here. It was well past the time for people to arrive. Which meant he wasn’t coming.
I slipped out the open side doors onto the terrace. There were only two