Say No to the Duke (The Wildes of Lindow Castle #4) - Eloisa James Page 0,12

whereof: If she’d stayed at home, she would have debuted in blissful ignorance of the ton’s opinion. She would have tried to be herself and promptly been relegated to the side of the ballroom, if not thrown out of society altogether.

Her father’s rank could do nothing to prevent the judgments of the matrons who ruled polite society.

“Will you send your own daughters to school?”

“It would depend on their wishes,” Betsy said. “My sister Viola is extremely shy. She would have been much happier at home. But my smallest sister, Artemisia, will relish a classroom full of other girls.”

Thaddeus looked down at her, his eyes glowing. “The more I learn about you, the more perfect you seem.”

Betsy cleared her throat. “I assure you that I am far from perfect.”

“I necessarily strive for perfection due to my rank and responsibilities,” Thaddeus said. “Yet when I fail to achieve my own standards, as any man must, I am reassured by the fact that an excellent reputation can defeat gossip. Your reputation is impeccable.”

Betsy nodded her thanks, conscious of a gloomy feeling.

“Small moral faults are allowable under a guise of rectitude,” Thaddeus added, digging himself deeper.

It could be that thick eyelashes were not enough to counterbalance such deeply-felt righteousness.

Chapter Five

In the first hours after midnight, revelers began to leave. The newly wedded couple had long since vanished. The duke and duchess had bid farewell directly after a light supper was served, retreating to the North Tower, where the family was housed. Guests who lived nearby took to their carriages; those from afar returned to their beds, alone or in pairs.

Still, the ball continued, the music playing on for those who loved to dance or loved to gossip, and wouldn’t retire until after Prism served another light meal.

Those guests who had worn masks had removed them at midnight; those with halos had thrown them away long before. The ballroom floor was littered with crushed spangles fallen from angelic headdresses. The expanse of polished floor glittered under the candelabras like a lake shining in the moonlight, the skirts of dancing ladies sweeping spangles into ripples that followed in their wake.

Betsy sighed.

She felt lonely.

She had danced with Thaddeus twice.

Unsurprisingly, the viscount danced with perfect control, maintaining his elbow at just the right level as they wheeled toward and away from each other. One of those dances, late in the evening, had been a new dance called a cotillion. His every move was perfection itself.

As was hers, of course.

People drew back to watch them, a rustle of whispers going through the assembled guests like wind in the trees. Thaddeus’s face didn’t betray any recognition of the attention they were receiving.

He was used to it.

So was she, but that didn’t mean she liked it.

This would be her life if she married him; for a duke and duchess, privacy was a luxury, scrutiny a given. London stationers churned out prints of the Wildes, no matter how spurious the depictions: her brother Alaric wrestling the kraken, North as a Shakespearean villain.

Without a doubt, someone at this ball would report their two dances, not to mention the fact she and Thaddeus had left the ballroom for a time together. By next week, the two of them would be in the front window of every stationer’s shop, likely with a wedding ring encircling their heads for good measure.

At this point, the only Wildes remaining in the ballroom were Betsy and Aunt Knowe. Betsy danced on, ignoring her sore feet, relentlessly cheerful.

People asked her cunning questions about the viscount, which she deftly deflected. Yes, he is most attractive. Yes, he dances extraordinarily well.

Just when she decided that she ought to entertain another suitor, if only to quiet the gossips, a candidate presented himself.

He bowed before her, slender and elegant. His wig was ambitious, if not quite the height of hers. She’d met him, of course . . . but who was he?

She fell into a deep curtsy, and managed to make the connection on her way back up. Grégoire Bisset-Caron, who was—oddly enough—Jeremy’s first cousin. They certainly didn’t appear to have fallen from the same family tree.

“I trust you are having an agreeable evening?” Mr. Bisset-Caron inquired. “I wasn’t lucky enough to claim a dance with you, but I thought that we should at least stand together, under the circumstances.”

Betsy raised an eyebrow.

Mr. Bisset-Caron indicated his black costume with a sweep of his hand. He was wearing a black coat with a flaring velvet collar stitched in red. “Mephistopheles, at your service. Your heavenly