How fun.
“I’d be delighted,” he said immediately. “May I guide you onto the floor, or is that a privilege reserved for the one doing the asking?”
“You may lead,” she said, with all the hauteur of a queen.
But when they reached the floor, she seemed a little less sure of herself. And though she hid it quite well, her eyes were flicking around the room.
“Who are you looking for?” Gareth asked, letting out an amused snuff of air as he realized he was echoing Jane’s exact words to him.
“No one,” Hyacinth said quickly. She snapped her gaze back to his with a suddenness that almost made him dizzy. “What is so amusing?”
“Nothing,” he countered, “and you were most certainly looking for someone, although I will compliment you on your ability to make it seem like you weren’t.”
“That’s because I wasn’t,” she said, dipping into an elegant curtsy as the orchestra began the first strains of a waltz.
“You’re a good liar, Hyacinth Bridgerton,” he murmured, taking her into his arms, “but not quite as good as you think you are.”
Music began to float through the air, a soft, delicate tune in three-four time. Gareth had always enjoyed dancing, particularly with an attractive partner, but it became apparent with the first-no, one must be fair, probably not until the sixth-step that this would be no ordinary waltz.
Hyacinth Bridgerton, he was quite amused to note, was a clumsy dancer.
Gareth couldn’t help but smile.
He didn’t know why he found this so entertaining. Maybe it was because she was so capable in everything else she did; he’d heard that she’d recently challenged a young man to a horse race in Hyde Park and won. And he was quite certain that if she ever found someone willing to teach her to fence, she’d soon be skewering her opponents through the heart.
But when it came to dancing…
He should have known she’d try to lead.
“Tell me, Miss Bridgerton,” he said, hoping that a spot of conversation might distract her, since it always seemed that one danced with more grace when one wasn’t thinking quite so hard about it. “How far along are you with the diary?”
“I’ve only managed ten pages since we last spoke,” she said. “It might not seem like much-”
“It seems like quite a lot,” he said, exerting a bit more pressure on the small of her back. A little more, and maybe he could force…her…to turn…
Left.
Phew.
It was quite the most exerting waltz he’d ever danced.
“Well, I’m not fluent,” she said. “As I told you. So it’s taking me much longer than if I could just sit down and read it like a book.”
“You don’t need to make excuses,” he said, wrenching her to the right.
She stepped on his toe, which he ordinarily would have taken as retaliation, but under the present circumstances, he rather thought it was accidental.
“Sorry,” she muttered, her cheeks turning pink. “I’m not usually so clumsy.”
He bit his lip. He couldn’t possibly laugh at her. It would break her heart. Hyacinth Bridgerton, he was coming to realize, didn’t like to do anything if she didn’t do it well. And he suspected that she had no idea that she was such an abysmal dancer, not if she took the toe-stomping as such an aberration.
It also explained why she felt the need to continually remind him that she wasn’t fluent in Italian. She couldn’t possibly bear for him to think she was slow without a good reason.
“I’ve had to make a list of words I don’t know,” she said. “I’m going to send them by post to my former governess. She still resides in Kent, and I’m sure she’ll be happy to translate them for me. But even so-”
She grunted slightly as he swung her to the left, somewhat against her will.
“Even so,” she continued doggedly, “I’m able to work out most of the meaning. It’s remarkable what you can deduce with only three-quarters of the total.”
“I’m sure,” he commented, mostly because some sort of agreement seemed to be required. Then he asked, “Why don’t you purchase an Italian dictionary? I will assume the expense.”
“I have one,” she said, “but I don’t think it’s very good. Half the words are missing.”
“Half?”
“Well, some,” she amended. “But truly, that’s not the problem.”
He blinked, waiting for her to continue.
She did. Of course. “I don’t think Italian is the author’s native tongue,” she said.
“The author of the dictionary?” he queried.
“Yes. It’s not terribly idiomatic.” She paused, apparently deep in whatever odd thoughts were racing through her mind. Then she gave a little shrug-which caused her to miss a step in the waltz, not that she noticed-and continued with, “It’s really of no matter. I’m making fair progress, even if it is a bit slow. I’m already up to her arrival in England.”
“In just ten pages?”
“Twenty-two in total,” Hyacinth corrected, “but she doesn’t make entries every day. In fact, she often skips several weeks at a time. She only devoted one paragraph to the sea crossing-just enough to express her delight that your grandfather was afflicted by seasickness.”
“One must take one’s happiness where one can,” Gareth murmured.
Hyacinth nodded. “And also, she, ah, declined to mention her wedding night.”
“I believe we may consider that a small blessing,” Gareth said. The only wedding night he wanted to hear about less than Grandmother St. Clair’s would have to be Grandmother Danbury’s.
Good God, that would send him right over the edge.
“What has you looking so pained?” Hyacinth asked.
He just shook his head. “There are some things one should never know about one’s grandparents.”
Hyacinth grinned at that.
Gareth’s breath caught for a moment, then he found himself grinning back. There was something infectious about Hyacinth’s smiles, something that forced her companions to stop what they were doing, even what they were thinking, and just smile back.
When Hyacinth smiled-when she really smiled, not one of those faux half smiles she did when she was trying to be clever-it transformed her face. Her eyes lit, her cheeks seemed to glow, and-
And she was beautiful.
Funny how he’d never noticed it before. Funny how no one had noticed it. Gareth had been out and about in London since she’d made her nod several years earlier, and while he’d never heard anyone speak of her looks in an uncomplimentary manner, nor had he heard anyone call her beautiful.
He wondered if perhaps everyone was so busy trying to keep up with whatever it was she was saying to stop and actually look at her face.
“Mr. St. Clair? Mr. St. Clair?”
He glanced down. She was looking up at him with an impatient expression, and he wondered how many times she’d uttered his name.
“Under the circumstances,” he said, “you might as well use my given name.”
She nodded approvingly. “A fine idea. You may of course use mine as well.”
“Hyacinth,” he said. “It suits you.”
“It was my father’s favorite flower,” she explained. “Grape hyacinths. They bloom like mad in spring near our home in Kent. The first to show color every year.”
“And the exact color of your eyes,” Gareth said.
“A happy coincidence,” she admitted.
“He must have been delighted.”
“He never knew,” she said, looking away. “He died before my birth.”
