“There’s no need to thank me. The last thing I’d want is for you to exert yourself in your condition. Besides, I enjoyed it.”
“But it does seem unfair that I will get the credit if the evening is a success. I won’t feel right behaving like the hostess at your ball.”
“I’m afraid you’ll have to. Our guests have come to see the Duke and Duchess of Loxwell, not plain old Selina Balfour.”
Daisy rolled her eyes. “You are the last person anyone would call plain. Would you be a darling and ring for my maid? I’d like to stay off my feet as long as I possibly can.”
Selina obliged and left Daisy to dress. A large mirror hung in the corridor between the bedrooms, reflecting the dying light from the windows on the opposite wall. Selina paused a moment and looked at her reflection.
Daisy was right. She was not plain. She had a set of even, regular features, made pretty by the contrast of her dark eyebrows and hair. Where her three sisters had inherited their late mother’s looks, she took after their father – at least, as far as she could remember him. Tall, with a straight nose and a wilful curve to her lips. No one who had seen her face would be surprised to learn that she was stubborn. Her eyes were softer, though. Her mother had given her those.
No, she was not plain. But she did not have the bloom of youth that glowed in Edith’s cheeks, nor the happy sparkle of motherhood that beautified Daisy. Selina was eight and twenty, unmarried. The ton had given up whispering about which suitor’s hand she would accept. Soon, they would start whispering something else about her.
Spinster.
Selina watched a smile lift the corner of her mouth. She could hardly wait for the day.
If there was one thing Selina was not, it was jealous of others’ success.
As she watched her family circulating through the crowded ballroom, a deep sense of satisfaction bloomed inside her.
Her brother looked as ducal as he ever had, straight-backed and solemn. The only part of his appearance that was not starched to perfection was the profusion of rowdy dark curls on his head. He had taken charge of introducing the Austrian ambassador to all the most important guests and was battling on manfully against the ambassador’s obvious preference for flirting with pretty young ladies.
Daisy glided from one group to another with a hand resting on her belly and a benevolent smile for everyone. The newly made ballgown was still held together by pins in a few places, though no one would know it to look at her. Its silk moiré glimmered red and gold in the light of the three hundred candles that had been set in the chandeliers just in time.
Edith had disappeared from the receiving line while the guests were still arriving, but since Lord Rotherham had also mysteriously vanished, Selina was not much concerned. What was a ball for, if not romance?
Well, in her own case, of course, balls were for business. Social manoeuvring. Advancing her brother’s political aims.
But she truly hoped Edith was about to find happiness with Rotherham. That would be one more of her siblings safely taken care of.
“I’ve taken the liberty of fetching you a glass of champagne.”
Selina turned from her happy contemplation of her family to find Malcolm Locke, the Duke of Caversham, standing closer than was strictly necessary with a glass of champagne in each hand and a self-satisfied smirk on his handsome face.
“Good evening, Your Grace.” She took a step back and dropped a curtsey that she hoped was sufficiently aloof. “Thank you, but I have no desire for any more champagne.”
If it were possible, the duke’s smirk grew even more impudent. “I suppose you’re about to tell me that you don’t desire a dance, either.”
Malcolm Locke had become the ninth Duke of Caversham at an impressionable age, and it showed. His character had hardly improved when, at the age of one and twenty, ladies began referring to him as His Gorgeous Grace. He was three years Selina’s senior, and she had endured the displeasure of every one of her friends simpering over him from her first Season onwards.
Now that those friends were all married – and not to the duke – Selina’s dislike for Malcolm had not abated. He was overconfident, outspoken, brash, and as enamoured of his power as he was of his own good looks.
Selina was very glad that her brother was not that sort of duke.
“A dance? Not with you, Your Grace,” she said coolly. Malcolm threw back his head and laughed, flashing a dazzling set of teeth.
“Nor with anyone else, either. I know perfectly well that you never dance. Now take the champagne, Selina, and stop beating me about the head with the Your Graces. Aren’t we better friends than that?”
Selina took the proffered glass and emptied it straight into the tall vase of flowers beside her. They had all bloomed beautifully. “I cannot claim that honour, Your Grace.”
Malcolm took a sip of champagne, his dancing eyes fixed on her. “Really? But only a true friend would see the pain that lies beneath this elegant exterior.”
She put on the coldest of all her polite smiles. “You are mistaken. I am not in any pain. I am enjoying myself immensely.”
Malcolm moved to stand behind her, putting his face beside hers so that he looked out at the ballroom from her point of view. “Don’t tell me it doesn’t pain you at all to watch that upstart girl take all the credit for your hard work. This evening is the event of the
