Free The Lady Confesses by Carole Mortimer Page B

dinner. I trust you will save the first set of dances for me, Miss Thompson?’
    Elizabeth frowned up at Lord Thorne, knowing from the challenging glitter in those amber-brown eyes that he was being deliberately irritating. Something he seemed to take delight in being whenever he happened to be in her company! ‘I am sure that Miss Rutledge would appreciate that honour far more than I, sir.’
    The earl gave a wolfish grin at the same time as those gorgeous eyes laughed down at her. ‘The honour will be all mine, I do assure you, Miss Thompson.’
    ‘But are you sure that your ribs will be able to stand the exercise, my lord?’ she came back with that same saccharine sweetness with which she had thanked Sir Rufus for his flowers.
    ‘I will ensure that they are.’ That warm gaze continued to laugh at Elizabeth.
    ‘Then I will claim the second set,’ Sir Rufus put in impatiently.
    ‘If Miss Thompson is not too fatigued from our own…dancing,’ Nathaniel taunted.
    ‘I am sure I will not be, Sir Rufus.’ She glared her displeasure at the earl as she answered the other man, a look Nathaniel returned with mocking amusement.
    ‘Until later, then, Miss Thompson.’ Nathaniel bent his head over her hand, then bowed tersely to Sir Rufus before he joined his increasingly impatient aunt and offered her his arm.
    Elizabeth gazed after him in frustration, that irritation deepening as she saw that every other woman in the room was also watching the tall and rakishly handsome nephew of their hostess, some from behind the discretion of their fans, others openly admiring of the dashing figure he cut in the perfectly tailored evening clothes that emphasised the muscled strength of his shoulders.
    Elizabeth gave a winsome sigh, knowing that as a mere companion to Mrs Wilson—worse, to Mrs Wilson’s dog—she took altogether far too much interest in the arrogant Earl of Osbourne.
    ‘Miss Thompson?’
    And obviously not enough interest in the impatient man standing beside her with his arm still extended to escort her into dinner!
    ‘Thank you.’ She placed her hand upon Sir Rufus’s arm, her face slightly flushed from the disapproval she read in the austereness of his features as they joined the line of guests moving slowly through to the dining room.
    As might be expected from her lowly position in this household, Elizabeth was seated far down the middle of the table, well away from the host and hostess. Mrs Wilson, aware of the roses that had arrived for Elizabeth yesterday, had placed Sir Rufus on Elizabeth’s left side, with the slightly deaf and ancient Mr Amory, the local vicar, on her right.
    The only consolation she could see to this arrangement was that as the host Nathaniel Thorne was seated at the head of the table, with the ‘sensible’ Miss Rutledge on his left, and the elder of the ‘silly’ Miss Millers to his right!
    ‘I truly believed, after two hours spent in Tennant’s company, that you were about to fall asleep in the sorbet!’ Nathaniel grinned at Elizabeth as they later danced the first set together in the small candlelit ballroom at Hepworth Manor, the music provided by four musicians placed up in the gallery.
    She looked at him with innocently wide eyes. ‘You are mistaken, my lord; I very much enjoyed Sir Rufus’s conversation. He was explaining to me the best way to grow roses.’
    Those blasted roses again!
    Amusement twinkled in those clear blue eyes as she continued, ‘It would appear that it involves rather a lot of horse…manure.’
    Nathaniel’s shout of laughter was completely spontaneous, and drew several interested glances their way, glances that Nathaniel chose to ignore as he looked down at Elizabeth. ‘He really is the most boorish of men,’ Nathaniel said, shaking his head in disbelief.
    Elizabeth shot Sir Rufus a slightly guilty glance as he glowered in their direction from the edge of the dance floor. ‘We are being unkind…’
    ‘In my opinion, one cannot be unkind