Free The Apothecary's Daughter by Julie Klassen Page B

at least one dance for poor me?”
    She answered warmly, “Of course I have.”
    Mr. Bromley had become one of her most frequent partners. He
was an elegant, slim young man of middling height and excellent
bearing. Straight brown hair framed classic English features. He was
also the only son of a wealthy family, as her aunt often reminded her.
As though Lilly needed reminding.
    “Excellent,” he said. “Then I shall have the next and the last and
as many as I can in between, when the chaperones aren’t looking.”
    She smiled at him, and his answering smile almost reached his
eyes. She studied his face, wondering just what was between him and
the lovely Miss Susan Whittier.
    At the end of the evening, Lilly found herself alone, surreptitiously
searching the crowd for Mr. Bromley, who had requested the last dance
with her. The first notes of a slow, ceremonious minuet began.
    William Price-Winters hurried by. Seeing her, he paused. “Miss
Haswell. Not sitting this one out, I hope? Oh, that’s right. Bromley
claimed the final. Where is that chap?”
     
    “I do not know.”
    At that moment Roger Bromley and Susan Whittier walked past
and joined the dance.
    Will saw them too. “Oh. Well, I say.”
    “She has agreed to a dance after all,” Lilly said. “How nice for
Mr. Bromley.”
    Will was not fooled. “I am sorry, Miss Haswell. My wife is waiting, or I “
    “Think nothing of it, Mr. Price-Winters. I have enjoyed a great
deal of dancing this evening.”
    “Wait,” Will said triumphantly. “Graves here will dance with
you.
    “Really, I am fine-“
    Will grabbed the arm of a nearby man she had never seen before
and turned him around to face her. And a very handsome face it was.
Thin nose. Pale blond hair swept over his right temple. A faint moustache, not in present fashion, shadowed his upper lip. “May I present
Adam Graves. We were at Oxford together. This is Miss Haswell.
Most sensible girl in the room, I assure you.” Will winked at her.
“Even if she is my sister’s friend.”
    Lilly curtsied to the newcomer. When she looked up, the blondhaired man still stood as he was, stiffly staring at her with startled
blue eyes. After a tense moment, he gave a jerky nod.
    Will clapped Graves on the shoulder. “Good man.” Will walked
away to find his wife, who had finally made an appearance.
    Still the man made no move. Did not offer his arm nor open his
mouth. An awkward silence followed, and Lilly felt her cheeks burn.
How mortifying.
    She turned slightly so that she was facing at an angle between Mr.
Graves and the dance floor. Blindly, she gazed toward the other couples
moving gracefully through the delicate steps of the dance.
    “It is all right, Mr. Graves,” she said without looking his way.
“You needn’t dance with me. Mr. Price-Winters was only acting the
part of protective brother. I do not mind sitting out.”
     
    “Graves! ” Will hissed as he and his wife stepped near, then away
again.
    Finally, Mr. Graves woodenly offered his arm. “Will you
dance?”
    She had long ago promised herself never to reject a man who’d
gathered his courage to ask for a dance. The automatic response, “I’d
be delighted,” would not come forth, however. She took a deep breath
and forced out a quiet, “Very well.”
    They joined the minuet in progress. He led her to an open space in
the ballroom and took up the movements with stiff, minimal precision.
She tempered her own steps accordingly. He kept his gaze averted.
    She sighed inwardly. Throughout the previous season and now this
new one, she had danced with dozens of gentlemen she secretly found
disagreeable or unappealing. But never, she hoped, had she made her
disinterest as plain as Mr. Graves made his now. Everyone in the room
undoubtedly saw how loath he was to dance with her.
    She discreetly glanced around at the other dancers. There at the
front were Roger Bromley and Susan Whittier. Roger beamed at his