Free Season for Scandal by Theresa Romain Page A

concentration. With hair graying at the temples and that devilish smile, he looked like a scandalous diplomat. “What shall I tell you about first? The elephants, I think. They’re so common in India, the natives keep them like Englishwomen keep pugs. One for every household, no matter how poor, and as gentle as you can imagine. Why, I once saw an elephant lift up a child in its trunk . . .”
    The story wrapped around her, tugging her from the crowded ballroom to the sultry sun-baked ground of a faraway land.
    Jane cradled her untouched flute of champagne, drinking in Bellamy’s words instead. Her hands were covered with expensive kid gloves, wrapped around costly crystal. She might dress the part, but she felt herself as much an outsider in this ballroom as she would be in India.
    For the first time this evening, it felt like an adventure, and not just a happenstance.

Chapter 7
    Concerning the Purpose of Flirtation
    “You dance like an angel, my lady.”
    As the last notes of the quadrille dissolved, Edmund uttered this complete falsity with a brilliant smile, bowing over the hand of his hostess. Lady Alleyneham’s awkwardness during the lively dance had made a catastrophe of his boots, but he had managed to weave her through the other couples well enough to keep the dance moving.
    “Dear me, Kirkpatrick,” the countess fluttered, taking his arm and accompanying him through the crowd. “I can’t think of the last time I’ve danced a quadrille. Not this year, I vow! Why, I hardly remembered a one of the figures.”
    “Surely not,” he lied. “You were as light on your feet as a cloud. Or—‘a host of dancing daffodils.’”
    A rather muddled compliment, but the Wordsworth seemed to please the countess. With five unmarried daughters—two of whom were presently in the country, recovering from some lung ailment—the countess deserved a bit of fun. Even if it came at the price of a few bruised toes.
    Edmund smiled down at the plump countess as she chattered about the complexities of planning a ball, but with his peripheral vision, he scanned the crowd. Whom should he approach next? This would be the supper dance, so he would be paired with the lady for quite some time.
    A laugh floated above Lady Alleyneham’s wall of prattle.
    His head snapped up. He knew that laugh: too loud for politeness, but lusty and genuine.
    Jane.
    And he realized in a flash that he had promised to return to her. And he was probably late.
    When she had released him for an hour, he had fallen into his usual habits at a ball, capturing the loneliest-looking women for a series of dances. Spinsters, widows, even a chaperone or two. Harassed companions used to following the whims of the wealthy and doing without pleasures of their own. He parceled out his evening for them, brightening their spirits a few minutes at a time. Delivering the most outrageous compliments he could think of, just to make them smile.
    What had Jane done with herself during that time? Surely he owed his wife the same amount of courtesy that he had extended to near strangers tonight.
    Lady Alleyneham was running through a lengthy account of how she’d chosen an engraver for the ball invitations. “So we chose the eleventh design,” she concluded, “because the gilding was so smart. Didn’t you think so?”
    “I certainly did.” Edmund had no idea what he was agreeing to. “Would you excuse me, my lady? I believe my wife needs locating.”
    Lady Alleyneham batted him on the arm. “You newly wed couples. So devoted! You must run off and find your bride, then. You were very good to give me a dance, Kirkpatrick.”
    Of course, my lady. I’m good to everyone—except the people who deserve it most.
    “It was my very great pleasure,” he said instead, then went in search of his baroness.
    Despite her lack of height, she was easy to find, for at the moment she possessed no corresponding lack of volume. Once more, her laugh rang above the chatter in the ballroom,