Marry Christmas (Zebra Historical Romance) (9 page)

“My dance card,” she said suddenly, smiling brightly and pulling it out for his inspection. “Which dances would you like? Or am I being presumptuous?”

“You’re angry. Why?”

She looked at him with shock. No one could read her. No one, not even Elizabeth, who thought her endlessly cheerful or as transparent as she herself was. Nothing could be further from the truth. “Why would you say such a thing? Of course I’m not angry.” She smiled brilliantly at him to prove it.

“You are. You are even a bit angry that I noticed you are angry.”

Maggie laughed, no longer attempting to mask her emotions. “I suppose I took exception to your censure.”

The earl looked taken aback.

“You hinted that I was blindly loyal to Elizabeth when that is not true.”

“Ah,” he said as realization hit.

“And how did you know I was angry?” she demanded.

“Your eyes,” he said simply. “They turn to fire when you are angry. There’s a tiny spark right there even now,” he said, pointing to one eye.

Maggie laughed aloud.

“Doused with mirth.”

Across the room, Maggie’s mother beamed, already trying to decide whether a spring or late winter wedding would be better. And how would they ever get a trousseau together in time. They would have to travel to Paris, of course, and be back in time for Miss Cummings’s wedding, for they certainly could not miss the social event of the year. And how ever would they get the funds for such a trip? Her mind was in a happy whirl watching her daughter laughing with the handsome earl. What a wonderful, wonderful summer season this had turned out to be.

Rand couldn’t fathom why he had demanded Miss Cummings dance each waltz with him. It could be construed as either excessively romantic or irritatingly domineering, and he didn’t have to try very hard to determine which she thought the gesture was.

Raising one delicate brow, she said, “Do you get your gift of command from your years of military service or your months as duke?”

“From my hours as a fiancé,” he said blandly. There, he’d made her smile. Her face fairly transformed when she was not scowling, or worse, forcing herself to smile. Her eyes, wide and far too large for her face, turned to half-moons and the effect was quite charming.

“If you smiled like that all the time, I daresay your dance card would be filled in mere seconds.” To his surprise, her smile widened; he would have thought such a remark guaranteed to produce a frown.

“I don’t really care about filling my dance card,” she said, as if sharing a great secret. “When my mother and I were in Europe, I would pray with all my being that no one would approach me. But because I was an American and in possession of a great fortune, it was always full.”

“Do you truly dislike dancing then?” he asked, surprised that any young girl would.

“No,” she said thoughtfully. “I actually adore dancing and parties. I disliked the idea that they didn’t truly want to dance with me. They much rather would have preferred to dance with my father’s bank account.”

He would have laughed if she hadn’t looked so very serious. “So, you felt sorry for yourself. And I imagine you told yourself that you should not, because a hundred girls, a thousand, would have taken your place in a second.”

She looked at him as if surprised he would have even the smallest understanding of how she felt.

“It is the curse of the privileged,” he explained. “Don’t you think that everyone in this room has met eyes with some poor beggar on the street and felt guilty that we thanked God we were not that beggar?”

“That is exactly how I feel. But I think you are far too charitable with the others. I don’t think they give a single thought to anyone outside their small circle. And if they do, it’s to throw money at it to make themselves advance only in the eyes of their peers. Or to say it is the beggars’ own fault that they are in such a situation.”

Rand examined her solemn face as she watched the others in the ballroom and couldn’t help wondering if anyone else knew how very intelligent she was. “You are quite cynical for one so young,” he said.

“I do try not to be,” she said, laughing a bit. “I wish I were more like Maggie. She’s never morose about anything. Or angry or bitter. I must be growing quite tiresome to you.”

“I cannot take another minute of your company,” he said, and laughed when she looked as if she believed him. “I see that hope springs eternal in your soul.”

“You can be quite awful,” she said with mock sternness. The orchestra began playing the first waltz and he gallantly held out his arm.

“I believe this is our dance, Miss Cummings,” he said formally.

“And all the other waltzes?”

“I don’t think I could bear to see you in another man’s arms,” he said lightly, and an uneasy feeling hit him that what he said was all too true.

Edward decided after the first dance with Miss Pierce, that he would make it his mission to crack through her happy facade before he left with Rand on their travels. For some reason, he found provoking the girl remarkably amusing. She chattered incessantly about nothing, something that normally would have bored him into a coma. But she had a way of observing others’ idiosyncrasies that had him laughing more than he had in years.

“There’s Mr. Belmont,” she said, tilting her head in the direction of a handsome man talking to Elizabeth’s mother. “He’s terribly infatuated with Elizabeth’s mother and doesn’t leave much secret about it. He lives alone above his stables and treats his horses better than most humans. I sometimes skip over there when I’m hungry and gnaw on some of the fresh vegetables he stores there for his mounts.”

Edward raised a skeptical eyebrow.

“I can see you think I’m lying, but the tastiest carrot I’ve ever had was pilfered from his horse’s bin.”

Edward looked down at her as if she were quite mad. “If you are that desperate for food, I can arrange to have carrots delivered to your door.”

She smiled impishly up at him. “I was five and being punished for not eating my lunch. I can’t remember what it was, but I’m certain it was something very objectionable. We went to visit Mr. Belmont and his horses that afternoon and I was quite starving. I was a plump little thing, you see.”

“Yes, I can see that,” he said, just to watch her reaction. She did not disappoint him. She laughed.

“You are overly fond of trying to antagonize me, are you not? Well, I can say for a fact that I will not allow it.”

He got the most wicked idea then, one he knew he would follow through on because if there was one thing about him, it was that he was often unable to stop his wicked impulses. “These balls are unbearably warm. I’m afraid I long for the cool English countryside. Shall we walk about the garden?”

“Let me ask my mother, first,” she said primly.

When she returned, clearly holding in a bubble of laughter, he placed her hand in the crook of his arm. “What has you so giddy?”

“Oh, my poor, poor mother. I’m afraid we have her nearly in a swoon of happy delirium. She practically pushed me toward you. I think she is the one who will need a new gown to mend a broken heart when you leave, not me!”

“We have her fooled well, have we?”

“Completely, poor girl. I suppose I’ll have to make it up to her by marrying one of those onerous Wright brothers,” she said, laughing.

Edward didn’t think her jest was funny. Certainly Maggie could do better than those rowdy boys, whose admittance into society was dictated only by their stepmother’s great social status. He simply did not understand these Americans and their strange rules of status. England had a wonderful order. One knew where one belonged, which was an extremely comforting thing. Members of the peerage married members of the peerage. At least that is how it used to be until things became disastrously tied to economics. He had a sudden recognition of how Rand must feel, throwing away generations of tradition in an ironic mission to save his legacy.

“Surely you can do better,” he said, feeling anger for her.

“I don’t know if I care to,” she said lightly.

He couldn’t see her eyes so could not determine whether she was jesting or not. He couldn’t tell from her tone, from her body, from the way she held her head. It was damned irritating not to be able to read her. As an officer, he’d made a study of men—and women—to see if they were being completely honest in their words. He’d gotten quite adept at ferreting out transgressors simply by asking a few simple questions. “So you truly don’t care who you marry?”

“It seems to end the same way no matter if it’s a love match or a business arrangement. Which is why, as I’ve told you, I haven’t any interest in marriage at all.”

“And how is it that all marriages end?”

“Badly. I suppose there are a few old couples out there still holding hands and enjoying one another’s company. If they are out there, they certainly aren’t members of the Four Hundred.”

“What, precisely, is your ‘Four Hundred’?” Edward asked, steering Maggie down a shadowed path lined with sweet-smelling beach roses, whose incessant blooms perfumed the air from May to October.

“It’s a made-up list of names of prominent people,” she said. “As far as I can tell, it’s a list of people with a lot of money or great connections. It is only my friendship with Miss Cummings that has our family skating on the fringes of society, for we are definitely not on that list.”

“What do you think of the list?” he asked, trying to provoke her.

“I really don’t think of it at all,” she said, turning to smile at him.

It struck him that the more she smiled, the more she was lying, and he thought he’d test his theory. “I’m going to kiss you as soon as we are alone,” he said matter-of-factly.

Maggie stumbled the tiniest bit before recovering, clinging to his arm to stop herself from tumbling to the ground. “What?”

He almost laughed at her expression, which she hadn’t managed at all to school into a smile. “I said, I’m going to kiss you.” He looked casually around, then, before she could utter a single word or bring her panicked facade into a false smile, he kissed her, and God above knew the moment his lips touched her soft, pliant ones, that he wouldn’t be able to stop with just one. She let out a small sound that might have been a protest or might have been surrender, but he didn’t care. He found he liked Maggie just as much when she was talking as when she was not. And not talking at the moment seemed infinitely better.

Slowly, he drew back and gazed down at her upturned face. “There,” he said softly. “There is an honest expression.” She immediately scowled before she could catch herself.

He watched as she carefully schooled her features. “Is your experiment over?” she asked politely.

“For now.”

“That was not part of our game’s rules,” she said. “I am afraid if you continue on in this amorous way, you will be in danger of falling in love with me. I do not wish to be a party to breaking your heart when you leave for England. I must ask, then, for the sake of us both, for you to never kiss me again.”

He smiled, trying with all his might not to laugh aloud. She was, quite simply, the most delightful girl he’d ever met. “I see I’m a far better kisser than I believed,” he said, and was rewarded by the faintest flare of her nostrils.

“I’ve experienced far better,” Maggie said, smiling brightly. “And far more sincerity. If you would please escort me to the ballroom, I believe Arthur Wright has reserved one of my waltzes. Arthur is the least onerous and least boisterous of the Wrights. He fancies himself an expert on Egypt, a subject that fascinates me entirely.” Not waiting for him, she turned and walked back to the Vanderbilt mansion, with the dignity of a queen. He found himself smiling at her back as he followed her.

Elizabeth was leading the poor duke on a merry chase. Or not so merry, she thought happily. Since that first waltz, two more had sounded in the Vanderbilt’s grand ballroom, but Elizabeth had mysteriously been unavailable. Now that they were engaged, no one seemed to think it at all odd that they were not spending any time together.

“Where is the duke?” Alva asked, turning away from Oliver Belmont. The two had been talking incessantly about a home Mr. Belmont was planning to build in New York. Nothing was of more interest to Alva than construction. In fact, she had already made plans to visit the newlyweds within the first year so that she might supervise improvements to the duke’s Bellewood.

“I haven’t the slightest idea where the duke is,” Elizabeth said, stifling a yawn. “I believe I saw him going off in the direction of the billiard room.” In fact, she knew precisely where he was because she’d asked one of the Wright brothers, Albert, to show the duke the room. It was a manly haven of cigar smoke, fine brandy, and gambling. Once there, she knew it would be near impossible to get him away. The only men left in the ballroom were either too young to enter the billiard room or too old to care where they were. Or those who were completely smitten by someone, as was the case with Mr. Belmont, who continued to hover near her mother.

“I do wish Father were here,” Elizabeth said pointedly.

“Whatever for?” Alva asked, clearly understanding her daughter’s question and just as clearly pretending ignorance.