Read Online A Crime of Manners by Rosemary Stevens - Free Book Online Page B

of how well you have treated me in the short time we have known one another.”
    The duke ignored this sally. He moved close to her, slipping a gloved hand around her waist while his other hand held hers in a firm grasp.
    Henrietta suddenly had difficulty breathing. She felt tiny sparks of energy radiating from their clasped hands up her arm, and the place where the duke’s hand touched her waist burned. Fighting an intolerable desire to arch herself into his arms, she instructed herself to no longer be attracted to the duke in light of his contemptible behavior.
    Watching from the side of the dance floor, Lady Clorinda viciously pinched her mama’s arm, wringing a yelp from Lady Mawbly. “I wanted the duke to dance the waltz with me,” she whispered fiercely. “He has already drawn enough attention to that country nobody.”
    Jewels clinking, Lady Mawbly turned to her daughter and said, “I am certain he is only doing it to stop the gossip, my pet. Why, you have only to look at Miss Lanford’s inadequate frame to know she could never compete with you.”
    Clorinda vainly acknowledged this truth and positioned her bosom in the duke’s direction in case he chanced to look her way.
    When the music began, the duke, at first slowly, then as he sensed Henrietta’s growing confidence, expertly, led her through the steps. Soon she swirled around the room in his arms. She had done so before, in her imagination, but the feeling it evoked was not equal to the variety of foreign sensations her body was now experiencing here in actuality.
    Really, thought the duke, Lady Fuddlesby has done wonders with the chit. And those eyes, he did not recall they were so very blue. Her tiny waist made one feel protective. He pressed his lips together at the thought of her earlier humiliation.
    “Miss Lanford,” he nobly began his apology, “I fear someone took a carelessly uttered word from me and used it to amuse his friends. I hope you have forgotten the matter.”
    The duke’s words effectively broke the spell Henrietta had fallen under in his arms. All in that moment, she realized that the duke’s demeanor did not imply a reserved nature as she had naively believed after their previous meetings. The Duke of Winterton suffered from an excess of conceit and pride!
    “Was that intended as an apology, Your Grace?” she said. The eyes the duke had just been silently admiring now glittered. “If so, I find it sadly lacking.”
    The duke looked down his nose at the girl in his arms.
    “Miss Lanford, allow me to impart a piece of brotherly advice. If you will be going about in Society, you must learn something of the conventions.  When a gentleman asks a lady to dance and then apologizes for an unpleasant occurrence, a lady accepts the apology graciously.”
    Henrietta chafed at the word “brotherly.” Her feelings for him had not run along those lines. “It appears to me that a gentleman would take responsibility for his words and not try to foist the blame of their consequences onto someone else,” she lectured.
    The duke gritted his teeth. With a sinking feeling, he realized she was correct. It was past bearing, but his sense of honor came to the fore.
    “Very well, Miss Lanford, I own myself at fault and ask your forgiveness. My churlish words were spoken in anger without any forethought.”
    At her puzzled frown, he went on, his usual air of hauteur gone for the moment.
    “You see, I have been pursued for my title and fortune this age by many ladies and then- mamas. It appeared at our meeting at Lady Fuddlesby’s this was once again the case. I grow weary of the game and directed my distaste at you unjustly.”
    He quietly uttered the words she realized she most wanted to hear. “The feminine beauty I see before me is the strongest argument that my regrettable comparison of you to a horse could not possibly be further from the truth.” His gray eyes turned silver for a moment, and Henrietta caught her breath.
    Her own pride