Read Online One Final Season by Elizabeth Beacon - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Elizabeth Beacon
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stiffen her spine and make her set a little distance between them.
‘If you ever find the courage to really look into that guarded heart of yours, Miss Alstone, you might find your answer to that question and a few others as well,’ he informed her even as he twirled and confused her in time with the dance.
‘I don’t know what you mean,’ she said, wishing she was in a position to cross her fingers against that uneasy lie, for she was beginning to wonder herself.
‘I know, that’s the pity of it all,’ he responded rather grimly and they spent the rest of the dance in uneasy silence.
Their waltz was over too soon and not soon enough, so they could step away from each other at last with more than just physical space yawning between them. Kate marvelled at herself for being such a fool as to have refused to marry him so often in the past, even as the guarded part of her drew back and whispered he’d always ask too much of her, however many times he asked and she said no. She told herself to be grateful he’d had the sense to slash through whatever bonds bound them to each other three years ago. Yet it didn’t feel right that they should now go their separate ways as if they’d never once mattered to each other. She hesitated ridiculously when he offered her his arm so distantly at the end of their dance, as though he were about to conduct someone he barely knew and didn’t much like back to her chaperon.
She laid her fingers on his immaculately tailored coat sleeve and did her best to look undaunted and serene while a flash of hot and confusing warmth shot through her at the feel of such latent power beneath her fingertips. It was utterly ridiculous to feel intrigued by even so light a touch on his muscular arm, when she’d been more or less immune to his physical allure on first acquaintanceship. She was still struggling with this odd twist to their relationship that now left her more conscious of him than he was of her when they were rudely interrupted.
‘What a delightful display that was, don’t you agree, my love?’ Lady Tedinton greeted them with apparent laziness as Kate and Edmund unwarily stepped off the dance floor and straight into her path.
‘Oh, they’ll need to practise for a few more years yet before they’re even half as good at it as you are, my dear,’ her husband replied and Kate could see how little her ladyship relished being lumped in with those who were accomplished and experienced, but no longer young, even if her husband seemed oblivious to her quick frown of displeasure.
‘Practice makes perfect, don’t you agree, Lord Shuttleworth?’ the lady responded, avid hunger brazenly obvious in her heavy-lidded eyes as she ran them over him, as if testing his power as a lover and liking the idea of taking him as her current one a little too well, whatever their past relationship might be.
‘Only until that perfection is achieved, my lady,’ he said with a supremely elegant bow Kate thought was more an attempt to distance himself from the woman than offering her even a hint of encouragement.
‘But if it’s not properly maintained, even perfection can fade away from lack of application,’ the lady murmured and Kate wondered at her daring, at the same time as she marvelled at her husband’s wilful blindness to her true nature as she tried to joust with a potential lover under his very nose.
‘A little imperfection always seems so much more human to me,’ Edmund replied with a surprisingly warm look in Kate’s direction that she decided was his way of subtly informing Lady Tedinton she was much less to him than she thought herself to be, since he’d just put Kate ahead of her and everyone knew they were no longer even friends.
‘Yet no doubt surprisingly tedious after a while. A person of taste and refinement, not to mention experience, cannot find it easy to be burdened with a bungling amateur forced to strive for mastery of a set of skills that comes to others with
‘If you ever find the courage to really look into that guarded heart of yours, Miss Alstone, you might find your answer to that question and a few others as well,’ he informed her even as he twirled and confused her in time with the dance.
‘I don’t know what you mean,’ she said, wishing she was in a position to cross her fingers against that uneasy lie, for she was beginning to wonder herself.
‘I know, that’s the pity of it all,’ he responded rather grimly and they spent the rest of the dance in uneasy silence.
Their waltz was over too soon and not soon enough, so they could step away from each other at last with more than just physical space yawning between them. Kate marvelled at herself for being such a fool as to have refused to marry him so often in the past, even as the guarded part of her drew back and whispered he’d always ask too much of her, however many times he asked and she said no. She told herself to be grateful he’d had the sense to slash through whatever bonds bound them to each other three years ago. Yet it didn’t feel right that they should now go their separate ways as if they’d never once mattered to each other. She hesitated ridiculously when he offered her his arm so distantly at the end of their dance, as though he were about to conduct someone he barely knew and didn’t much like back to her chaperon.
She laid her fingers on his immaculately tailored coat sleeve and did her best to look undaunted and serene while a flash of hot and confusing warmth shot through her at the feel of such latent power beneath her fingertips. It was utterly ridiculous to feel intrigued by even so light a touch on his muscular arm, when she’d been more or less immune to his physical allure on first acquaintanceship. She was still struggling with this odd twist to their relationship that now left her more conscious of him than he was of her when they were rudely interrupted.
‘What a delightful display that was, don’t you agree, my love?’ Lady Tedinton greeted them with apparent laziness as Kate and Edmund unwarily stepped off the dance floor and straight into her path.
‘Oh, they’ll need to practise for a few more years yet before they’re even half as good at it as you are, my dear,’ her husband replied and Kate could see how little her ladyship relished being lumped in with those who were accomplished and experienced, but no longer young, even if her husband seemed oblivious to her quick frown of displeasure.
‘Practice makes perfect, don’t you agree, Lord Shuttleworth?’ the lady responded, avid hunger brazenly obvious in her heavy-lidded eyes as she ran them over him, as if testing his power as a lover and liking the idea of taking him as her current one a little too well, whatever their past relationship might be.
‘Only until that perfection is achieved, my lady,’ he said with a supremely elegant bow Kate thought was more an attempt to distance himself from the woman than offering her even a hint of encouragement.
‘But if it’s not properly maintained, even perfection can fade away from lack of application,’ the lady murmured and Kate wondered at her daring, at the same time as she marvelled at her husband’s wilful blindness to her true nature as she tried to joust with a potential lover under his very nose.
‘A little imperfection always seems so much more human to me,’ Edmund replied with a surprisingly warm look in Kate’s direction that she decided was his way of subtly informing Lady Tedinton she was much less to him than she thought herself to be, since he’d just put Kate ahead of her and everyone knew they were no longer even friends.
‘Yet no doubt surprisingly tedious after a while. A person of taste and refinement, not to mention experience, cannot find it easy to be burdened with a bungling amateur forced to strive for mastery of a set of skills that comes to others with
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