Page 18 of A Single Obsession

Eliza followed his glance up the set. She bit her lip, her eyes twinkling with amusement, though she was not so ill-mannered as to agree with him.

“I don’t think I’ve ever seen you ride. At least, not since you were a girl. I expect you ride like you dance,” he added with a lopsided grin. “With grace.”

It gratified him to note that Eliza glowed with pleasure at his compliment.

Encouraged by her reaction, he spoke what was uppermost in his thoughts. “Truth is, much as I’m enjoying dancing with you, I would rather be riding across the countryside. There’s something about being outdoors that gives me energy, whereas this”—his eyes swept over the room—“does not.”

“I know what you mean.”

Beau gazed at his partner, puzzling over her words. Did she? Did she understand? There was no hint of deception in her face—no suggestion that she was just saying what he thought he wanted to hear. She was so different from Georgie, it was…surprising.

Every comment he made met with the same encouraging responses. A cheerful look, a few words, and sometimes a fuller reply.

There was no fluttering of her eyelids. No provocative pouts. No requirement to make clever conversation. Just a genuine appearance of pleasure, reflecting her enjoyment of the dance and, he thought, of his company.

It was most refreshing.

“I hope we’ll have many opportunities to stand up together again,” he said as they walked back to Georgiana.

Eliza’s lips curled into a full smile. “As do I.”

Beau’s eyes were drawn to the dimple which appeared in her chin. Was it always there when she smiled? He hadn’t noticed it before and found it disconcertingly alluring. There was something oddly satisfying about making Eliza smile like that.

“Perhaps you could save the last dance for me?”

“Perhaps I could,” Eliza said, with another dazzling smile.

He returned Eliza to Georgiana’s side, feeling like a king, but his buoyant mood was short-lived.

As he moved away to find his next partner, Beau came face to face with his mother. Again. Her eyes gleamed, and a thin smile was pasted on her lips.

“I am glad to see you secured a dance with Elizabeth. It is well you are taking your duty seriously at last. There is a gracefulness in her deportment and a meekness in her manner which is most pleasing. I trust you made sure your partner enjoyed standing up with you?”

Duty. Beau’s stomach clenched. His enjoyment of the dance fled at the implications of her words. She wanted him to court Eliza and by standing up with her, he had unwittingly fallen in with a plan of his parent’s making, not his own.

“I believe so,” he said in a colourless voice.

“Excellent. I count on you to ensure she keeps enjoying your company.”

The sick feeling in Beau’s stomach grew. He should have guessed his beloved parent still hankered after a connection with the Duke of Wessex. If not one of the Duchess’s granddaughters, why not another? He’d failed to gain Georgie’s hand, so his mother expected him to win her sister instead.

How could he face Eliza again, knowing she was his mother’s choice? He wasn’t such a cad as to raise expectations he was not willing to fulfil, and despite his mother’s ambition, he had no intention of getting married this year if he could help it.

Out of the corner of his eye, Beau saw Lady Whitlow approaching with her daughter in tow, and his spirits sank even further. His mother might favour Eliza, but she encouraged Miss Whitlow too, and that woman had set her sights on him.

Beau didn’t think he could cope with another attack tonight. Just thinking about her flirtatious behaviour brought him out in a cold sweat.

“Good evening, madam,” he said, with a quick bow to his mother, taking his leave before the Whitlows could reach them.

He needed to escape before he was forced to dance with Miss Whitlow again.

With that single thought in mind, he headed for the door.

Chapter 8

That night, Beau dreamt of dancing with Eliza. It was a pleasant, floaty sort of dream in which she glowed up at him with her captivating dimple showing, and he awoke with the ghost of a smile on his face.

It quickly faded as he remembered what had happened. His mother had made the mistake of approving of Eliza. Instead of encouraging him, it had made him wary, reluctant to fall in with any plan of his parent’s making.