"Careful," he murmured, his face inches from hers. "If we fall, Lady Cowper will write a ballad about it."
"You did this on purpose," Beatatrice breathed, her face flushed as they spun past a row of gaping dowagers.
"Did what?"
"Caused a scandal. You bypassed my sister. You bypassed everyone."
"I asked a woman I find interesting to dance," Arthur said calmly, guiding her smoothly around the floor. "If society finds that scandalous, it speaks to their lack of imagination, not my manners."
"My mother will likely lock me in the cellar when we get home."
Arthur's eyes darkened, the humor vanishing instantly. "She will do no such thing. If she tries, I will buy your house and evict her."
Beatatrice stared at him. He was entirely serious.
As they turned, Beatatrice caught a glimpse of herself in one of the massive floor-to-ceiling mirrors. She saw a plain girl in a gray dress, but she also saw the towering, dark-haired Duke looking down at her as if she were the only person in the room. She wasn't wallpaper anymore. She was the center of the room. And as Arthur pulled her just a fraction of an inch closer, Beatatrice realized with a jolt of terrifying clarity that she never wanted to hide in the shadows again.
The carriage ride back to the Hemsley Townhouse was suffocating. The silence was thick, heavy, and dangerous like the air right before a thunderstorm. Beatatrice stared out the window at the gas lamps blurring past in the London fog. She could feel the heat radiating from her mother's fury on the opposite seat. Clara sat beside Lady Hemsley, her face buried in a handkerchief, weeping with a quiet, dramatic rhythm that required years of practice to perfect.
The moment the heavy front door clicked shut behind them, the storm broke.
"You scheming, ungrateful little viper!" Lady Hemsley hissed. She did not yell. Yelling was for the lower classes. She dropped her voice into a register that made the floorboards vibrate.
Beatatrice slowly unpinned her cheap fascinator. "I did nothing, Mama. He asked me."
"He asked you to mock us!" Clara shrieked, dropping the handkerchief. Her eyes were red, her perfect face contorted into something ugly and feral. "He used you to humiliate me, and you let him! You smiled at him in front of everyone!"
"Was I supposed to refuse a Duke, Mama?" Beatatrice asked, her voice trembling despite her desperate attempt to keep it steady. "You have drilled it into our heads for years. One does not refuse a titled lord."
Lady Hemsley stepped forward and grabbed Beatatrice by the upper arm, her nails digging through the cheap gray silk. "Do not use my lessons against me. You are a shadow, Beatatrice. You are here to hold Clara's train. You are not the main attraction. Tomorrow you will write a letter to the Duke apologizing for your inappropriate behavior and excusing yourself from the rest of the season due to a sudden illness."
Beatatrice stared at her mother. A sudden, terrifying coldness settled in her chest. For 22 years, she had obeyed. She had shrunk herself down to fit the tiny airless box her mother had built for her. But she could still feel the phantom pressure of Arthur's hand on her waist. She could still hear the deep, genuine rumble of his laugh.
"No," Beatatrice said.
Lady Hemsley froze. Clara stopped crying. "What did you say?"
"I said no," Beatatrice repeated. The word tasted strange on her tongue. Intoxicating. "I will not write to him. I will not pretend to be sick. If I am a shadow, Mama, then let me fade away in peace. But I will not actively destroy the one good evening I have had in four years just to soothe Clara's pride."
Lady Hemsley's hand dropped. She looked at Beatatrice as if a footstool had suddenly sprouted a mouth and started reciting Latin. "Go to your room." she whispered viciously. "Do not come out. You are not to speak to the staff. You are not to take meals in the dining room. You will rot up there until you remember your place."
Beatatrice turned and walked up the stairs. Her spine was perfectly straight.
She spent two days in her room. The isolation wasn't entirely a punishment. It was quiet. She read old books. She stared out the window at the rain. She tried to convince herself that the waltz had been a fever dream, a bizarre anomaly in the grand, boring mathematical equation of her life. He was a duke. She was Beatatrice. The universe would right itself soon enough.
On the third morning, a sharp rap on the heavy mahogany front door echoed through the house. Beatatrice cracked her bedroom door open, listening. Downstairs, the butler's voice murmured, then a heavy, measured tread of boots.
In the foyer, a man's voice. Low, gravelly, impatient. "I am here for Miss Penhaligan."
Lady Hemsley's voice fluttered, high-pitched, and breathless with sudden, desperate hope. "Your Grace! What an unexpected honor. Please step into the drawing room. I will have Clara brought down immediately."
"You misunderstand, Lady Hemsley." Arthur's voice cut through the foyer like a scythe through dry wheat. "I did not ask for Clara. I asked for Beatatrice. Fetch her."
Upstairs, Beatatrice clamped a hand over her mouth. A long, agonizing pause stretched below.
"Your Grace," Lady Hemsley stammered, the oily charm slipping from her voice. "Beatatrice is... she is indisposed. A terrible head cold. Quite contagious."
"Excellent. I have a robust immune system."
"She is entirely unfit for visitors."
"Lady Hemsley," Arthur said, his tone dropping to a dangerous quiet register. "I am not a man who enjoys repeating himself. If you do not send someone up those stairs to retrieve her within the next 10 seconds, I will go up there and fetch her myself. And if I find she is locked in, I will remove the door from its hinges. Do we understand each other?"
Beatatrice didn't wait for her mother's reply. She threw open her door and practically ran down the stairs. She stopped on the landing. Arthur stood in the center of the foyer. He was dressed in a dark green riding coat and pristine leather boots. He looked massive in the cramped, overly decorated entryway. Lady Hemsley stood near the drawing room door, looking as though she had been struck by a carriage.