“Miss Cecilia.”
    The voice of that particular earl’s son caused her to quickly turn, his smile eliciting a painful throb in her heart and her cheeks to heat. “Hello, Ned.”
    His features might not be to every girl’s taste, but, oh, how handsome he seemed to her. Green eyes that held golden glints; fair hair that needed no tongs to curl; a smile that dug twin dimples in his cheeks and tugged delicious warmth within her chest. And then there was his scent, oh, so delectable, with its spicy mix of bergamot, sandalwood, and musk, a scent she dreamed about, the slightest whiff quickening a powerful yearning inside.
    But more than this was his kindness, his good humor, the way he was so quick to oblige—save in offering her the attention she longed for. And as she was a praying woman, and knew him to be a praying man, she had the oddest sense that God had destined him to be hers. The thought made his ignorance of her so much the harder. For as long as she had known him, Ned Amherst had pulled at her heartstrings.
    “Would you do me the honor of this dance?” He held out a hand. 
    Her heart began a rapid tattoo. Oh! Finally—finally!—she would dance with him. He wanted her to dance with him—he wanted her—not her sister, not some prettier young lady, not someone else. She accepted his hand, the touch shivering all the way to her spine, the glow in her heart sure to be suffusing her features as they moved to join the dance formations. Not that she cared what others might think. It was enough that he had noticed her, and wanted her, and perhaps she could finally persuade him to consider her as a potential love—
    “Caro once told me I should dance with you.”
    Cecy blinked. Stumbled. Felt the heat in her cheeks flame to a scorching fire as she scurried to keep up the movements of the dance. “I beg your pardon?”
    She barely heard his words repeat, wincing as the movements of the dance drew him away. What kind of idiot was she? Did she really want to hear his rejection again? That he only danced with her because her sister told him to? Emotion tightened her chest, touched the back of her eyes, as the couples around them smiled and spun with laughter, oblivious to her mortification.
    He returned, eyes serious, lips pulled up into wryness. “. . . said as my good deed I should dance with you.”
    The shame curdling within waned under the weight of her anger. She stopped, heedless of the couples twirling about her, heedless of those who would gape and stare, the heat within pushing words into her mouth. “You . . . you are dancing with me as some sort of good deed?”
    He flushed. “I suppose when you put it like that it doesn’t sound so good.”
    Her bottom lip wobbled. She bit it savagely. Flinched at the pain, pain which wove with the strands of her hurt and frustration, binding tightness around her heart and felling the guard around her mouth. “Oh, you suppose that, do you?” She pulled her hands from his, blinking away the moisture gathering in her eyes. “Forgive me, but I’m not interested in being the recipient of your charity, Ned.”
    “Miss Cecilia, I didn’t mean—”
    “To belittle me? To sound so patronizing?” Oh my! Where was this coming from? She almost sounded like Verity—or at least the heroine of one of her Minerva Press novels.
    “Cecilia, I am sorry. Please, people are watching.” He held out his hand.
    She eyed it, then him, her spurt of temper dying as quickly as it had risen. Truly, he did appear a little ashamed. Her gaze lifted, encountering her mother’s hard stare, which forced her to accede to his request and place her hand in his again.