She shook her head. “It’s so silly. Really.”

“Tell me.” He gripped her shoulders and leaned his head closer to hers. Lord, had her eyes always been such a brilliant shade of green? However had he not noticed?

“It was only something Lord Exeter said,” she demurred. “He was trying to be funny. I think.”

“What did he say to you?”

Lottie’s eyes widened at his dark tone, then she looked away. “He remarked on the number of guests in attendance, then said they all must have come to get a glimpse of Sir Alfred, as I certainly wasn’t the draw,” she explained with a wince, flushing with embarrassment at the memory. “He’s right, of course. I’m hardly the most promising debutante of the season, but he said it in front of so many people. And most of them laughed…”

Alec inhaled slowly, controlling the anger that suddenly thundered through him. Her familiar rosewater scent further calmed him. “He’s not a wit. He’s an ass. Forget about him.”

Lottie’s lips parted in shock, but then her gaze turned adoring. Alec nearly lost his breath. She hadn’t looked at him quite like that since she was a young girl. He’d forgotten how powerful her admiration made him feel. The hairs at the back of his neck prickled with a dangerous new awareness.

He patted her arm. “Come. I want a waltz.” The idea of going back downstairs where any man could dance with her, touch her, whisper sweet words to her, was suddenly unbearable. But they needed to get out of this room before he was tempted to keep her there.

“Oh, no. I feel so silly now—”

Alec grabbed her hand and pressed his thumb against her wrist. Her pulse was steady, strong, and swift. “Please, Lottie. Do it for an old man like me.” He moved his thumb in small circles and her heart beat even faster. As she stared at him, the very nature of the air seemed to change. They were no longer Lottie and Alec, but something more. Something that had been building for years, steadily growing without either of them noticing. But it had been there all along, biding its time. In every letter, every charged silence, every accidental touch.

And Alec could no longer ignore it.

“All right,” she said softly.

He smiled and placed her hand in the crook of his arm, as if it was the most natural thing in the world. Because it was. Because it always had been.

Alec let her enter the ballroom a few minutes ahead of him to avoid any hint of a scandal, then proceeded to dance with her not once, but three times. Sir Alfred’s frown seemed to deepen a little more with every turn, but Alec was tired of living to please that man. Not if he could live to please someone else.

As the night wore on, Alec laughed harder than he had in ages, while Lottie radiated with a happiness he hadn’t seen in years. And slowly, all his reservations dimmed. Though he bore no title, was not even recognized by his own family, and had no inheritance beyond the pittance his father’s copyright earned, he had a world-class education and, more important, a driving hunger to succeed. Perhaps that could be enough.