“She is going to need all the help she can get tonight.”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” he scoffed, but he knew what she meant. Billie was not meant for London. She was a country girl, through and through.

“She lacks confidence, George. The vultures will see this instantly.”

“Do you ever wonder why we choose to socialize with these vultures?” he mused.

“Because half of them are really doves.”

“Doves?” He stared at her in disbelief.

She waved a hand. “Perhaps carrier pigeons. But that is not the point.”

“I would never be so lucky.”

She gave him just enough of a look to make it clear that while she had heard this, she was graciously choosing to ignore it. “Her success is in your hands.”

He knew he would regret encouraging her to expand upon this point, but he could not stop himself from saying, “I beg your pardon?”

“You know as well as I do that the surest way to ensure a debutante’s success is for an eligible gentleman—such as yourself—to pay her attention.”

For some reason, this irritated him greatly. “Since when is Billie a debutante?”

His mother stared at him as if he were an idiot. “Why else do you think I brought her to London?”

“I believe you said you wished for her company?” he countered.

His mother waved that away as the nonsense she clearly saw it to be. “The girl needed some polish.”

No, George thought, she didn’t. He jabbed his fork into his sausage with far too much force. “She’s perfectly fine the way she is.”

“That is very gracious of you, George,” she replied, inspecting her muffin before deciding to add an additional dab of butter, “but I assure you, no lady wishes to be ‘perfectly fine.’”

He fixed a patient expression on his face. “Your point, Mother?”

“Merely that I need you to do your part this evening. You must dance with her.”

She made it sound as if he thought it a chore. “Of course I’ll dance with her.” It would be awkward as hell, all things considered, but even so, he could not help but look forward to it. He’d been longing to dance with Billie since that morning back at Aubrey Hall when she’d looked up at him, planted her hands on her hips, and demanded, “Have you ever danced with me?”

At the time, he couldn’t believe that he’d never done so. After all those years as neighbors, how could he not have danced with her?

But now he couldn’t believe that he’d ever thought he had. If he had danced with Billie, music washing over them as he placed his hand on her hip . . . It was not something he could forget.

And he wanted it. He wanted to take her hand in his and dance her down the line, to step and dip, and feel her innate grace. But more than that, he wanted her to feel it. He wanted her to know that she was every bit as womanly and elegant as the rest, that she was perfect in his eyes, not just ‘perfectly fine,’ and if he could only—