“Your Grace, may I present Lady Jillian Kittridge? Lady Jillian, His Grace, the Duke of Rushton.”
As if acting on instinct, Lady Jillian dipped a curtsey. “Your Grace,” she said. She had a lovely, clear voice, absent of the high, ingratiating inflection he had come to expect of the ladies of the Ton.
“Lady Jillian,” he said, “I wonder if I might request a dance.”
“No,” she replied promptly.
He felt his brows lift in surprise. “No?”
“That is, no, thank you, Your Grace,” she amended, and he watched a light splash of color tinge her cheeks. “It is kind of you to ask, but Eleanora has torn the ribbon of her slipper and I have decided to keep her company rather than dancing.” She linked her fingers before her.
Lady Ravenhurst’s dark eyes sparkled with merriment. “Oh, do go on, Jilly. You needn’t dance attendance upon me all evening.”
Jilly. It suited her, James thought. Pleasant and warm. It seemed impossible to say without smiling. He wondered if she would balk if he called her that, if he snatched that small bit of familiarity and made it his own without her leave.
Still she hesitated. “I cannot accept such a request without my chaperone’s approval,” she said.
Lady Eleanora gave a trill of laughter. “Your aunt will pardon you,” she said. “She’d never thumb her nose at a duke. You know that as well as I do.” She made a shooing motion with her hands. “Go, Jilly. My slipper will still be broken when you return.”
James grabbed for Lady Jillian’s hand before she could argue, pulling her inexorably toward the dance floor, ignoring the small gasp she gave.
“Your Grace,” she said, her voice faintly shocked, “the dance has already started. We must wait for the next set.”
The next set was a minuet, and would allow him little time to converse with her. The waltz already underway would provide far more opportunity for conversation. How else was he to pique her interest?
“We’ll simply slip in with the rest of them,” he said, nudging aside Lord Worthington, who had inadvertently blocked their path. The man mumbled a curse beneath his breath, looking sulky as James swept past him, and he thought he heard a muffled flutter of laughter from Lady Jillian. When he peeked back, however, her face was placid, looking remarkably unruffled for a woman who had just been dragged across the room.
“Your Grace, this is highly irregular,” she said, but he fancied there was a hint of a smile lurking at the corners of her mouth. Perhaps she had not been pleased with his high-handed commandeering of her company, but at the very least he had amused her.
He pulled her as close as he dared, settling his fingers upon her waist. When the next couple flew by on the strains of the music, he swept Lady Jillian onto the floor and into the rhythm of the dance.
Despite her earlier reticence, she was a graceful dancer.