A Royal Kiss and Tell

Had he danced with her there? He’d had too much whisky that night, too, as was his unfortunate habit, and he didn’t recall it clearly. Perhaps that explained why she thought they were so familiar. Well. For the second time today, he desired very much to kick his own arse.

“The duke and duchess are starting their dance,” Lady Eulalie said.

Bas and Eliza had taken their places beneath one of the dozen enormous crystal chandeliers in the space the crowd had formed around them. Lady Caroline smiled with delight—and then gasped. “Oh dear, her train,” she moaned, and actually leaned against Leo as if to share a secret. “Do you see? It’s undone on one side. I’m sure she doesn’t know—oh! There is Hollis. Hollis will set it to rights. Hollis takes such good care of her, really. So do I, for that matter. I can’t imagine what she’ll do once we leave her, can you? She said she will have a lady’s maid, but it’s not the same, is it? Alas, we must return to London. I have my many friends, as you know, and Hollis, well...” She looked at Lady Eulalie. “Her father needs her desperately. He’s blind.”

Lady Caroline was astonishing. He hardly knew men as free of spirit and tongue as she was. He had never met a woman who wore her eccentricities with such confidence.

She wasn’t paying any attention to him now, as all eyes had turned to the royal couple. The music began, and Bas smiled encouragingly at Eliza as he led her into the first steps of the dance. Poor Eliza’s fair face turned as red as the cardinal’s robes, and she kept her gaze on Bas’s feet as she tried to match his movements.

“Lord, she’s as awful as I feared,” Lady Caroline said without the slightest compunction. “It’s really not her fault. Either one is born a dancer, or one is not, wouldn’t you agree?” She looked at him for an answer.

Leo said nothing. He would not dare criticize Eliza so openly.

“I’ve known more than one lady who has been given any number of dance lessons and can’t retain the steps,” she continued, and winced apologetically. “Eliza tries very hard, but it’s almost as if she can’t hear the music.”

“Oh dear,” Lady Eulalie said with a smile she could not contain.

Lady Caroline blinked as if she’d just realized what she was saying. “Oh! You mustn’t mind anything I say. If Eliza were standing here, she’d be the first to admit her poor dancing. She finds it rather amusing.”

She should certainly not remark so openly about a royal duchess, and by her given name at that. Even he wasn’t so irreverent. He felt a strange responsibility to defend his new sister-in-law. “If you would allow, Lady Caroline, I think you meant to say Her Royal Highness.”

Instead of demurring as he expected, perhaps even apologizing, Lady Caroline’s lovely green eyes rounded impossibly larger. And then she laughed. Chortled, really. “I meant Eliza, of course!”

Apparently Leo still had a bit of stodgy princely blood running through his veins, because he was appalled. Eliza was the future queen of Alucia, and Lady Caroline obviously didn’t fully understand that meant that even she was to afford her friend the respect she was due. If she wanted to call the duchess by her given name behind closed doors, that was one thing. But in a public setting? It could not be tolerated, and he believed he was doing Lady Caroline a kindness by intervening. He turned more fully toward her, so that his back was to Lady Eulalie. “I have no wish to embarrass you, Lady Caroline,” he said softly, “but I would have hoped that someone might have explained things to you before now.”

The light of the dozens of candles in the chandeliers above them sparkled in her eyes. “What things?” she asked as her gaze wandered his face and settled, somewhat disconcertingly for Leo, on his mouth.

“Your friend is the future queen of Alucia. As such, you must show her the respect that all her subjects must show her.” He arched a brow to emphasize that point. Part of him couldn’t believe he was having to say these things. Certainly he had never been one to defend or promote royal decorum. But he’d never been confronted with such an obvious breach of decorum, either. “That would include how you address her...particularly in public.”

Lady Caroline’s mouth dropped open for a sliver of a moment. And then her eyes narrowed into brilliant slits of ire. “I do beg your pardon, Highness. I understand perfectly that Eliza will be the future queen, but I am her dearest friend and I don’t think it is for you to say what I call her.” One of her feathery brows arched high above the other, daring him to disagree.

Her redress absolutely stunned him. And, on some level, bloody well impressed him. That was some cheek for you. But it could not be tolerated, not in this palace, so he glared down at her so that she would not mistake his displeasure. “You should not address the duchess as anything other than Your Grace, and you most certainly should not address me in this manner.”