The Lady's Tutor by Robin Schone

the
gilded ton, of the soft swish of brightly colored silk and banners of
black coattails, men stepping, women swirling.
    She concentrated on the stark white of her glove, the shiny black
satin that comprised his lapels, anything but the uncomfortable pounding of her
heart and the painful hardening of her nipples underneath the slick friction of
silk on silk.
    She desperately searched for a safe topic of conversation. She
was not supposed to respond to a man who was not her husband. “I did not
know that you danced.”
    “You mean that you did not know I was accepted in polite society.”
    There was no sense in lying. “Yes.”
    “There is a lot about me that you do not know, Mrs. Petre.”
    “Do you sleep with the baroness?”
    Elizabeth missed a step at the words that came unbidden from her
mouth. His fingers dug into her waist; a whalebone jabbed into her rib.
    “You seem to be current on the prevailing gossip. Why don’t you
tell me?”
    She stared hard at a diamond stud in his shirt. It winked in the
bright light from the overhead chandelier.
    “How else could you know that my husband and I had accepted an
invite to the ball?”
    “My mother,” he said lightly, twirling her. “She and the baroness
are bridge partners.”
    “Does your mother know about our. . . lessons?” she asked
breathlessly.
    “Siba, Mrs.
Petre. I have told you I will not speak of what goes on between me and a lady
behind closed doors.
    “You do not need to wear a corset.” His leg stepped between hers
as he twirled her again; solid heat pressed into the jointure of her thighs. “You
are suffering from lung collapse for nothing.”
    Elizabeth’s fingers dug into his shoulder—no padding there, just
hard muscle. “We are not in your home, Lord Safyre. Whether I wear a corset or
do not wear a corset is of interest only to me and my abigail.”
    “What about your husband, Mrs. Petre? Doesn’t he have anything to
say about what underclothes you wear?”
    The sharp retort did not make it past her lips.
    Her husband had never seen her underclothes, let alone expressed
an interest in them. Whereas she had no doubt that the Bastard Sheikh had seen
a lot of women’s underclothing.
    “How do you come to dance so well if you do not often attend
social events?”
    “How do you come to waltz so well when your husband does not?”
    “I did not say that he does not waltz,” she retorted stiffly.
    Edward waltzed; he merely did not waltz with her. He saved the social
amenities for his constituents.
    “Tell me about your two sons.”
    “I told you I do not discuss my children.”
    “But I am not your tutor now. I am a man who is making small talk
to pass the time while we dance.”
    Elizabeth’s head jerked back, her mouth opening to tell him that
if dancing with her was such a boring chore, he need not bother.
    It was a mistake.
    The only thing that separated their faces was ten inches. The
span of his two hands.
    “My sons are both at Eton,” she blurted out.
    “Richard and Phillip, those are their names, aren’t they?”
    “Yes. But how—”
    “I do open an occasional newspaper. What do they like—politics?”
    A smile rimmed Elizabeth’s mouth, remembering Phillip’s fight
because Master Bernard, a “Whig,” was supposedly an outrage to his “Tory”
beliefs.
    “No, my sons are not interested in politics. Richard is studying
to be an engineer—he says technology is the way of the world and will help
people far more than government. Phillip wants to be a sailor”—her smile
widened—”preferably a pirate.”
    An answering smile softened the Bastard Sheikh’s face. “Richard
sounds like a clever boy.”
    Elizabeth searched his eyes for mockery but found none. A rush of
maternal pride overcame her caution.
    “He is. He takes his exams for Oxford next fall. It will be hard
on Phillip when Richard leaves Eton though. They have always been very
close—despite their age difference and perhaps because their personalities