Rayna murmured something, unaware that the comte was regarding her closely. She
barely noticed him.
“You will have to introduce your friend, monsieur le comte,” Sir Hugh said.
Gervaise bowed. “Ladies, my friend the Marchese Pietro di Galvani, newly arrived from Sicily.”
He has lovely teeth, Rayna thought, extending her hand to the marchese. Adam smiled down at Rayna Lyndhurst, carefully avoiding Arabella’s eyes, and brought her slender white hand to his lips. He gently turned her hand over and lightly kissed her palm.
Rayna knew the marchese was taking liberties, but still she felt her pulse quicken at the touch of his mouth. She did not snatch her hand away.
“Signore,” she said, raising her eyes to his face. She blinked, thinking for an instant that he looked somehow familiar. But that was surely impossible. She had never been in Italy before, and he was a Sicilian nobleman. For a long moment he held her gaze and she noticed that his eyes were an even more vivid blue than she had first thought.
Adam released her hand and looked into his sister’s face. He saw a silent warning in her eyes, and a measure of amusement. And something else, he thought. Smugness. That was it. The chit looked smug.
“Signorina,” he said politely, bowing to her and then to Lady Delford.
“Do you speak Italian, signorina?” Adam asked lightly, turning back to Rayna.
“A little,” she said. Indeed, she thought, she would pay more attention now to Arabella’s lessons.
“French?”
“Oui, monsieur, je parle français.”
“Her French is far more fluent than mine,” Arabella said, sounding mournful. “Indeed,” she added with a covert glance at her brother, “now that you have discovered a common language, why do you not dance?”
Adam cast her a smile, but quickly turned back to Rayna. “An excellent idea, mademoiselle. Your permission, my lady?”
Lady Delford was in a quandary. Her husband had assured her they would not see much of Adam Welles, yet here he was, looking for all the world like a bearded buccaneer, asking her permission to dance with her daughter. There was no reason she could think of to refuse him, and she nodded, albeit unwilling. She saw her daughter smiling up at him, her eyes sparkling outrageously. She was not blind to Adam Welles’s attraction—what woman could be? And it was but one dance. “Enjoy yourself, my love,” she said to her daughter.
“If it pleases you, my lady,” the Comte de la Valle said, staring for a moment after the marchese and Rayna, “I also would like to dance with your lovely daughter, after the marchese.”
“Certainly, monsieur,” Lady Delford said.
“I will wait with impatience, my lady,” the comte said, his eyes on Rayna’s retreating back.
“So you are left high and dry,” Sir Hugh said to Arabella.
“I am quite sunk,” Arabella said. “I ask you, ma’am,” she continued to Lady Delford, “is it fair that Rayna receives all the masculine attention? Perhaps I am fated for a convent.”
Things, she thought, were going quite well. Adam and Rayna seemed quite taken with one another, as she had thought they would be.
“It is a pity,” Adam said to Rayna as he took his place opposite her in the dance.
“What is, signore?”
“The dance leaves little time for conversation.”
They were immediately separated to perform their steps with the others.
“I have never before been to Italy,” Rayna said, pleased that she had managed to think of a sensible comment before they stepped back together. They touched hands lightly, Adam bowing and Rayna curtsying. Rayna’s attraction for him was not lost on Adam, but what he did not understand was why he had asked her to dance. He saw her flush deeply, and cocked his head to one side in silent question.
“Have you ever been in England?”
“I? Why do you ask, signorina? What reason would I have to travel to that cold, distant country?”
“It is not that cold, signore.”