“I’m not. Several times you’ve apologized for not being perfect. Now I would know—do you require perfection? In others as well as yourself?”
“Should we not strive toward such?”
“How can one seek such an impossible goal when to be human is to be imperfect? Is not the very perfection of man to learn about his own imperfections?”
She heard his intake of air, felt the hitch when his feet faltered. “Did you just quote Latin at me?”
She replayed the last sentence in her mind and realized she had. “Saint Augustine, I believe, of the Roman empire.”
He resumed his confident pace with a chuckle. “I know full well who that was, having history drummed into me by more than one overeager instructor. I just didn’t expect a mere slip of a woman to be quoting him at me.”
“Because women cannot learn Latin?”
“Because most women are mute whenever I’m near. This holiday’s been stranger than any other…with one startling revelation after another. Why not let it continue?” he said cryptically. “Go on, quote at me all you like.”
She scoured her mind for another appropriate quotation, unwilling to disappoint the challenge she heard in his tone. Scoured again yet came up empty. “A pox on you and your deuced goose, for you’ve thoroughly cooked mine! Anything else that comes to my lips is weaker than the last.”
He perplexed her thoughts further when he hefted her higher and skimmed his lips over hers, still striding toward some unknown destination. “I owe you a berry.”
What he owed her was a dose of common sense, that which he seemed to steal with but his presence!
“Take myself, for example,” she said solemnly, determined to subdue the tingle racing across her mouth and return to the prior topic, which he hadn’t taken as seriously as she needed him to. “Were I to hold myself up to the standard of perfection, I would fail ere I ever began.”
“That’s absurd!”
“Is it, Lord Frostwood? Do you forget that an unseeing eye has failed miserably at its intended design?”
“That’s preposterous!” he shouted, shouldering past doors that thumped shut loudly behind them. “To apply such nonsense to yourself. How can—”
“Shhh.” She tugged sharply on the short strands of hair at his nape, hoping to quiet his outburst. “Perhaps, Sir Blusters About, instead of holding yourself accountable to such an unrealistic standard—”
“Unrealistic? I assure you—”
“And I assure you,” she overrode his protest, intent on being heard, “that whatever less-than-perfect habits—ahem, giving orders, whistling whiskers through your teeth—you may possess, however few I’m sure they are, you would be a much happier and more pleasant person were you simply to strive toward being the best you can be, perfection aside.”
He grunted and set her on her feet. “Are you insinuating I’m the opposite of pleasant? That I’m a veritable churl?”
“With me you have been all that is—dare I admit it?—charming and thoughtful.” And delightfully forward, but she couldn’t share that with him. “I only offer this token of my counsel based on the general comments that seem to flit about at the sound of your…your name. Stop! What are you—?”
Humming, he’d placed her right hand upon his shoulder. He grasped her left. “Preparing to dance. With you.”
Sheer terror gripped Isabella and she stiffened. “You most certainly are not.”
“Come now, there’s no one here to see you dancing upon your ankle. We’re alone and—”
She jerked away. “Is that where you brought me? To the ballroom?”
He attempted to gather her in his arms again and she evaded his efforts, darting several steps back. “Isabella? What causes your distress? Do you not wish to dance with me?”
She wished it with all her heart, but that mattered not.
Have you any idea the horrid spectacle you make of yourself? One of her father’s tirades obliterated all reason. And you question why I won’t countenance a match for you? You’re a disgrace and your unnatural contortions an abomination!
Tepid as far as many of his refrains went but piercing all the same.
Now only one realization penetrated the fear—Lord Frostwood could never see her that way. Never!
Having no idea where he’d placed her or how far into the room they’d come, or even the direction of the doors, she felt lost. Like a cornered animal, she lashed out at the person closest to her. “No! I most certainly do not wish to dance with you. Have I not declined every time you’ve asked? And I wish you would keep your berries and your hands and your lips to yourself!”