The Duke Goes Down (The Duke Hunt #1) by Sophie Jordan

Still, she loathed the idea of going back inside and pasting a smile on her face—mingling with everyone like nothing was amiss. Like nothing shattering had just occurred.

She sucked in a breath and rejoined the masses.

Everything in her yearned to slip around the house and hop in a carriage and take flight for home. She longed to lock herself away in the comfort of her bedchamber. The only problem was that they had not taken their own carriage here tonight.

They had accepted the gracious offer from the baroness to ride with her and her daughter this evening. Imogen was well and truly stuck. She could not walk home. It was dark and much too far, even if she knew every road and path in this shire as well as her own face. Doing so would be overly dramatic and only alert Papa and others that something was amiss.

Well and truly stuck.

Moving through the bustling ballroom, she was immediately assailed with all the scents and sounds of the Blankenship ball. The sweat from so many bodies crammed in one space mingled with cloying colognes and perfumes and the rich smell of congealing food.

“Shall we refresh ourselves with a drink?” Mercy asked.

Imogen nodded in agreement and followed Mercy, single file, through the crowd.

A quick sweep of the room and she spotted Papa deep in conversation with Gwen Cully, the local blacksmith. She had taken over her family’s smithy as her father was deceased and her uncle was getting long in years and not quite up to the task anymore. She had worked alongside the men in her family for many years, ever since she could walk. No one in Shropshire blinked over her role in a male-dominated enterprise.

The Blankenship sisters were dancing.

The baroness was at the center of a group of ladies who were engaged in an animated conversation. Imogen could guess what—or rather who—might be their topic of discussion. She continued after Mercy, surveying the ballroom as she went.

And her gaze collided on him.

Mr. Butler was still here. Bodies quickly obscured him, and she lost sight of him, but she had spotted him. Her eyes had not deceived her. He was still here.

She stopped hard in her tracks, not even moving when someone jostled her from behind.

“Pardon me.”

She didn’t even turn to see who addressed her. She could only stare across the room, searching for another glimpse of him, starkly handsome in the bright light of the ballroom.

She might be rattled over what transpired and battling a chronic blush, but in that brief flash he’d seemed as composed as ever. She peered through the crowd, trying not to look conspicuous in her quest to locate him.

A crack split the crowd, and she spied him again through the opening. He was mingling with several gentlemen. No ladies in their midst. She smiled slightly. Apparently he was still a pariah among that gender.

One of the men conversing with him turned, and she was granted a full view of Mr. Blankenship, the only other gentleman in attendance who was dressed as richly as Mr. Butler. His color palette might be more flamboyant, but there was no doubting his peacock-blue jacket threaded with gold was costly.

Butler was speaking. Something he said struck Mr. Blankenship as the height of amusing. The older gentleman tipped his head back and laughed uproariously, clapping Butler on the back jovially. It dawned on Imogen then that it did not matter how unsavory she made him in the eyes of the ladies. If the papas, in this case Mr. Blankenship, liked him, then that was all there was to it.

Heiresses had fathers who decided upon the husbands for their daughters. Imogen winced at the unfairness of that. Luckily, she was no heiress. But that meant Mr. Butler only had to win over the papas.

Butler’s gaze locked with hers across the ballroom, and there was such knowing smugness in his smoky gaze that she felt a fresh wave of indignation sweep through her. Understanding passed between them.

She narrowed her gaze on him. He knew a father would not care about the rumors she had started. The things she had said would be deemed trivial and, sadly, not serious enough to dissuade a father.

Mercy lightly touched her arm, capturing her attention. “Imogen? Are you well? You’re looking pale. Can I get you anything?”

“Oh. Um. The crowd is a bit of a crush. Perhaps some ratafia would refresh me.”

“Of course. Wait here. I’ll be but a moment.”

As Mercy disappeared into the press of bodies, Imogen faded back against the edge of the ballroom, taking position alongside the wallflowers and widowed dames—one dame in particular whom she knew to be a salacious gossip, even greater than any of the Blankenship women.

There was one queen of gossip in every town, and in Shropshire that was Mrs. Hathaway.

“Mrs. Hathaway,” she greeted.

“Ah, Miss Bates. Not taking your spot on the dance floor this evening?”

“No, not tonight.” Or ever again.

“Just as well. I’ve counted and the ladies present far outnumber the gentlemen. Not ideal. Not ideal at all. Shropshire must work to even these odds.”

Imogen nodded as though in agreement.

“Perhaps when the new duke arrives he will have brothers,” Mrs. Hathaway added hopefully.

“Perhaps,” Imogen murmured, not bothering to point out that the previous two Dukes of Penning had never deigned to grace any of the local fetes. Why would the new duke, once they hunted him down—or his possible brothers—be any different?

Whenever he returned from Newfoundland or Greenland or wherever he was, he would be just as socially distant as previous dukes. If he had brothers, they would be remote, too. It was the way of the aristocracy. They were all pompous prigs. The baroness was singular in her willingness to socialize with country society.