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“Hmm…” He moved even closer until they were standing side by side, leaning against the railing, looking out into the night.

“Why are you here?” Helen glanced at him briefly.

His broad shoulders moved in a shrug. “For the same reason, I suppose. Only different. I am trying to put the scandal behind me. Trying to pretend as if I can get through a ball with my dignity intact and failing miserably.”

Helen let out a chuckle. “Trying and failing, is it? Is that what we are doing?”

Helen couldn’t believe how at ease she felt speaking openly with this stranger. Perhaps his status as an exile, hovering at the fringes of society, made him easy to relate to.

“Looks like that to me,” Lord McAllaistair said with a nod. “Trying to be normal. But failing at it.”

Helen cast her eyes down. Yes. This was exactly what she’d been trying to do most of her life. Trying to be normal and failing abysmally. But she’d never realized this before. No one had ever put it to her this way.

“Would you like to dance?” Lord McAllistair turned toward her, suddenly.

Helen raised her head. He was looking at her, direct, open. Serious. “I told you. It’s too hot—”

“Not in there,” Lord McAllaistair interrupted hoarsely. “Here.”

Helen looked around the empty balcony. It was narrow but had plenty of space for two people to move around. “I haven’t… It’s been a long time since I danced. I am not certain I remember how.”

He extended his hand. “There’ll be no one here to judge you.”

Helen hesitated, looking at his large palm, snuggly enclosed in a white silk glove. Her heart drummed violently in her ears, and her thoughts escaped her mind. She couldn’t come up with a reason to refuse, so the only option was to put her hand in his.

He immediately tugged her toward him. Softly.

Helen stepped closer as Lord McAllaistair raised their hands and then slowly spread his fingers until their hands were touching palm to palm. The tingly, raw sensation traveled from her palm and through her entire being. Helen caught her breath.

She hadn’t been touched in a long time. Not like this. Not by a man. Her palm seemed sensitive and raw, her eyes entranced by the man before her.

She could do nothing but follow his lead in a dance as they stepped away, then closer still. Their eyes never broke contact as they circled each other, turned, and joined their hands again.

It was strange. They moved fluidly as if they were one. A river flowing through the forest. Together. As one.

Helen swallowed. Was this how dancing always felt?

She couldn’t remember. It had been too long.

Her heartbeat accelerated, her palms perspiring, her vision blurring.

She stopped abruptly. So abruptly that her body shook still from the momentum of the dance.

Lord McAllaistair caught her hands in his. “Are you unwell?”

Helen looked at him, her mouth open, gulping the air. Was it part of her illness? Had she overexerted herself with one little dance? Or did this handsome stranger have this unfathomable effect on her?

Perhaps Greyson had been right to never let her dance anymore.

Greyson.

Helen snatched away her hands. “I am fine. It’s… just little vertigo.”

She turned away and clutched the railing.

“Apologies,” he said hoarsely. “I did not mean to overwhelm you.”

She didn’t answer.