No sooner had Ellen opened her mouth to spill out her emotions than Lady Margaret bumped viciously into her back.
“I beg your pardon!” Lady Margaret gasped. From the amount of offense she had taken to being touched while dancing, Ellen would have thought she’d purposely whacked the lady over the head with a candelabra to steal her partner or some such. “Apologize at once,” she demanded.
“I am very sorry,” Ellen said, her eyes downcast.
“It was not Miss Garrett’s fault,” Joseph rushed to her rescue, eyes blazing with indignation.
“She should not even be here in the first place,” Lady Margaret sneered. “The duchess only invited her because she felt sorry for the pitiful thing. Everyone knows she’s done nothing since arriving in London but make a spectacle of herself.” She glanced to Ellen and said, “Isn’t it time you returned to your circus in America with all the other freak show participants?”
“Lady Margaret, really,” the gentleman with Lady Margaret said, scowling and shaking his head.
Ellen wasn’t consoled at all by the gentleman coming to her defense. It was too late. She’d already lost the game. The duchess had only invited her out of pity, not because she’d made any sort of headway with London society.
And she never would. She’d been fighting a hopeless cause.
“I’m terribly sorry,” she said, barely able to draw enough breath to form the words, then peeled away from Joseph and dashed for the nearest door.
“Ellen,” Joseph called after her, following.
Now she gained the attention she had missed when she arrived. Now everyone chose to turn and look at her to see what was going on. It was the bitterest of ironies, and it was all Ellen could do not to burst into tears under the scrutinizing way people followed her with their eyes as she dashed from the room.
But once they reached the hall—through a different door than the one that guests were still arriving at—Ellen nearly ran headlong into Joseph’s brother, Lord Carnlough. He stood in conversation with another man, who looked a great deal like Joseph, for some reason.
“Ah, Joseph, there you are,” Lord Carnlough said. Ellen tried to step around both men, but Lord Carnlough shifted to block her path. “Miss Garrett. I’m glad I ran into both of you. I should very much like you to meet a friend of mine, Prince Petrus of Aegiria.”
“How do you do?” Joseph said, barely looking at the man. He tried to reach for Ellen, but she made another bid for freedom.
Lord Carnlough frowned and blocked her path again. “I very much wish for the two of you to meet Prince Petrus,” he said. “I have been wanting to make the introduction for quite some time, but I was in Lisbon, and Petrus needed to make a quick visit home.”
Ellen swayed one way, then the other, looking for a way to escape. She was closer and closer to tears with each moment that passed.
Lord Carnlough went on with, “He has returned, you see, because we have important family matters to discuss. As it turns out, Father had a secret he kept from us, and that secret is—”
“I do not have time for this, Francis,” Joseph snapped. “Can you not see that Miss Garrett is distressed?”
Lord Carnlough finally seemed to notice. “Is something the matter, Miss Garrett?”
As kind as Ellen was certain the offer was, she had had enough of people thinking there was something wrong with her. “Yes!” she shouted. “I do not belong here. I will never find a place in this wretched society that you all cling to. Just let me go and stop pestering me.”
She raised her gloved hand to her mouth as a sob escaped from her, then darted around Lord Carnlough and down the hall.
“Ellen, wait.” Joseph came after her, even though Ellen could hear Lord Carnlough say something in an attempt to stop him.
When Joseph caught up to her, Ellen stopped long enough to glance down the hall at Lord Carnlough. “You should go back to him,” she said, weeping and trying to catch her breath. “He is your brother. He has something important to tell you.”
“Francis can wait,” Joseph said firmly. “I’ve no need to be introduced to another of his friends right now, and I certainly don’t want anything to do with my father. You need me. I can see that as clearly as day.”
“It’s no use,” Ellen said, shaking her head. “I am a lost cause. I will never find the acceptance I wanted. Those people don’t like me, and they never will.”
“I do not give a damn what those people think,” Joseph said. He grasped the sides of her face and stared adoringly at her. “I love you.”
Ellen caught her breath and snapped her watery eyes up to meet Joseph’s. The heat of love was right there, burning in his gaze. It was the most wonderful thing she’d ever seen.
And then Joseph looked past her with a start and caught his breath.
“Westminster has just headed into that room over there,” he whispered. “Alone.”
Just like that, the beautiful moment was shattered by something more important than her feelings.