She was getting annoyed. Every time she and Max talked about this wedding, going all the way back to their first conversation about it at The Nutcracker, he had assured her he would look out for her. Not that she needed him. Mr. Benz was hovering and could be hailed. But Mr. Benz could not buoy her the way Max could. She brooded as she reviewed her notes. When the royals and Leo—did Leo count as a royal now, even though he’d declined the formal title?—entered to a great big cheer, there was still no Max. After the new couple was seated, Marie leaned over Leo and Gabby to speak to Dani. “Do you know where Max is?”
“I’m sorry, I don’t.”
Marie frowned, and once more, Dani surveyed the ballroom. He was nowhere. But his parents were here, which both relieved and annoyed Dani. If they were here, it meant they weren’t somewhere else being beastly to him. But that also meant he was AWOL for no reason.
She felt a hand on her shoulder. It was Mr. Benz, handing her a microphone.
“I thought the baron was going first?” she whispered. Her protocol lessons had taken—she’d been instructed to address Max as Lord Laudon and refer to him as “the baron” when in public.
Which was fine. Because that was what he was. It was good to remember that.
“There’s been a slight change of plans,” Mr. Benz whispered. “Lord Laudon is delayed, so I think it’s best if you go first, which means you need to welcome everyone and thank them for coming before you start.”
Great. Winging it at the royal wedding.
“I have the utmost confidence in you,” Mr. Benz added, and when she turned to look at him, he smiled sincerely. He seemed to mean it.
She wondered what the delay was if it wasn’t Max’s parents. It wasn’t like him to—
Oh, but there he was. Slinking in a side door.
With Lavinia.
Which was fine.
Lavinia was a nice person.
She was also quite the sight to behold, dressed in a long, jade-green column of a gown with matching emerald earrings. Her hair was done in an elaborate updo.
Max had his head bent as they walked so she could speak into his ear, and whatever she was saying was making him smile.
Well, crap.
Dani had been thinking it wasn’t like him to go missing from a responsibility, but that wasn’t right, was it? It wasn’t like the Max she knew. But it was like the Depraved Duke to be late to the royal wedding reception because he was busy chasing after a goddamn cousin to the Austrian archduke who also happened to be an extremely nice person.
“Unless you feel you can’t?” Mr. Benz prodded.
“No. I can.” She accepted the microphone, took a fortifying breath, stood, and said, “Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. If you would indulge me in a few words?” She glanced at Max, who had taken his seat, hoping for an encouraging nod or a wink of solidarity, but he wasn’t looking at her. All right. She was on her own.
She did everything she was supposed to do. Welcomed the guests. Introduced herself. She was confident with a dash of self-deprecating humor thrown in. She told funny stories about Leo and segued into a less humorous and more heartfelt ending. She actually made a few people get misty.
She did a damn fine job. Take that, Your Royal Highnesses.
She sat to an enthusiastic round of applause, and as Max started talking, she picked up her drink and took a big, relieved gulp.
“Welcome to my wedding. Ah, no! I jest. It’s not my wedding anymore, is it?” He smiled at Marie and Leo with a mix of affection and impishness as the crowd laughed. She supposed he wanted to address the elephant in the room. He made sure, though, to telegraph his love for the couple and his genuine excitement over their union. He did a bang-up job, handling what could have been a fraught situation with his signature breezy humor and emotional intelligence. Dani cast a glance at the crowd. Lavinia, seated next to Max’s mother, was rapt.
When Max was done, he sat on the other side of Marie, which meant Dani no longer had to look at him—and that she was done with her official duties. She was relieved on both counts.
She understood that she couldn’t simply disappear for the rest of the evening, and really, she didn’t want to. She wanted to celebrate Leo’s wedding. She just needed a break. So as the servers started bringing the first course, she got up and headed toward the exit. There was a parlor outside the ballroom set up for the wedding party to use as a green room. It had comfy chairs, beverages, and, most critically, a door that closed. She would sit for a few minutes, get her shit together, and shake off this mix of Max-inspired attraction and annoyance. Then she would go back into the ballroom, and hopefully whatever weirdness was going on between Max and her would be gone. Because, honestly, they were supposed to go to Austria tomorrow.
Maybe he wanted to take Lavinia instead.
Well, whatever. Dani was going to Austria with Leo and Marie. Max could do what he wanted with whomever he wanted. It was no concern of—
Just as she escaped the ballroom, a hand came down on her shoulder. Oh, shit. She knew who it was. She could feel who it was.
“Wait.” His voice confirmed it.
Damn it. “I just need to step out for a moment.” Her own voice was less familiar. It was too high. It sounded like it belonged to someone playing her in a movie. It felt like that, too, like she was reciting a line. I just need to step out for a moment. It was a line. It was a lie. What she needed to step away from was him. And she’d almost made it.
“You looked at me first.”
“What?” What was he— Oh. Oh. She gasped as goosebumps rose on her skin.
He remembered.
She was frozen in place, shivering with his hand on her bare shoulder, his skin on her skin. She was his prey, and she could no sooner move than if he’d literally caught her in a trap.
“Don’t pretend you don’t know what I’m talking about.”
He sounded angry, which was such an uncharacteristic emotion from Max, at least when it came to her.
She needed to turn around and face him. She’d pulled up her big-girl pants and gotten through that toast, and she could do this, too.
She pivoted in place. He didn’t take his hand off her shoulder, just let it rest lightly against her skin as she turned and settled it more heavily on the ball of her shoulder when she finished her rotation.
She had compared Max’s eyes before to the cool blue center of a flame, but now, despite the fact that his body was calm, that his palm on her shoulder was still and dry, his eyes were a wildfire raging out of control. She had always thought of Max as funny and breezy and easygoing with a hidden center of deeply felt emotion. But now he looked like he’d been turned inside out, like all the tender, emotional stuff was on the outside, plainly visible for anyone to see.
“I did look at you,” she said slowly, relieved that her voice came out sounding like her again. “But then you stopped looking at me.” And for some reason she couldn’t articulate, that loss of his attention had hurt.
“Because I couldn’t look at you anymore.”
“Why not?”
“Because then you would see everything.” He moved his hand from her shoulder across her suddenly tender skin until the heel of his palm rested lightly over the notch in her collarbone and his fingers radiated up her throat. She had the sudden, absurd notion that maybe he was on fire, inside. His hand, though it was barely touching her, hovering almost, brought heat as it traced a path through her cold-pebbled skin.