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hardly blame Bond for his displeasure. Emma had rebuffed him.
    “Come, Mr. King,” she said. “With one dance you will know all I have to teach. And I shall understand why you asked me such questions just now.”
    She crossed to the French doors, and Adam pushed them open. Laying her lavender gloves on a side table, she gave him a little curtsy.
    “Shall we dance?” she asked.
     
    Adam made no move. Emma looked into his blue eyes and watched them gazing back at her. They had gone dark now, with black rims that matched the lashes framing them. He set his right hand at her waist and drew her close. Without taking his eyes from hers, he spread her slender fingers with his left hand and squeezed them gently.
    The music barely filtered into her ears, even though she knew it was there—for as they drifted out onto the floor, Emma’s sense of the world around her seemed to vanish. All she heard was the heavy throb of her heartbeat and the quietjingle of Adam’s spurs as his boot heels tapped the wooden floor. She was aware of her skirt, floating behind her on its stiff crinolines—meant to keep the dancers apart, but failing tonight. He held her close, too close for this dance. Yet she could not stop him, could not make herself say the proper words, the polite things, the gracious empty syllables.
    “Emma…” The name floated from his lips in his strange, beguiling accent. His breath warmed her ear.
    Her mind told her to pull back from him, warned her—he was treacherous, he was foreign. He was married.
    Yet he lifted her feet from the floor, and her cheek brushed against his shoulder. The scent of leather and the plains filled her nostrils…and her mind reeled away with all its doubts and warnings.
    Her eyes met his again, deep pools in which she thought she might drown. “Mr. King,” she whispered, trying to prevent herself from falling into them.
    “Call me Adam,” he said.
    They moved into the shadows of an alcove, and he stopped, still holding her close in his arms. The music died and the other dancers separated, sweeping into bows and curtsies and polite applause.
    “Emma.” He lifted her chin with a finger. “Thank you.”
    Aching to speak, she found it impossible to form words. She glanced toward the crowd as the music started and yet another dance began. Cissy stood in one corner surrounded by a cluster of attentive men. Their father was speaking with Lord Delamere.
    And now she saw Nicholas approaching. He made a small bow. “You may leave now, Mr. King,” he said. “I advise you to keep your attentions from Miss Pickering in the future. Her father is not pleased.”
    Adam’s eyes flashed with an anger that twisted Emma’s stomach into a knot. “I decide who gets my attention, Bond,” he growled. “If you’ve got a problem with that, let’s step outside and settle this.”
    “Do you challenge me, sir? I hope not. I may be forced to speak with Lord Delamere and Commissioner Eliot about the sort of men scratching out a living on the queen’s protectorate. Traitors to the Crown.”
    “Talk to anyone you want, Bond. I’m not budging from my ranch—not even for the queen herself. Excuse me, Miss Pickering. I have business to take care of.”
    Adam doffed his black hat and strode through the whirling dancers toward the verandah, his heavy footsteps echoing across the floor. Nicholas’s neck was red above his white collar as he faced Emma.
    “I must apologize, Miss Pickering. You can see the man has no respect for our queen or her empire. Adam King is a schemer and a liar. Not a word of truth escapes his lips. You must not trust the man for a moment. I beg you to keep yourself under guard if you chance to meet him again. His forward behavior with you this evening was inexcusable.”
    “Emma,” Cissy cried, hurrying across the room and taking her sister’s hand. “May I speak with you for a moment in private? Do you mind dreadfully if I take my sister away, Mr. Bond?”
    Emma glanced at