Mr. Darrow please what? Alfred thought a little desperately as the Minister's wife singled him out. He had less than zero desire to talk with her at the moment, particularly if it involved, as she seemed to be indicating, stepping outside of the dance area and away from the safety of a crowd. He hadn't been expecting this — they were supposed to want to talk to Zelda, not him. Actually, they were supposed to not be staying this long to interrupt at all. This entire plan depended on the Fisks not wanting to make a scene. This may not have crossed into scene territory quite yet, but Konstantin was right — people were starting to look. At a glance, someone might assume this was a pleasant chat between Zelda and her siblings, but none of them were quite so good at disguising their true feelings to keep that charade intact under closer examination.

What to do now? If he agreed to follow Mrs. Ross outside, it would be a concession of defeat, wouldn't it? The rest of Zelda's siblings would be able to start damage control and erase the idea of a courtship from the eye of society entirely. All their efforts so far, and all of the anxiety tying his stomach in knots, would be for naught. But staying here like this was unsustainable; if neither of her siblings backed down, eventually people observing would realize this conversation wasn't as pleasant and superficial as ballroom chats usually were. From there it would be only a minor logical leap to assume Zelda's family disapproved. And if it was already well-known that they disapproved, there would be no reason to try and preserve appearances by allowing it to continue — so, again, all for nothing.

He hesitated, clearly uncertain. This conversation needed to end, but it needed to end on their terms. Nothing he could say was going to persuade them to leave the two of them alone, and Zelda had already declared that she wasn't going to quietly follow her sister out of the party. Roslyn was trying to divide and conquer the couple, Alfred thought, and unless he could think of something fast, she was likely to succeed. What could he do that would prevent the Fisks from undoing their carefully crafted narrative the moment he was out of sight?

Something to strengthen the narrative, he supposed. His stomach dropped, but there was no putting off his response any longer. "I'll be back before the waltz," Alfred told Zelda, hoping it was a promise he'd be able to keep. Assuming none of her brothers attempted to murder him in the hall outside after this.

He hoped Zelda would understand, too, because this wasn't anything they'd talked about beforehand and she might very well try to slap him if he caught her too much by surprise. He reached down to take her hand and squeezed it, then, after another very brief pause, leaned in to kiss her cheek.

There. He'd kissed her in the middle of the dance floor, where everyone could see. Let the Fisks try and talk their way back from that.