by Eloisa James
He wasn’t going to turn away and follow Willa Ffynche to the other side of the room.
That would be absurd—a conclusion he came to at the precise moment he caught sight of her slipping out the door.
WILLA REMAINED IN the ladies’ retiring room just long enough to give herself a lecture. She hadn’t rejected fourteen proposals of marriage—one of them from a future marquess—only to follow in the footsteps of Lady Biddle.
Mooning after Lord Alaric, in other words.
The problem was that he appealed to the worst side of her. One of the reasons that she and Lavinia had come up with an ironclad set of rules governing their debut into society was that they were well aware that correct behavior didn’t come naturally to either of them.
As Willa saw it, Lavinia’s infatuation with the Wilde books had had less to do with their author than with the freedom depicted in the books. Lord Wilde could and did go anywhere he pleased. He could talk to anyone.
Not so for a young lady.
Willa had resisted the books, but the man himself, walking through the drawing room as if the straitlaced world of high society was irrelevant? She felt the pull of his presence as if it were the tide going out.
With a start, she discovered that she was staring blindly into the glass and had bitten her lower lip until it was ruby red. Enough!
She opened the door to the corridor.
Walked through—and froze.
Lord Alaric was leaning against the opposite wall, as casually as if he were waiting to enter the ladies’ retiring room.
He looked up, and all that raw masculinity he wielded like a weapon focused on her. It took everything she had for Willa to say casually, “Good evening once again, Lord Alaric.”
He straightened and gave her a slow smile. “Miss Ffynche.”
“Is there something I can help you with?” Willa managed, proud of keeping her voice from rising to a squeak. Willa Ffynche never squeaked. Or sighed. Or …
The comforting list of rules slipped from her head because the door swung closed at her back, which left them alone in the shadowy corridor.
“I’m not sure,” he said, looking down at her, his eyes curious.
Willa could feel a flush rising in her cheeks. She never blushed. She never squeaked. She never sighed—
“I think I’m having an odd reaction to returning to England,” he said, almost to himself.
“I can certainly understand how you might wish to flee a drawing room full of ladies,” she answered. “People,” she corrected herself hastily. “Drawing rooms full of people, because—because I suppose there is a great deal of solitude onboard a pirate ship.”
She groaned inside. A pirate ship? She sounded like such a ninny.
“Would it surprise you to know that I’ve never been aboard a pirate ship?”
“Indeed not,” she said, flustered. “I know that pirates board English vessels, rather than the other way around.”
The smile in his eyes deepened. “I confess to piratical tendencies.”
Was he implying that he viewed her as an English vessel eager to be boarded? Boarded? Willa felt her cheeks flame, and be damned with that rule about flushing. What on earth made him think she would welcome a blatant proposition of that nature? She was no Helena Biddle.
She flashed him a look and made a move to go, but he caught her arm before she could leave. “I succumbed to a pun, which was outrageously ill-bred of me. I’ve been too long outside of England.”
Willa agreed, so she kept her silence.
“I had no intention of casting aspersions on your chastity.” His voice was peppery and deep. “I’m not used to watching my tongue, and I’ve an idiotic weakness for puns. All plays on words, in truth.”
In that case, he didn’t belong in polite society, because if there was one thing English gentlepeople did, it was watch their tongues.
Perhaps that was why he had spent years wandering the world—so he needn’t be constantly thinking about the implications of every utterance. The realization gave her a strange sensation under her ribs: a mixture of envy, censure, and wariness, all jumbled together.
“I expect attention to language is essential for a writer,” she murmured, tacitly accepting Lord Alaric’s apology.
His fingers slid from her arm, leaving a sensation of heat in their wake.
“I enjoy the discipline of shaping my experiences on the page, but I never imagined gaining all these admirers,” he said flatly.
“Your readers?”
“For the most part, the ladies I’ve met in the drawing room are not readers. They seem infatuated with a character in a play, who has nothing to do with my books.” His eyes were rueful, but sincere. “Not something I welcome, I assure you.”
She was trying not to think about how close to her he was standing in the dim passage. He smelled like mint.
“I’ve been away from England long enough to forget many rules, but I remember the important ones. This one, for instance.” He picked up her hand and brought her fingers to his lips again. “I like this one. What a marvelous way to greet a woman, say goodbye to her, or apologize to her.”
His lips touched her hand and she felt the shock of it down her whole body. Followed by a withering sense of shame. She was not going to succumb to the allure of such a public figure, whether he welcomed his admirers or no.
She withdrew her hand and nodded coolly. “If you’ll forgive me, Lord Alaric.” She strolled past him to the comfort of the drawing room and her boyish suitors—any one of whom could call to mind upwards of a hundred social rules without prompting, and likely thrice that if given time.
She knew he was watching her go, and she did not turn around.
Chapter Six
Diana and Lavinia were standing together, staring out the window. Willa forced herself to walk calmly toward them, pretending that her heart wasn’t racing and her cheeks weren’t flushed.
“What are you looking at?” she asked a moment later, peering out at the lawn. Diana made a noise that sounded like a sob. Abruptly, Willa saw that Diana’s shoulders were shaking, and Lavinia was standing in such a way as to shield her from the room.
She hastily reached into her knotting bag and produced a handkerchief. “Is something wrong?”
“Oh, no,” Diana said unconvincingly, dabbing her eyes with the handkerchief. “I’m merely overtired. I traveled through the night yesterday. Mother didn’t want to insult His Grace with a belated arrival but she was occupied in London. She sent me ahead with my maid, knowing Lady Gray would act as my chaperone, and it was a tiring journey.”
That betrayed a profound lack of understanding of the nature of house parties. One didn’t worry about arriving late; people sometimes appeared a fortnight after the party began.
But while Diana’s late father had been a distant relation of Lavinia’s, her grandfather on her mother’s side had been a Lord Mayor of London—a fact everyone tactfully pretended to overlook while talking about it constantly.
Love at first sight is more romantic when it has a touch of mésalliance about it, and Diana’s grandfather—a rich grocer—was rarely forgotten when Lord Roland’s proposal was mentioned.
“Lady Gray is generally late to every occasion,” Willa said comfortingly.
“We told my mother that the house party began three full days early,” Lavinia said, rubbing small circles on Diana’s right shoulder blade. “Otherwise, we might have arrived a week from now, and you’d have had no chaperone at all.”
Diana gave them a wobbly smile. “My mother felt I had to be here on the first day of the party. She is terrified that it will dawn on my fiancé that we don’t belong in the highest circles. She keeps trying to disguise me.” She gestured toward her wig.
“Your wig is a disguise?” Lavinia asked. “How so? I would think it makes you more obvious, if anything.”
“I know,” Diana said miserably. “I feel as if I’m an entry at the fair for the largest marrow grown in the shire.
I couldn’t sit down in that infernal dress I wore this afternoon because it felt as if I had a washing tub strapped to my hips. I just stood in one place and ate so many muffins I felt ill.”
“I suppose all clothing is a disguise of one sort or another,” Willa said, thinking about it. “Just look at Lavinia.”
Diana glanced at her blue gown.
“My bodice is extremely small,” Lavinia said helpfully.
“Which disguises her face,” Willa followed up. “When Lavinia wears it, gentlemen are incapable of looking anywhere else.”
“I could cut one of the bundles off the back of my Polonaise gown and it would contain more cloth than your entire bodice,” Diana observed, looking slightly more cheerful.
“Mother wasn’t entirely pleased when I ordered this gown,” Lavinia said—something of an understatement in light of the ensuing hysterics—“but she changed her mind after seeing its effect on gentlemen.”
“I wish my mother would allow me to select my own gowns,” Diana said.
“Soon enough you’ll be a married lady and you can wear whatever you wish,” Willa pointed out. “Will you live in London, or here at Lindow?”
“I haven’t the faintest idea,” Diana said, in a voice that welcomed no further questions on that subject. “You were speaking to Lord Wilde, or rather, Lord Alaric, earlier, weren’t you? I have the feeling that he doesn’t like me very much.”
“He has a brusque manner,” Willa said. “Could you be mistaken? He frowns easily, but I don’t think he dislikes me.”
In fact, she had the unnerving conviction that Lord Alaric liked her quite a lot.
“My fiancé says that his brother is frightfully cross about that play,” Diana said. “It seems that Wilde in Love is akin to his books; to wit, entirely fictional.”
“The plot may have been elaborated upon by the playwright,” Lavinia said defensively. “I am willing to accept that the missionary’s daughter was added for the sake of melodrama. But Lord Alaric’s adventures, as described in his books, are not exaggerated. I am certain of it.”
Across the room Lord Alaric had his head bent as he listened to Helena Biddle, who was cuddled so close to him that her bosom was practically in his armpit.
“Do you suppose she’ll be able to lure him into her bed?” Diana asked. Then she clapped a hand to her mouth. “I am so sorry. I’m not used—”
“That’s all right,” Lavinia assured her. “We both plan to remain faithful to our husbands if at all possible, but one can’t pretend that more creative arrangements don’t exist.” She studied the couple, and added, “Even though she’s a widow, Lady Biddle is remarkably assertive.”
The lady was clinging to Lord Alaric’s arm, one of her hands pressed to her heart, her eyes round.
“Perhaps he’s telling her about his adventures,” Willa said, feeling a visceral flare of dislike for the lady.
“Or the location of his bedchamber,” Diana put in.
Lavinia tossed her head. “If his taste is that wretched, I shall definitely stop adoring him.”
Diana laughed, but it was a small, stunted sound. “Do you believe that is within your control?”
“Yes,” Lavinia stated.
“I have the impression that Lord Roland would like to stop adoring me,” Diana said.
Willa was surprised into silence by her frankness.
Lavinia, naturally, was not. “For your sake, I would hope not. I have every intention of ensuring that my husband adores me. It will prevent any number of problems.”
“It’s awkward to marry someone who doesn’t share one’s feelings. We are both uncomfortable.”
They all three instinctively looked toward her fiancé. From this distance, he resembled an advertisement for a French tailor.
“Likely you will come to love him in time,” Lavinia said. “Lord Roland is quite handsome. If nothing else, he will present a pleasing vision at the breakfast table.”
“And the bedchamber,” Willa said.
“Wil-la,” Lavinia hissed, under her breath.
Diana gave the two of them a quizzical look.
“Lavinia is reminding me to avoid improper subjects in public,” Willa explained. “But just think how pretty your children will be.”
“Mama mourned my father for well over a year,” Lavinia said. “Yet she absolutely detested him during the first year of marriage. Detested.”
“Why?” Diana asked.
Lavinia laughed. “She says he smelled like a horse, because he spent all his time in the stables. She taught him to bathe regularly, and then he taught her how to ride a horse, and after that, they began loving each other.”
“I don’t think it will be so simple,” Diana said.
“Are you in love with someone else?” Lavinia asked.
“No!” Diana said. And then: “Will you both stay at Lindow Castle for the entire six weeks of the house party?” There was just the faintest shake in her voice.
“We plan to travel to Manchester for a few days next week,” Willa said, “and you should definitely join us, unless your mother has arrived by then. Lady Gray has some friends whom she wishes to visit.”
“Look at that,” Diana whispered. Lord Alaric was headed across the room toward his brother at a pace scarcely short of a jog. “He’s escaping!”
They watched as the two men met in the center of the room. Lord Alaric’s face lit with laughter as he slung an arm around his brother’s shoulder.
“There’s something remarkably attractive about all those muscles,” Lavinia said. “Your future husband has them, Diana, and he doesn’t even climb mountains. You are very lucky.”
“I’ll try to keep it in mind,” Diana replied. “Lord Alaric’s life sounds so uncomfortable, doesn’t it? Arctic ice, mountains, pirates, cannibals, and likely no afternoon tea, either.”
“I know,” Lavinia admitted, with a sudden flash of common sense. “I adore his books, but I certainly wouldn’t want to be him. Or marry him. What will you do if he falls in love with you, Willa? Everyone else did.”
She and Willa had come to the duke’s country house party straight from their first Season, during which they had been fêted and proposed to with remarkable fervor.
Willa’s heart skipped a beat at the idea of Lord Alaric at her feet. “None of those men truly love me. Nor you either, Lavinia, to be blunt, even though you were as popular as I. They don’t know us at all.”
“He would make an excellent spouse,” Diana said, adding in a lowered voice, “I heard that Lord Alaric’s estate is easily the size of his father’s, with one of the biggest apple orchards in the county.”
Lindow Castle could be seen for miles about, which suggested that the Wilde books were far more profitable than Willa would have guessed. “Lavinia must own at least one of those apple trees, given all the prints of his face that she’s bought,” she pointed out.
As she was laughingly backing away from Lavinia, who was threatening her with a fan, the duke hoisted his pregnant duchess out of her chair, which served as a signal that everyone should make their way to the great hall on the upper floor, where supper would be served.
“Will you sit with us?” Lavinia asked Diana. “We shall be near the bottom of the room, because Willa has asked the butler to place her at a smaller table with a scholar who’s transcribing Egyptian hieroglyphs.”
“I know that sounds dire, but it’s an interesting subject,” Willa promised.
“You’re not seated at a table with Lady Gray?” Diana said doubtfully. “My mother wouldn’t approve.”
Just then her fiancé turned and headed in their direction.
“I’m sure the scholar will be enlightening,” Diana said, setting out for the door at a brisk pace.
They had almost escaped when Lord Roland cut them off. “May my brother and I have the honor of escorting the three of you upstairs to dine?”
That rumble in his voice betrayed far more about his emotions than a man of his caliber would ord
inarily care to reveal. Diana certainly didn’t like it; her whole body had gone rigid.
“Not tonight,” Lavinia said, giving them both a cheerful smile. “We have plans to educate ourselves.”
Lord Alaric was looking at Willa, which made her feel pleased and uneasy at the same time. “I am always in need of education,” he said. “Who is dispensing instruction this evening?”
“We have made plans to dine with Mr. Roberts, a young Oxford don who has been working in the duke’s library,” Willa explained.
“Roberts, the Egyptologist?” Lord Alaric inquired.
She nodded. “I want to ask about his work on hieroglyphs and the Egyptian alphabet.”
“What are hieroglyphs?” Diana asked, edging around to Willa’s other side, away from her fiancé.
“It’s a way of writing with little pictures,” Willa said. “Lavinia and I saw an exhibition of ancient Egyptian scrolls covered with them.”
“I’ve always been interested in hieroglyphs,” Lord Alaric said. “And so has North.”
He elbowed Lord Roland, who was gazing at Diana. “Absolutely,” his brother said. “Fascinated.”
“If I’m not mistaken,” Lord Alaric added, “Roberts is working on the barrel of papyri I sent home. I’d forgotten all about that. It’s just like our father to have someone in to translate them.”
“You cannot translate hieroglyphs,” Willa said, before she could stop herself. “The alphabet isn’t understood at this point.”
“She’s got you there,” Lord Roland said, snapping out of his study of Diana’s downcast eyes to elbow his brother back.
“I’m more interested in the present than the past,” Lord Alaric said. “But I shall be interested to see what the fellow thinks of the papyri. I had them off an old man who swore they were found in one of the pyramids.”
“Perhaps we should continue to the dining hall,” Willa said. Lady Biddle was bearing down fast behind Lord Alaric, the way a thundercloud bundles up on the horizon, and then manifests as a black cloud just over your head.
To judge by her scowl, she had decided that Willa was persona non grata.