Servants rushed forward with the soup course. Footmen began filling wineglasses. Good, because he needed a drink.
The eating started. He sampled his soup. “Ah, this is very superb, is it not?” He spoke to those around him in general.
Sitting on Cass’s other side, Lord Rawlins nodded. “Camberly always sets a good table.” Across from Cass, the almost deaf Lord Crossley nodded as if he agreed. Soren doubted he’d heard a word.
“I think it needs salt,” the widowed Marchioness of Haddingdon pronounced. She was seated to Soren’s right. She had been quite the thing in her day. She still dressed the part in bold colors, a purple turban with jewels and two huge plumes, each the size of a full-grown ostrich. Her bodice was cut so shamelessly low her aged, ample bosoms threatened to spill over. “I need salt,” she repeated, speaking to the air.
A footman stepped forward, picked up the salt dish that was right in front of her, and sprinkled her soup with a silver spoon. She peered down to see what he was doing, leaving Soren to change his opinion from thinking her too haughty to salt her own food, to suspecting she probably possessed a very strong pair of spectacles vanity prevented her from wearing.
“Is it better, my lady?” the footman asked.
She tasted the soup with a smack of her lips. “Yes, that is fine. Much better.” The footman stepped back.
“And what do you think, Miss Holwell?” Soren asked, keeping his tone formal and polite. “Is the soup to your liking?”
She wanted to ignore him. For the briefest moment, resentment flashed in her expressive eyes. She looked away. “It is good.”
Well, at least she’d acknowledged him.
But then her nose wrinkled. She took a sniff. “Do I smell camphor?” She looked at Soren’s jacket, her brows puzzled together.
Lady Melrose, a birdlike woman who was the dowager’s sister and seated across from Soren, tested the air. “I don’t smell anything.”
“I don’t, either,” Lady Haddingdon agreed before taking another slurp of her soup.
But Soren could smell it.
When he’d first purchased the jacket, it had reeked of camphor, a popular agent against moths. He’d given it a good airing out and had already worn it to several balls and dinner parties without complaint, and yet he’d always been aware of the slightly medicinal odor. Especially the day after an event. Camphor had come to symbolize his bloody empty pockets.
Then again, that Cass had noticed might be a sign she paid more attention to him than he thought?
Perhaps Camberly and the dowager’s plan did have some merit.
The hard-of-hearing Lord Crossley said to the people on either side of him, “What? What are they saying?” No one answered him.
With a last quizzical glance, Miss Holwell turned her attention to her meal.
Lady Melrose spoke up. “I understand you are recently returned from the war in America, Lord Dewsberry. What do you make of all that is going on there?”
“Here now, were you in the military?” Lord Rawlins asked. He had been surreptitiously ogling Cass’s admirable breasts in such a way that Soren had been tempted to thump him on the head.
“I was for a time,” Soren said.
“A time? What does that mean?” Rawlins barked. He motioned for this wineglass to be refilled. The footman also filled Soren’s.
“I sold my commission several years ago.”
“And why?”
“I had other opportunities.”
“What sort of opportunities?”
“I embarked on business,” Soren answered. That statement was met by several blank stares.
“Do you mean trade?” Lady Haddingdon queried. “You sold your commission to work?”
Soren knew their generation would think him odd. His generation would as well, although things were changing. If they knew the complete truth of his life in Canada, they’d be horrified.
He wondered if Cass would be as well. The girl she had been wouldn’t have blinked. But the woman she had become apparently followed the pack.
Or did she? She’d been known for thinking for herself. Now, behind a veneer of bored sophistication, she pretended to be uninterested, but he sensed she listened.
For that reason, he elaborated. “I have investments in Canada. I own a trading post, a store for general supplies, and a tavern. I also started a small shipping company on Lake Huron.”
He was proud of his accomplishments. To his knowledge, he was the first York to make money instead of squandering it. Hence he could set aside his pride to purchase another man’s clothes and not run up more debt. Of course, finding a tailor willing to extend him credit had also been a challenge. Tradesmen were wary of the York name.
“Why would you need to ship things on a lake?” Lady Melrose wondered.
“Lake Huron is larger than the Channel,” Soren explained. He understood how difficult it was for the average Englishman to grasp the vastness of Canada.
“But you are a storekeeper?” Rawlins questioned.
“I HEARD HE IS DONE UP,” Lord Crossley said to Rawlins, indicating with a nod of his head he was speaking of Soren.
“You are speaking too loud,” Lady Melrose chided him.
“WHAT?”
“BE QUIET,” Lady Haddingdon said, a comment that was heard up and down the table. There were twitters here and there. Glances were exchanged.
Soren could have cheerfully wished them all to Hades.
Lady Melrose proved she was indeed attempting to be his angel by saying, “My late husband was good in business. It is one of the things I liked most about him. Tell me, Dewsberry. Are your businesses lucrative?”
“There is the rub. They were starting to do well when I was there to oversee things. Then my father died. I had to return to England and took on a partner.” He kept his story simple. “He is overseeing matters for me; however, with the war . . . well, one never knows.”
“Your man could be robbing you blind,” Rawlins predicted.
“Possibly.” With Soren’s luck of late, he probably was. Or bankrupting the businesses. “I pray not.”
“Did you see any savages?” the blunt Lady Haddingdon demanded. It was a question all Londoners liked to ask and the one Soren detested the most.
“I knew many natives,” he answered. “I find them intelligent people.”
“I hear they run around half naked. Is that true? Are they all naked?”
“No, they wear clothes.”
“Oh,” was her disappointed response. “I’d like to see one. I hear they are frightfully ugly.”
“You ‘hear’ a great deal,” Soren countered. “The truth is, the natives are not ugly. They are a handsome people who have the same concerns and cares as you or I.”
“It sounds as if you admire these Indians?” Rawlins said.
“I do,” Soren answered. “I’ve worked with them for years. They are our closest allies in the war we fight right now and I respect them. No,” he said, correcting himself. He’d attended too many dinner parties where he’d been “polite,” a condition that was starting to annoy him about himself. “I admire them.” If they knew the whole truth, they would be truly shocked.
Even so, that statement killed conversation. Rawlins pulled a face at Lord Crossley, who hadn’t heard a word of what had been said. “What? What? What?” he repeated, albeit more quietly than before.
Lady Melrose shushed him while, beneath the table, Lady Haddingdon placed her hand on Soren’s thigh.
At first, he thought she’d made a mistake. He looked askance at her. She smiled at him with her squinting eyes. He took her hand and moved it back to her lap, warning her with a pat to keep it there. Her response was an unrepentant burp into her napkin and a signal to the footman that she needed more wine.
She might not know where the salt dish was, but she could unerringly find both his thigh and her wineglass.
With a shake of his head, Soren looked away from her and found himself face to face with Miss
Holwell. She had witnessed the bit of lap play. The corners in her mouth curled with disapproval. Coolly, she gave him her shoulder. That momentary interest in him and his life had been dismissed. She had moved her stiff, unyielding attention toward—
Camberly?
Her gaze had gone right to the duke. A look of such heartfelt longing crossed her face that finally Soren understood.
Cassandra Holwell had set her cap for the duke. She’d thought she’d been invited to Mayfield this weekend because Camberly was interested in her.
And she was interested in him.
Jealousy was an uncomfortable emotion, one Soren had rarely experienced. He felt it now with a vengeance.
Cass was a fool if she thought a miner’s granddaughter could become a duchess. Then again, his mother had always claimed the Holwells were more arrogant about their money and standing than the Yorks could ever have imagined being. Cass’s father had never ceased reaching far above himself. The man’s gall was legendary.
It was also obvious that if Cass had a duke in mind, well then, being a countess would be meaningless.
Soren drained his wineglass and glanced down the table at her father. The man was talking with his mouth full of bread and gesturing wildly with his knife as he declared the Tories were wrong on the agriculture question. He spoke almost as loudly as the deaf Lord Crossley but with the puffed-up consequence of a man who believed his daughter could and should marry a duke.
Camberly was not the man for Cass. Matt needed seasoning. He was a lamb, a dreamer among the ton’s wolves. He didn’t need a wife who could do nothing for him save give over her fortune, any more than he needed Letty Bainhurst for a lover.
But how to tell Cass those truths? How to stop her from sending furtive looks in Camberly’s direction? Had there once been a time when he’d been so vulnerable? Or foolish? If there had been, then life had pounded any memory of it out of him.
He wondered what she would say if she knew about Letty? Would she still make adoring calf’s eyes at her duke?
As he remembered, the Cass he’d known in his childhood had been a bit of a stickler when it came to rules. She had delighted in lecturing everyone on manners and good behavior—himself especially. That Cass would never have approved of adultery.
Before he knew what he was about, he leaned toward her. “You know Camberly is not for you.”
Her response was to pretend he hadn’t spoken . . . just as she’d pretended he hadn’t escorted her in to dinner. Except there was a slight stiffening in her shoulder blades. She set her soup spoon aside, folding her hands in her lap and looking anywhere but at him.
The game was on. He hated being snubbed, especially since there was no reason for her to have any more pride than he had. Yes, he was practically penniless. But she was the daughter of a buffoon. They were on equal standing in his mind.
“I mean, it is true Camberly needs to marry money, but he has his choice of candidates,” Soren observed conversationally. “He also must be very particular. He will want someone young.”
That comment broke her stony reserve. She swiveled in her seat to look down her nose at him. Her eyes flashed their disdain, and he couldn’t help but smile. He had her. She would not ignore him now—
“Bread, my lady?” A servant offered the bread basket between them, breaking the moment.
She nodded. The servant put a piece on her plate. She busied herself with knife and butter.
Once again, she refused to look at Soren, but she was also not paying attention to Camberly. As far as Soren was concerned, that was a mark for his side.
The servant offered him bread. “Please. Thank you,” he said cheerily and broke his bread apart.
Her eyebrow lifted. “When did you start speaking so familiarly to servants?” Her tone could have cut glass. God, he prayed her pomposity was a veneer. He suddenly realized that perhaps it was his mission to snap her out of it.
“Always have. I’m one of the little people. How about you, Miss Holwell?”
“The little people, my lord? How can that be true? You have ‘lord’ in front of your name. You come from the family in our parish.”
“Our humble Cornish parish,” he answered. “Humility is an attitude, Miss Holwell. An openness. Besides, aren’t you trying to have ‘duchess’ in front of yours?”
She faced him. “That is the second time you have referred to the duke and myself. Let me assure you, I don’t have any such expectations.”
“Liar.”
Her face flushed red. She drew herself up and then gave him her back, fiercely engaging Lord Rawlins in conversation about the hare in cream sauce being served.
Lady Haddingdon’s hand returned to Soren’s knee. He shot her a look. She was unrepentant. “I won’t ignore you like she is, Dewsberry. It has been a long time since I’ve been seated by one as handsome as you.”
“And I know why,” he assured her, moving her hand back to her lap. She cackled her amusement.
The hare dish was placed in front of him. He had no appetite. Instead, he listened to Cass laugh at something Lord Rawlins had said as if he was the most clever man in the room.
Leaning toward her, Soren said, “Who would have thought that at one time we’d spoken easily with each other?”
She turned and considered him. “Easily?” She shook her head to deny his words. “There can be nothing easy between a Holwell and a York.”
There, Cassandra had let Soren know exactly where he stood, and it felt good.
And how dare he appear to woo her on one hand and then mock her on the other as not being suitable—or attractive?
The last was a loaded word. Especially from him.
Oh, there was so much she wanted to say, including how hard it had been to hold her tongue ever since the marquis’s ball when he’d started asking her to dance and pretending that they had a friendly acquaintance.
The sight of the food on her plate made her ill. There was no way she could eat. There was no room for simple nourishment. Not when she was filled with so much bile.
The difficulty was that Cassandra prided herself on her composure. She’d spent years going through the humiliating exercise of being trotted out for men to ogle and judge with dismissive or snidely clever comments. She had managed to keep control over her emotions, to appear serene.
But right now, she discovered she didn’t have the will to continue to be silent. In this moment, she couldn’t sit next to Soren York and pretend.
Not when everyone in the room, save for her father and stepmother, was apparently thinking that a match between them would be a good thing. After all, Soren wasn’t first quality. He came from a line of gamblers who’d left him with empty pockets. They wouldn’t want their daughters to marry him.
But it would be perfectly fine for her to be his wife . . . because they didn’t consider her first quality, either. Her father was boorish and his manner crude. Yes, Cassandra knew what they whispered. Her father did as well. He took great pride in pushing himself upon them.
Whereas she sometimes wished she could disappear . . .
“Excuse me,” she said to the table. She tore her napkin from her lap and tossed it beside her plate. Before anyone could comment, she pushed back her chair and walked away from the table.
Did the conversation miss a beat as she left? She thought not. She didn’t even hear a pause.
A footman opened the door to the hall. She walked through it and then stopped. Where could she go?
She wanted to go home to London, to stop pretending that she could fit in—
“It is down the hall, my lady,” the footman whispered. “The third door on the right.”
“Down the hall—? Oh, yes, thank you.” He had assumed she was interested in the necessary room set aside for the ladies. There was another one for the gentlemen. It was a quick, convenient place as any to escape. At least it gave her an excuse for having abruptly risen from the table and taken her leave.
She moved down the hall and
opened the appropriate door. She was pleased to find she was alone. The maid who had been in there earlier had obviously been pulled to the kitchen to help with the serving of so many guests.
And at last, Cassandra felt free to think.
The tension in her shoulders eased. She was away from him. She raised a relieved hand to her forehead.
Confound it all, she’d been completely content with her life knowing that Soren York was on the other side of the world. Why had he returned to England?
More important, why was he hounding her? Why was he placing himself in her path?
Oh, she knew he wanted her money, but she would never marry him. Not ever.
For one thing, he was too honest. Brutally so. She knew he was right, Camberly was not interested in her. Willa would make a better duchess. She wasn’t as rich in her own right as Cassandra but she had money enough. Yes, there was the height difference—and Cassandra still believed as a couple, it would make them look silly—however, her friend was beautiful.
Even Willa’s father had been given a position of honor at the table, whereas her father and stepmother were located at the foot of the table. She also realized that the only thing that had saved her from ignobly being seated with them was Soren, the duke’s good friend. Indeed, he was probably the reason the Holwells had even been invited to this party.
And that annoyed her most of all.
Everyone in that room believed she should marry the penniless Lord Dewsberry and consider herself fortunate. Even grateful.
How little they knew him. Or her.
She wasn’t some dull bookworm. She’d make a brilliant duchess. With Camberly by her side, she’d host a literary salon that would rule London. She’d thought it all out. It was her favorite dream. Everyone of importance would desire an invitation, but she would be very choosy. Only those with ideas of merit or who had great talent would be invited. Lord Rawlins and Lady Haddingdon were definitely off the guest list.
At her salon, the conversation would sparkle with wit and great ideas would be discussed. Minds would be changed. And she’d feel she had something meaningful in her life.
A Match Made in Bed Page 3