Mistletoe, Marriage, and Mayhem: A Bluestocking Belles Collection

by Mariana Gabrielle

  "You never looked lovelier. I just happen to have another surprise for you."

  Margaret reached for the diamond necklace gracing her neck that he had gifted to her just this morn. "Freddy, you cannot continue to give me presents of this magnitude. Whatever will your parents say when you break your bank account?"

  His chuckle sounded deep within his chest, uncontained joy that made Margaret shiver with delight. "I have more money in our accounts than either of us could spend in several lifetimes, my love. Besides… you will have to indulge me, Lady Beacham. I have many years to make up for."

  He took her arm to usher her from the room. With his hand on the knob, he whispered for her to close her eyes.

  "What are you up to, Freddy?"

  "Just behave and close your eyes, Margaret. You did vow to obey me."

  "Freddy. I—"

  He cut off her words with another kiss. "Behave and no peeking," he teased.

  "Very well," she huffed.

  Apparently he did not trust her, for he covered her eyes. She heard the library door open, followed by the bark of Sophie's puppy Tulip and a hiss of protest from Barty. The nails of both cat and dog went down the hallway until a door was slammed—most likely Cook sending both animals out into the cold.

  Freddy continued ushering Margaret forward until he stopped and removed his hand. Her eye's widened, and she turned around in the entryway of their home to see what had been happening while she and her husband had been ensconced in the library.

  Each doorway that led into the entrance hall had a bunch of mistletoe tied with a bright red Christmas ribbon suspended from the doorframes. "I cannot believe you did this."

  Freddy led her from doorway to doorway, stopping at each to lean down and brush his lips against her own.

  "Purely selfish reasoning on my part I assure you, my lady," Frederick replied. "Never let it be said that I had you under the mistletoe and did not take advantage of a Christmas tradition."

  "I would never dare."

  Frederick leaned down to kiss her once more. "I love you, Lady Beacham. You have given me the greatest of gifts by becoming my wife."

  Margaret caressed his cheek. "And I have always loved only you, Lord Beacham."

  As they took their places at the table, Freddy's parents gave her a welcoming smile, and she was grateful they accepted her as their son's wife. Margaret glanced at her family and friends that surrounded her for the holiday. All of her dreams had at last come true, and she had a lifetime to spend with the man who had always held her heart.

  Margaret looked up at Freddy. Her husband gave her a mischievous wink. She did not know what was in store for them in the future, though she knew they would face it together. And she knew another thing for certain. Freddy could kiss her under the mistletoe any time he wished.

  The End

  About Sherry Ewing

  Sherry Ewing picked up her first historical romance when she was a teenager and has been hooked ever since. A bestselling author, she writes historical and time travel romances to awaken the soul one heart at a time.

  Website and Blog: http://www.SherryEwing.com

  Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/SherryEwingauthor

  Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/Sherry_Ewing

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  Other Books by Sherry Ewing

  If My Heart Could See You

  When you're enemies, does love have a fighting chance?

  For All of Ever: The Knights of Berwyck, A Quest Through Time Novel

  Sometimes to find your future, you must look to the past…

  Only For You

  Sometimes it's hard to remember that true love conquers all, only after the battle is over…

  A Knight To Call My Own

  When your heart is broken, is love still worth the risk?

  'Tis Her Season

  Mariana Gabrielle

  Charlotte Amberly would rather eat a lump of coal for Christmas dinner than marry the Marquess of Firthley, so when her parents cancel her London Season in favor of a rush to the altar, the feisty debutante takes husband-hunting into her own hands.

  Alexander Marloughe, reluctant heir to a marquessate, would rather not spend his holiday dashing through the snow after a flibbertigibbet just out of the schoolroom, but no woman before Charlotte has ever led him such a merry chase.

  This is a prequel to Royal Regard.

  Prologue

  September 1803

  Brittlestep Manor

  Somerset, England

  Charlotte sat bolt upright in bed. Screams echoed across the frozen grounds to Brittlestep Manor, seemingly all the way from Evercreech. She lit the candle at her bedside, pulled a dressing gown on over her nightrail, grabbed the iron fireplace poker from the hearth, and flew out her bedchamber door and down the hall. By the time she reached the front door, her father's butler was already there with a pistol in his hand. When she nodded, he flung open the door.

  "You bloody bitch! Come back here!"

  A young woman threw herself through the entryway as if blown by the hard wind that whipped around her into the foyer. Almost falling at Charlotte's feet, she managed to remain standing only by leaning against a wall, bent over, her breathing heavy and coarse, sobs threatening to overwhelm her reason—if they hadn't already.

  "Remove yourself from the grounds, Mr. Smithson," the butler intoned, pistol pointed directly at the forehead of the pursuer. "You will not be warned again."

  "Go now, Jeremy, or I swear, I will beat you to death myself!" Charlotte yelled, brandishing the poker.

  Snarling, slurring his words, stumbling across the graveled drive, the man fell back, barking, "It's not over, you hatchet-faced whore. You can't hide in there forever, and Effingale's not here to stop me. I'll be back for you with the magistrate."

  The girl fell against the wall, choked by the same sounds made by animals caught in traps. Holding her arm at the elbow, she slid to a seat on the floor. Wild, red-blonde hair framed a bruised cheek and blackened right eye; her cut and swollen lower lip oozed blood. Terror-filled blue-green eyes squeezed shut when she flinched away from the butler's offered hand—a man she had known since birth, who had never been anything but kind.

  "I think he's broken my shoulder, Charlotte. I can't move it."

  The butler sighed and sent the night footman to ride for the doctor, no stranger to being called to the Effingales' manor house for this purpose. The housekeeper rushed to help Charlotte support the girl, clucking her tongue.

  "Your bedchamber is ready for you, Miss Smithson. And I'll send up some tea." Taking in the thin nightrail hanging on her lanky form, the motherly old woman added, "Haven't eaten a bite since last time you were here, by the look of it, but I don't suppose you'll want a meal with your lip in that state. Perhaps some broth."

  Balancing her cousin, Bella, against her shoulder, Charlotte opened the door to the bedchamber adjoining hers, easing her over to the canopied bed while the housekeeper laid a fire in the stone hearth. Carefully settling Bella back into the pillows, listing slightly to the right to accommodate the shoulder, Charlotte sent a maid for hot water, towels, and the medicine box, and told her abigail to find a clean nightrail in Bella's wardrobe.

  "Only Jeremy?" Charlotte asked, voice gentler than her countenance.

  Bella shook her head, then set her hand on her forehead, as though trying to clear away a mental fog. "No, Father, too. He is the one who hurt my arm, but he is floored now. They were drinking."

  "Are they not always drinking?" Charlotte snapped. "And John, I presume?"

  "No, he is in London." Bella's tears fell faster. "I wish it were John. He isn't so…"

  Charlotte patted Bella in the hand. "I know. Though 'not such a monster' is hardly a recommendation. Can you remove the nightrail over your shoulder?"

  Cradling the elbow, Bella shook her head, so Charlotte cut the bloodstained linen off her cousin's body with scissors, then draped the dressing gown over her
shoulders, arranging it in a semblance of modesty, covering it further with the quilt. "Perhaps one good thing will come of this."

  Bella's laugh cut into Charlotte's gut.

  "I'm quite serious." Charlotte had never seen Bella so disheartened, even on countless other nights like this. "Father will never allow you back there if Uncle Jasper has broken your arm, no matter what Mother says."

  Chapter One

  December 15, 1803

  Somerset, England

  The snow falling outside the frosted drawing room window blanketed Charlotte Amberly's mood as surely as it did the garden on which she gazed. Usually, she loved the Yuletide season, but she could hardly keep her mind on wassail and holly berries, knowing who would be staying at least through Twelfth Night, assuredly planning to meet her under the kissing bough.

  The Marquess of Firthley, Charlotte's new betrothed, was expected in a few days for an indefinite stay, and if Charlotte's mother had her way, he wouldn't leave until they were married. When a viscount's daughter snared a marquess, it behooved her to leg-shackle him before he could run.

  "Lord Firthley's note said he was bringing his grandson." Minerva Amberly, Lady Effingale, calmly stitched the outline of a Christmas rose on an altar cloth intended as a gift for the vicar's wife.

  "Yes, Mother. You've told me twenty times. I must be kind to the poor, motherless child, so the marquess will believe me a good grandmother for his heir."

  "Quite right, and you needn't take that tone."

  "I will be a grandmother before I am eighteen," she grumbled.

  "Better than a spinster before you are twenty."

  "I've not even met him!" she argued, going so far as to stomp her foot.

  Lady Effingale would brook no such nonsense from a recalcitrant daughter. "Then it is fortunate he wants you sight unseen."

  Between the flare of her mother's nostrils and the arch of her left eyebrow, Charlotte's rebellion fizzled—briefly.

  "He wants Papa's voting bloc, not me," Charlotte protested under her breath, but before her mother could castigate her again, she moaned, "I was to make my curtsey next month! How can you just ignore an invitation from the queen?"

  "One of your husband's relations will present you at Court as his marchioness. He has the king's ear, you know."

  Dropping onto the window seat, hiding her grimace behind the curtain, Charlotte muttered, "Yes, Mother. You've said."

  Lady Effingale set down her needlework to sort through her basket of silks, finally finding a length of dark green. "You should be grateful to be the wife of a man of considerable fortune and influence."

  "Yes, Mother."

  The sounds of running and yelling down the hall came rapidly closer until Charlotte's two younger brothers dashed into the room, throwing a rounders ball between them. The ball promptly slammed into the teapot and sent it flying off the table next to Charlotte, into the skirts of her new pale pink dress, leaving a huge brown stain. Guy and Hugh, ages twelve and fourteen respectively, stopped short at their mother's screeching and Charlotte's rage.

  "You hellions! Get out! Get back to the nursery before I break you into pieces and return you to Eton in a box!"

  Although she had complained endlessly to her mother and Bella about the wishy-washy color of the gown, it was not improved by being soiled. And she was in a far worse temper now than she had been a week ago.

  Guy scurried to retrieve the ball, while Hugh drew himself up into a dignified and offended stance worthy of the viscount he would one day become.

  "We no longer reside in the nursery, and you have no call to screech. I heard Mother tell you just this morning, you 'must improve your sense of decorum.'"

  By contrast to his brother's false indignity, Guy's sheepish smile apologized for the teapot, the yelling, and Charlotte's dress, though he was not contrite enough for their mother.

  "But for her execrable language, your sister is quite right," she snapped. "Where is Isabella? She was to be keeping watch over you, was she not?"

  Now Hugh looked a bit chary. "Er, she is… was… uh… detained. And we are too old for a governess, at any rate." He straightened his shoulders. "We are both Eton men now. Papa said so."

  Charlotte strode toward him, and he fell back. "Little Eton boys, rather. Go let Bella out of whatever closet you've locked her into, or I will shut you up in the nursery on bread and water and give your Christmas gifts to the children in the poorhouse!"

  Both boys ran out of the room, still throwing the ball between them, gaining more volume once they cleared the door. Lady Effingale took up her embroidery again, remarking, "You will wish to be gentler with the marquess's grandson."

  Charlotte dabbed at her dress with a table napkin, but the exercise was hopeless. The stain reached from waist to hem and crossed the dress from side to side. She dropped the napkin on the tea tray, waved her hand toward the door, and turned up her nose. "No sane woman will ever want to marry either of them. You will be stuck with them your entire life."

  "I'm sure that is not true," her mother said. However, her lips quivered just slightly when she added, "They are both growing up too handsome for any girl's good, and Hugh will be Effingale one day. Surely some woman will suffer him, if only for his title and lands. I do agree, though, his brother may ever be a bachelor, and probably an incorrigible rake." Dropping the altar cloth in her lap, peering through her lorgnette at her daughter's dress, she added, "You'd better go find Isabella, so that she can help you change your dress and try to remove the stain."

  Yes, Charlotte thought, Bella is sure to be more sympathetic.

  Chapter Two

  Three days later…

  "Ouch! Must you?"

  Bella apologized for pulling too hard at a knot in Charlotte's hair, and Charlotte's regret for snapping was extracted from her mouth almost as painfully. "My apologies. It's only—"

  "The marquess will finally be here tomorrow, and you wish he would not."

  Charlotte sighed. "I don't understand how Papa can do this to me. He has always stood up to Mother before." Rather than passing it over her shoulder, she threw a diamond hair comb on the vanity table, as though the jewels were tin. "Politics! It is all politics. I wish there had never been a House of Lords. And I wish Papa had never set aside a dowry. I would be better off as a seamstress."

  Bella reached across for the comb, carefully placing it in Charlotte's lush black hair, holding the high curls in place on the left side, level with the right. "You would be an awful seamstress. You cannot sew a straight line."

  "You take my meaning, Bella. And stop smirking. You would be in a poor temper, too, if your father planned to marry you off to some old man."

  "My father would marry me off to a hundred-year-old drunken wife-beater in debtors' prison, if there were advantage in it." Bella's tone stopped just short of complaint.

  Ignoring that appalling truth, Charlotte continued, "He probably has slobbery lips. And spots on his hands." She shuddered. At seventeen, spittle and discolored skin seemed the worst fates imaginable, until another thought occurred. "Oh, no…" Her eyes widened.

  "What is it?" Bella asked, looking over the coiffure again, silver hairbrush hovering.

  "He will want to bed me."

  "Charlotte!" Bella turned an extraordinary shade of crimson, cheeks all but throbbing.

  "He will! Nettie says it can be quite nice if the gentleman is kind, but I will never know now, will I? Some ugly, fat, old man with dry, papery lips and skin like crumpled parchment? It will be awful." Yanking the hairbrush from Bella's hand, she threw it across the room, where it shattered a vase. Bella groaned. So did Charlotte. Her mother would now feel it her duty to check on them, and Charlotte was not nearly prepared to be inspected.

  Sure enough, the door crashed against the wall when Lady Effingale rushed in. Bella was already on her knees, gathering pieces of china in a pouch she made of her dingy, gray skirt.

  "What is it? Is everyone unharmed?"

  "Yes, Mother. I sim
ply knocked a vase from the shelf."

  Narrowed eyes taking in the hairbrush on the floor, lips pressed into a thin line, her mother warned in the low tone usually reserved for Charlotte's brothers, "You will do nothing to ruin this arrangement, Charlotte Amberly. Not one thing."

  Bella backed into a corner.

  "You will be happy and charming and sweet to the marquess and the little boy and act as though you wish nothing more than his honorable attentions, or I will make you regret it. Do you hear me? This marriage is of great importance to your father, and you will not destroy the agreement with your willful, unruly tantrums, or believe you me, I will use that hairbrush on you in a manner inconsistent with its purpose."

  Willful, unruly tantrums threatening, Charlotte growled, "Yes, Mother. Of course, Mother. Anything you wish, Mother."

  Chapter Three

  The next day…

  Snow piled up outside the door, falling heavier and heavier as the day wore on. Charlotte had never seen so much snow in December; it was almost as if the Almighty Himself were taking her part in the ongoing quarrel with her parents. She hoped the marquess's carriage would be delayed again, perhaps lose a wheel, or be stuck in a ditch or a snowdrift. Perhaps, if she were lucky, the old man would freeze to death and leave her alone. She corrected herself for such spiteful thoughts, but couldn't quite hold in a sigh. Her life would be much happier if no Marquess of Firthley existed.

  She had been looking forward to her come-out as long as she could remember. While other girls giggled and planned for a wedding, she had planned for ballrooms and beaux, and her curtsey to the queen. The queen had been her entire reason for learning to curtsey, after her nurse told stories about girls being presented and going on to marry handsome gentlemen with titles and plenty of money. The perfection of her Town manners was entirely due to her plans for her Season.

  She had known since age six what color dresses she wanted—sea-foam green to match her eyes; which jewels she would wear from her mother's collection—the emeralds to accent her dress; the types of decorations she would insist upon—an ocean of flowers, all white; and the ladies and gentlemen she would invite—everyone who was anyone. She had collected recipes for years for the food that would be served at her ball. She should have been traveling to London in a matter of days to finally have her Season.