Miss Darby laughed. “You know, I am surprised you are here with us, Miss Lymington, when there are so many eligible young gentlemen circling you!”
Miss Lymington attempted to look affronted, but it was clear to Priscilla that she was pleased with the description.
“I heard Miss Ashbrooke has been stalking around looking for more eligible young ladies,” said Miss Worsley with a wicked grin. “Perhaps your mama should write to her and see which titled gentlemen she has on her books!”
All four of them laughed. Priscilla could not forget her most recent conversation with the matchmaker.
“I am always in desperate need of ladies, of course – never enough ladies in town!”
Miss Darby’s eyes were bright as she said, “Well, I would take that as a sign, her business is going well if she has run out of ladies!”
There was more laughter in the room, and she looked genuinely gratified to have contributed to the laughter.
Miss Lymington leaned forward to place her own teacup on the side table between herself and Priscilla. “’Tis strange, to think that someone like Miss Ashbrooke who has no personal knowledge of marriage can simply choose two people, a gentleman and a lady, completely secure in the knowledge that the marriage will work.”
Was there something wistful in her tones? Priscilla could hardly make it out, but there was definitely something strange in her voice.
“I think it is more like an arranged marriage,” said Miss Worsley dismissively, “and there are plenty of those in society, ’tis just we rarely hear about them. Miss Ashbrooke certainly knows how to make a happy couple. You hardly ever see hers living apart, do you?”
Priscilla’s heart lurched at the mention of arranged marriages.
Charles. If only she had known how she felt about Charles, knew she loved him before his arranged marriage. Perhaps she could have mentioned something to her mother, and she would have spoken to Lady Audley, and…
But they would not have become engaged. Lady Audley had made that perfectly clear. To be sure, she did not despise her, but every time she looked at her, she saw Mary.
Frustration twisted in her stomach. Perhaps Lady Audley’s objections could have been overridden.
“Well, most of our parents or grandparents probably had arranged marriages,” Miss Lymington was saying stiffly. “Or at the very least, a pairing suggested to them with encouragement from their own parents. They managed to be happy.”
Miss Darby laughed bitterly, and all three turned.
She blushed but said darkly, “If you can think that, then you have never met my parents.”
There was a stilted laugh from Miss Worsley, who seemed unsure whether this was a jest or not, and the conversation started up again.
Priscilla did not bother to attempt to follow. She had her own chance of happiness, far greater than any arranged marriage, but then…
But she had not gained her chance of happiness in the correct way. She had rivaled Miss Lloyd the only way she knew how: by doing wild things to get Charles’s attention, allowing herself to succumb to his advances, right to the bedchamber – and further…
Well, it was not what young ladies were supposed to do. And concocting her plan with Miss Lloyd, that was not well done.
There was something strange moving before her eyes. Priscilla blinked, and Miss Worsley’s hand came into focus.
“Can you hear me?” Miss Worsley moved her hand again. “Miss Seton, are you in there?”
There was a giggle from Miss Darby as Priscilla roused herself. She needed to pay attention. The whole purpose of coming here and taking tea with her friends was to stop thinking about Charles!
“I do apologize,” she said with a wan smile. “I was a little lost in my thoughts.”
“I know what you were thinking, and it does you credit,” teased Miss Lymington. “You were thinking of hiring Miss Ashbrooke for yourself, weren’t you?”
Miss Darby laughed, and even Miss Worsley smiled.
“What a strange thing to say! Miss Seton will never have to worry about finding a husband – and besides,” Miss Darby said, “’tis only Mamas and Papas who acquire Miss Ashbrooke’s services when they are concerned the next generation will not make the right match.”
Miss Worsley looked shrewdly at Priscilla. “But your mother is not concerned about that, is she? Mrs. Seton has always appeared to me to be a very genteel lady, with no thought as to who you could marry. She doesn’t mind, does she, Miss Seton?”
Priscilla shook her head with a wry smile. “My mother is far more likely to be getting married next than I am!”
She laughed along with her friends, but the bitterness in her stomach twisted. The jest had too much truth.
“If I was any judge, I would say that is not a concern,” said Miss Lymington with rather more perception than Priscilla liked. “If I was any judge, I would say you have already met a gentleman that you have your eye on.”
Priscilla knew the blush was coming but could do nothing to stop it. She did, however, protest, “Now, what a foolish thing to say!”
Her words were almost completely drowned out by their laughter.
“No, really!” She attempted to speak again. “I have not met anyone – there is no one.”
Miss Darby said soothingly, “Of course.”
Miss Lymington did not look so sure. “Who was it in Shakespeare that said the lady doth protest too much? Hamlet?”
“Queen Gertrude,” Miss Darby supplied quickly. “Did you ever see Hamlet on the stage? Oh, my favorite play.”
“Hamlet? Goodness, could you not think of a less cheerful play?” Miss Worsley rolled her eyes. “Why not try Romeo and Juliet?”
The conversation moved on, and Priscilla breathed a sigh of relief. She was not ready to be quizzed on her supposed secret gentleman.
Miss Lymington, however, had not joined in the critique of Shakespeare. Leaning closer to Priscilla, she said in a low voice. “No matter whether you think it is possible to win him, whoever he is, you should try for him. You never know.”
Priscilla smiled bitterly. “Thank you for your encouragement, but…I know.”
How well she knew.
“Have you noticed that every time we meet now, you storm off?”
A leaden weight had settled onto her heart the moment he had thrown those words at her, and nothing could take it away. She had lost the one person she could consider as her partner for life, and now…
Now she would be alone for the rest of her life.
Chapter Seventeen
That he had never noticed before, there was a dent in the plasterwork.
Charles shook his head slowly. Shoddy craftsmanship. How had he never noticed it before?
He shifted, trying to get more comfortable, and smiled wryly. Well, he had probably never noticed the dent because he had not lain on the billiard table in years.
Charles twisted his head around to look at the dent more closely, and then a wry smile crept over his face. It looked almost as though someone had thrown a billiard ball up at the ceiling.
He had not resorted to that. Not yet.
Stretching out his legs, he sighed heavily.
Here he could just be alone.
He had to forget Priscilla and think instead of Miss Lloyd. Seeing Priscilla would have to stop, naturally. She occupied his every waking thought, and that could not continue.
He must be loyal to Miss Lloyd – Frances, he should probably call her now. He had not been loyal to her in any description over the last few weeks. That would have to change. He was marrying Frances. He would learn to love Frances.
“Charles?”
The voice was just behind him, and Charles sat up hastily, whacking his head on the billiard table lights.
Stars appeared before his eyes as pain seared through his forehead. Even so, he could just about make out the figure standing in the doorway.
“F-Frances?”
It was Miss Lloyd. As though his mere thoughts
had conjured her up, she was standing there, a little nervously, waiting for an invitation to enter.
“Frances,” he repeated.
Moving off the billiard table hurriedly, Charles stood up straight, brushed the dust from his shoulders, and tried to smile through the pain in his head. “Frances. I was – I was not expecting you.”
He glanced at the butler, who shook his head briefly. No, Miss Lloyd had not been expected. So what was she doing here?
“Thank you, Hodges, that will be all,” Miss Lloyd murmured quietly.
The butler bowed, and as Miss Lloyd stepped into the room, he closed the door behind her.
Charles stared. None of this made sense.
She smiled wanly. “Come, sit with me.”
He blinked blearily. The room was hardly set up for a woman’s comfort; the billiard room had always been the domain of gentlemen, and that meant a different kind of comfort.
Miss Lloyd looked perfectly comfortable; however, walking over to the leather armchairs placed haphazardly around the fireplace with no fire in the grate.
Charles knew he had to move, but his legs did not obey. With an immense effort, he managed to stumble and fall into an armchair opposite her. It groaned as it took his weight, the old leather slightly cracked on one side.
Immediately a vision of Priscilla soared through his mind.
No, the last thing he should do now is compare the two ladies! He was with Miss Lloyd, and he was marrying her.
“Your Grace,” she began.
“Charles, please. I think, considering what we will be to each other in three days, Charles is appropriate.”
“Well, then, I suppose you should call me Frances,” she said quietly.
“Frances. To what do I owe this pleasure?”
Frances had not leaned into the welcoming embrace of the leather armchair and instead looked incredibly uncomfortable. There was evidently something on her mind she found distasteful.
A wedge of hot ice slid into Charles’ stomach. Oh, God’s teeth, she had heard. She had come to confront him about his passion for Priscilla, and there he could not deny it. How could he?
“Look,” he said quickly, “I want you to know –”
“You do not look very happy, Charles,” she said. It was almost a whisper, but her eyes had lifted, and she stared unblinking.
Charles shifted in his chair. He was hardly going to tell her the truth.
“Nonsense, I have never been happier,” he prevaricated with a wide smile, throwing his hands out. “How could I not be, knowing that in just three days –”
Frances was smiling. “You never learned how to lie, did you?”
Charles’s words faded away. He swallowed. This was potentially the longest conversation he had ever had with Miss Lloyd – Frances – just the two of them, and he had not realized how perceptive she was. It was going to be a damned nuisance when they were married.
“I have not been sleeping well recently, ’tis true,” he began. “But that has no bearing on my happiness, I assure you. I am quite well.”
Even to his own ears, the words sounded hollow. God’s teeth, he had to come up with something better than this if he was going to persuade her of anything.
Frances was watching him carefully. “This hasn’t got anything to do with Priscilla, has it?”
Red hot guilt swept over him. “Of course not,” he said automatically.
She considered him for a moment, and then, “Do not bother lying to me, Charles. In three days, I will become your wife. We will spend the rest of our lives together. Do you think, perhaps, that now is the time to start telling me the truth?”
Charles sighed, wishing to damnation he had thought to be upstairs in bed. How could he speak the truth to Frances, when all it would do is hurt her?
He truly looked at her for what was probably the first time. She was not unattractive, a delicate face, features that did not dazzle but were at least regular. She was well-dressed, but not extravagantly so. She was the perfect maiden, and was…
Well, boring. Charles hated the word, but there was no other way to describe her, other than perhaps average.
Priscilla was not average. She sparkled in social settings. Every part of her gleamed and shone. It was like comparing a candle to the stars in the heavens.
His heart twisted. He could not, would not enter a marriage in which he lied every day. The time to be truthful had finally come.
Charles sighed. “I cannot tell you how wretched this makes me—admitting to a woman with whom I am engaged to be married that…that I have been thinking about another woman. And I wish you to know, Miss Lloyd – Frances – that this is the last time it will ever occur. I am committed to you, and that means something to me. I vow –”
“Do you think I am blind?” Frances spoke without malice, but with a finality that cut Charles’s words short.
He was unsure whether he had heard her correctly. “Blind?”
She smiled. “I saw the way Miss Seton looked at you at the Donal wedding. It was impossible to ignore – and so was the way that you concertedly did not look at her.”
Charles’s mouth fell open. “I…I did not…what?”
How was it possible that Frances had seen what he had not even known at the time? It was impossible. The shock of the very idea reduced his ability to speak to a mere mumble as he attempted to collect his thoughts.
“I did – at that time, I…im-impossible!” He swallowed. “I did not even know myself!”
Frances laughed, shaking her head, and finally accepting the comfort of the chair. “You may not have known, but I believe your heart did. You love her, Charles. That is nothing to be ashamed of.”
She could not have been more wrong. The single candle in the room flickered, throwing shadows around the room, as Charles put his head in his hands.
“I really thought,” he said, voice muffled, “I would be able to keep this from you.”
“You know, I do not believe that either of us entered into this engagement with the idea that love would blossom immediately. I mean to say, some of my acquaintances who have had arranged marriages never learned to care for each other much more than they would a neighbor.”
Charles kept his head in his hands.
“But I had hoped,” she continued, “perhaps, in time, we would have found ways to make each other happy.”
He looked up quickly, but there was no bitterness in her eyes nor her tone. Panic started to grow from the sick feeling in his stomach. Was she saying what he thought she was saying?
“We will just you wait and see,” he said hurriedly. “I know this engagement has not exactly transpired how we would have wished it, but…”
His voice trailed away.
Frances was shaking her head slowly. “Do you really think you could be as happy and contented with me as you would be with Priscilla?”
Charles swallowed. Priscilla. She had been a part of his life, his world, for as long as he could remember. The first ball they had attended out in society, they had danced the first dance together. When he had left for the Grand Tour, she had been the one to secret humorous letters throughout his luggage. Those notes had staved off homesickness for over two months.
When they had lost Mary, it was to Priscilla he had clung.
The memory of Priscilla arriving at his engagement picnic – their engagement picnic, he reminded himself painfully – swept into his mind. He could recall nothing else from that day, except her. Her beauty. Her fiery temper. The way she had looked at him.
That kiss in the drawing room. The dawning realization, the relief, that she felt the same burning heat that he did.
The way she had smiled at him, had closed her eyes, as they made love…
Charles coughed. As children, as adults, as lovers, it was all Priscilla. Two people who felt that intensity of emotion, surely, would be unable to stay away from each other for long.
Frances was smiling. “Charles, I hate to be the one to tell you this,
but I believe the phrase ‘made for each other’ applies here.”
He nodded, trying to keep bitterness from his voice. “I know, and after we are married, I will ensure you feel valued, and special, and –”
“No, not you and I,” Frances interrupted, an incredulous look on her face. “You and Priscilla. Can’t you see, at every point in our engagement, it has not been me, but Priscilla, who has been on your mind?”
It was true, he could not argue with her – but Frances was very calm about the whole thing.
She had discovered, nay, perhaps always known that her betrothed had no eyes for her but affection for another. Why did she not scream and shout? Why were there not tears, threats of recrimination, a determination to bring the wedding forward by three days to secure him?
“If you ask me, I think that you should continue thinking of her, not me,” she said quietly. “I am not one to get in the way of what, if you ask me, is true love.”
The meaning of her words took a few moments to sink in. Panic flowed through his veins. He could not lose Frances – he could not lose the security, and the solvency her money would give the Orrinshire name!
“I can change,” he said hurriedly. “And I will change, and that is a promise, Frances. I know I have not been as attentive as I should be, but –”
“Do not think I say this without any due consideration,” Frances interrupted gently. “Please, Charles. Just listen to me.”
Charles forced down all his objections and tried to master himself. He would not allow this to happen. He would not get so close – within three days! – of marriage and saving the house of the Orrinshires. He would marry Frances. He would make her understand.
Frances was watching him carefully, and only when he was calm, did she continue. “Do not misunderstand me, Charles. I know that my dowry is important to you and to your family. But money? I have no wish to buy your affections, Charles – no, and that is exactly what I would be doing if I agreed to continue this engagement!” Her voice had gained a little steel. “I think, in a small way, I am giving you a far greater gift,” Frances said softly. “Freedom.”
Charles blinked. “I – I do not understand. What freedom do you speak of?”
Always the Rival (Never the Bride Book 7) Page 17