by Lucy Monroe
“Undoubtedly it would be better were I made of sterner stuff.” Lady Beauford allowed the ministrations. “Humph. I’ll order a fire lit in the drawing room and you can change your dress to one of your new lawn gowns.” Annabelle smiled at the concession. “Aunt Griselda, that is very kind of you, but I like this dress. I’m sure we won’t have any callers as it is not typically our at-home day.”
“You do not expect me to take you calling in that?” Lady Beauford looked properly horrified.
“Of course not, Aunt Griselda. I had thought to take care of some correspondence today. Now, you can see that my dress is hardly significant.” Lady Beauford sighed and rested against the pillows. “Very well. Dress as you like, but if the laird comes calling today, do not pretend I did not warn you.” Poor Aunt Griselda. “I’ll change my dress after breakfast. All right?” Annabelle asked.
The other woman nodded. “Now, be off with you.” As Annabelle approached the breakfast room, she heard Ian’s deep burr and the deferential tones of the butler in the hall. Annoyed that her aunt had indeed been right and that she would be caught dressed like a governess, Annabelle moved forward to greet him.
She could have waited and Cresswell would undoubtedly have told Ian that they were not yet receiving. The irresistible pull of Ian’s presence overcame her frustration at being caught dressed so practically, however.
He stood with his back to her, still wearing his many caped great coat. A large basket of red roses dangled from his hand.
“Good morning, my lord.”
His head came around at the sound of her voice. Her knees went weak at the potent masculinity in his smile. “Good morning, Belle. Although it’s near enough to afternoon.”
“I suppose that is your excuse for calling so early?” His brows raised in question. “You are not yet ready to receive callers?” She wanted to throttle him. Of course she wasn’t ready yet. She hadn’t even had her breakfast. Her aunt was still abed and it must be obvious she was not dressed to receive visitors. She decided to fall back on the excuse of her aunt. She had to stifle a sigh of disappointment, however, at the thought of sending Ian on his way.
“My aunt is still indisposed so I cannot receive callers.” He inclined his head in understanding. “I had hoped to be granted your company for a trip to the museum today.”
“I adore the museum,” she replied.
In truth, it was one of her favorite places. She could wander for hours room to room getting lost in the paintings, sculpture and even the Kings Library. Embarrassingly, her stomach chose that moment to make its empty state known.
“You havena eaten yet this morning?” Ian frowned at her. “You have no call to be standing in this drafty hall conversing with me.” She bristled at his tone. One minute he was kissing her like a…a lover and the next he was scolding her as if she were a child. “I’m sure my eating habits are my own concern.”
He did not react to the frosty tone of her voice. “They should be someone else’s as well if you are no going to take proper care of yourself.” He looked at her like an angry parent.
She could not help laughing at the absurdity of being upbraided for not eating her breakfast. “My lord, I have not been chastised for like misbehavior since my old nurse was retired to a country cottage.” She smiled at his set features. “You don’t look a bit like her, but you do sound like her.”
His face registered disbelief. “I canna believe that Lady Beauford would not take it into her head to scold you on occasion as well.” He had read her aunt very well. Aunt Griselda did like to scold. “True, but she reserves her reprimands for my clothing.”
“What is the matter with the way you dress?”
Laughter bubbled up yet again at the sincere confusion in his voice. “My lord, you may like the fact that I dress like a dowd, thus making me more suitable in your eyes, but I can assure you that it does quite the opposite for my aunt.”
“Belle, there is nothing the matter with your choice of attire.” Her insides warmed at the approval she heard in his voice. “Really, my lord, you must stop addressing me as Belle.”
He shook his head as if her complaint were a pesky fly trying to land on him. “Dinna try to change the subject.”
“Fine.” She lifted the unfashionable wool skirt of her gown slightly. “Take for instance my dress today. Aunt Griselda would have heart palpitations if she realized that you had caught me wearing this.”
He stared at her as if he could not believe what he was hearing. “What is the matter with that dress? It looks warm enough for the day. Your aunt’s house is no warm, I have noticed.”
Annabelle smiled at Ian’s understatement. When the fog moved in, her aunt’s townhouse became downright chilly. “My aunt can sometimes be parsimonious. She prefers to save money rather than have fires lit in all the grates.”
“Your aunt would do well with my housekeeper. The woman is cheeseparing, no doubt about it.”
Annabelle warmed under their shared smile.
The front door knocker sounded. “Are you expecting other callers this morning, Belle?”
The suspicion she heard in Ian’s voice was laughable. Of course she wasn’t expecting callers. Hadn’t she made that clear enough? There was a flurry of activity at the door. She found herself enveloped in masculine arms and quickly released.
“Annabelle, I have missed you.”
She looked into her brother’s eyes and hers became misty. They had always been close. She impulsively leaned forward and gave him another hug. “Nothing like I have missed you, Robert.”
She looked around him for Diana and came face to face with a fire-breathing Ian.
“Belle, I dinna know this gentleman. Won’t you introduce me to your caller?” The question came out as a command.
She took her brother’s arm and beamed up at him before acknowledging Ian’s demand. “Robert, this is the Earl of Graenfrae, Mister Ian MacKay. My lord, my brother, Robert Courtney, Earl of Hamilton.”
It was her brother’s turn to stiffen. “Lord Graenfrae.” His words came out in the pompous tone he sometimes used, a tone Annabelle had come to despise. She could not deny that where she had shared in her parent’s cavalier attitude toward society’s rules, her brother kowtowed to them. Sickeningly so.
Ian’s shoulders relaxed and his hand that had been fisted at his side unclenched. He inclined his head to her brother, more arrogant than even Robert in his acknowledgement.
“Lord Hamilton, it is a pleasure.”
A delicately cleared throat and Annabelle knew her brother was in deep trouble. He had been so busy matching Ian arrogant look for arrogant look that he had neglected to introduce his wife. Spinning away from Robert, Annabelle threw her arms around her beautiful sister-in-law.
“Diana, I was about to ask Robert where he had hidden you.”
Momentarily ignoring her husband and the laird, Diana returned Annabelle’s embrace. “Darling Annabelle, how I’ve missed you. Your letters have been all that has kept me sane these months with just your brother for company.” Leaning closer to Annabelle, she whispered, “So who is this gorgeous man and do tell me the roses are for you?”
Annabelle laughed at her incorrigible friend. “Surely you heard me introduce him to Robert.”
Diana gave her a disgusted frown. “Of course, how could I miss it and my husband’s subsequent posturing? But who is he?” Robert interrupted. “Annabelle, if you are finished greeting Lady Hamilton, perhaps you will allow me to introduce her to his lordship.”
“Of course, Robert. By all means. I wouldn’t want Lady Hamilton to think you had forgotten her,” Annabelle mocked.
Diana winked at Annabelle before turning a perfectly composed face to her husband.
When the introductions were finished, Ian offered the roses to Annabelle. “I’ll return another time for our excursion. No doubt you want to visit with your family and eat something.”
Diana and Robert turned startled eyes to her at Ian’s injunction that she
eat.
“Ian is under the delusion that I still need a nursemaid.” She took the basket of flowers from him and couldn’t resist leaning forward to inhale their fragrance. “They are lovely. Thank you, my lord.”
“’Tis my pleasure, Belle.” Bowing to her brother and Diana, he took his leave.
Annabelle stared after him until Robert’s words interrupted her thoughts. “Where is Aunt Griselda and why were you entertaining a gentleman unchaperoned in the hall?”
“Aunt is still abed.” The butler came forward and relieved her of her flowers. “Please put them in my room, Cresswell.”
He nodded before leaving.
Ignoring Robert’s censure about entertaining Ian without a chaperone, Annabelle took Diana’s arm and headed toward the breakfast room. She was hungry. “So, he calls our aunt by her given name, but calls his wife Lady Hamilton. Have my brother’s brains gone to let?”
Diana looked over her shoulder and smiled indulgently at her husband. “He calls me Diana in private, but believes it lends me countenance for him to address me more formally before those that are not our intimates.”
“How interesting.”
“Yes, isn’t it?” Diana caught Annabelle’s eyes and they went off into peals of laughter.
Annabelle hugged her friend’s arm. “I’m glad you’re here.” Remembering her first two seasons, Annabelle grimaced. She had not wanted to come out of mourning for her parents, but Robert and Aunt Griselda had been adamant.
Robert told her that he was worried she would never get over their parents’ death if she did not start living again. So, he insisted that she attend the Season.
No amount of persuasion on her aunt’s part, however, would convince Annabelle to wear gowns adorned with flounces and furbelows. The ornamentation seemed obscene to her grieving mind. With average looks and no interest in the social games of the ton, she had soon been labeled The Ordinary.
She had not cared.
Then she met Diana. They had been sitting near one another at a ball. Diana, resting because she had danced too much, and Annabelle because she rarely danced at all.
Someone had raised the issue of women’s rights. Annabelle shocked both herself and those around her when she made an impassioned declaration about the plight of women in England. Diana had stared at her with wide eyes and avowed that she was not ordinary at all.
They had been fast friends ever since.
Robert followed them into the breakfast room and took a seat next to his wife at the table. “I’m quite serious, impending engagement or no, it is highly improper for you to be entertaining the laird alone.”
“What on earth are you talking about?” Honest bafflement overrode any other reaction to her brother’s words. There was no way that Robert could have heard of Ian’s plans at his country estate so far north. “What impending engagement?” Robert said, “It’s hardly a secret. You needn’t play ignorant with me.” Annabelle turned to Diana in desperation. “Has Aunt Griselda been communicating with you?” She didn’t see how it could be the case, unless her aunt had envisioned her current circumstance with the laird on their first meeting.
Diana picked up the paper and opened it to the society page. “Here, read this.” Annabelle scanned the column and all vestiges of hunger drained from her.
“A certain Lady A. has been seen often in the company of Lord G. of Scotland since his arrival to Town. Could Lady A. be making a match at last? ” queried the impertinent writer.
Annabelle put a hand to her head. What had she expected with Ian making his suit so obvious? Looking at the speculative gleam in her brother’s eyes, she groaned. Robert was almost as fixated with getting her married as their aunt.
“It’s not what it seems.”
“He is not courting you?” Outrage vibrated through her brother’s words.
Visions of dawn appointments swam before Annabelle’s eyes. Sometimes her brother went over the top on the issue of family honor. “Well, yes, he is courting me.” Her brother’s anger turned to a look of complacence and he smiled. “Well done, Annabelle.”
“I’m not going to marry him.”
Hoping to change the subject, she turned to Diana. “I’ve been waiting impatiently for your arrival. I’m so glad you are finally here. We have much to discuss.”
“How could that be? You two corresponded more than I did with my estate managers.”
Giving her husband a condescending smile, Diana said, “Naturally.” She faced Annabelle and grinned. “You couldn’t keep me away a day longer.”
“Diana, you know quite well I was content to molder away on my country estate to keep your lovely person all to myself.”
Diana gave her husband a look full of warmth and secrets. A timeless moment passed in which Annabelle was overcome with longing. For all their banter, her brother and Diana’s was a love match.
“You certainly don’t look like someone who has been moldering away, Diana. You are positively blooming with happiness,” Annabelle said with fondness.
“You will be having your own dish of happiness soon,” quizzed Robert.
Annabelle frowned at her brother. “I told you, I am not going to marry Laird MacKay. Besides, even were I to agree to such a ridiculous notion, it would be quite different than the union of minds and hearts you and Diana enjoy.”
“Surely it is too early to make such an emphatic pronouncement,” declared Diana.
There was nothing for it, but to explain the matter in its entirety. Well perhaps not the entirety, her brother need not know of Ian’s passionate kisses in the garden.
Annabelle felt Ian’s proposal did her no credit, but it would be the only way of explaining her aversion to his marked attention.
As she spoke, her brother looked hard-pressed not to laugh. The mirth in his eyes did nothing for her sense of injured dignity. She scowled at him.
“It is not amusing.” She waved the newspaper before him. “Now this. How would you like to be painted in such unflattering terms and the latest on-dit on the tip of everyone’s tongue?”
His mirth vanished. Robert had a horror of being the center of gossip or scandal.
Diana’s reaction aligned itself immediately with Annabelle. “How dare he. The brute. You are a perfectly lovely creature and if he’s so blind he can’t see that, he doesn’t deserve you. As for this rag,” she said, indicating the paper with a condescending sweep of her hands, “they simply do not understand a lady taking her time to the altar.” Her friend’s staunch support went a long way toward restoring Annabelle’s good mood.
Cresswell entered the room. “There is a fire lit in the drawing room per Lady Beauford’s orders.” When no one moved, he spoke again. “It is quite comfortable in there.”
Diana took the situation in hand. “Robert, go pay your respects to your aunt. She’s undoubtedly ready to receive company by now.” When he hesitated, she shooed him with her hand. “Go. I will be up momentarily.”
Robert left the room and Diana tugged on Annabelle’s arm. “Come, let us retire to the drawing room. Cresswell seems quite put out that no one is in there to appreciate Lady Beauford’s generosity in ordering the fire lit.” Annabelle followed Diana to the other room. They sat on matching tapestry chairs near the brazier. She regretted her choice of dress for the second time that morning. The heat of the fire made the wool prickle against her skin.
“Tell me all,” Diana said firmly.
Annabelle grimaced. “The proposal was truly awful.”
“Yes, yes, so you’ve said. What about the rest?”
“The rest?” Now that the opportunity had come for Annabelle to unburden herself, she wasn’t entirely sure she wanted to. Would Diana understand her quandary? Happily married to the man she loved, could she understand all the riotous emotions coursing through Annabelle?
“Yes, the rest. You would not be so beside yourself if Lord Graenfrae had simply made a proposal of no consequence.”
“You cannot believe an impertinent m
arriage proposal of no consequence,” Annabelle exclaimed.
Diana patted her arm. “Of course not. Haven’t I already said so? But your sense of humor has served you well in other circumstances that could have been equally devastating.”
Annabelle stood and moved away from the heat of the fire. She spoke with her back to Diana. “Nothing has ever been this provoking.” Diana laughed. “That is hard to believe. Remember when Freddy Jenkins was on the verge of proposing and then he fell for that empty-headed Mary Potts? When he came to explain his change of heart to you, you laughed him out of the room. You were not affected at all.”
Recalling Freddy’s ignominious exit, Annabelle could not help smiling just a little.
Picking up one of the trinkets on a lacquer table she idly played with it before setting it down with a thump.
“This is entirely different. Freddy’s idea of our relationship was amusing in the extreme, but Ian is an infuriating man with no concept of the tender emotions, much less the meaning of denial.”
Diana shifted in her chair to face Annabelle. “My dear, you are putting too much importance on this matter. The Scotsman will eventually give up when you continue to deny his proposal.”
Annabelle whirled around to face her friend, nearly knocking the entire grouping of knick-knacks off the shiny black table. “I would think that if he has the effrontery to say he is going to court me, then he is honor bound to do so.”
“Yes of course, I’m sure he’ll continue to court you if that is what you want,” Diana said, obviously trying to soothe, but failing.
“It’s not a matter of what I want. The man is stubborn as they come and will not give up easily,” Annabelle insisted.
Annabelle fingered a piece of silver trim and thought morosely that she had been quite wrong about Ian’s stubbornness. Moving away from where Diana discussed the merits of some dyed muslin with the modiste, Annabelle tried to find something of interest among the bolts of colorful fabric. Her mind persisted in dwelling on Ian’s easy defeat.