In My Wildest Dreams

by Christina Dodd

  CHRISTINA DODD

  In My Wildest Dreams

  To Donna Nasker,

  one of the funniest, kindest women in the world

  and my best wine-drinking buddy.

  (I understand many of the bottles have corks now.)

  And to Jerry Nasker—

  may your carburetor never hang lower than your tailpipes.

  Thanks, guys, we treasure your friendship.

  Contents

  Announcement

  Prologue

  1 “Garrick, you must tell me—who is that beautiful lady . . .

  2 Throckmorton watched as Ellery craned his head,

  3 “Didn’t I tell you, Garrick?”

  4 Celeste had dreamed of this moment every night of her life.

  5 Depending on her whim, the gardenter’s wife, Aimee, had alternately cursed and praised . . .

  6 Stunned, Celeste squeezed Mr. Throckmorton’s arm.

  7 “Dear!” An hour later, Lady Philberta bustled into Throckmorton’s study,

  8 “We can never do that again.”

  9 Celeste was nodding over a book that she’d pulled from . . .

  10 “By George, Throckmorton, there’s that comely young woman . . .

  11 Throckmorton strode toward the swing.

  12 A whisk of wind lifted the tendrils of hair off Celeste’s forehead.

  13 “If you follow the arc of the Big Dipper’s handle,

  14 “Mr. Throckmorton! A gentleman would never use his strength against a lady.”

  15 A burst of laughter from the conservatory stopped Celeste in her tracks.

  16 Throckmorton stepped out from behind a fluted marble column.

  17 “Mother, this is not going to work!”

  18 “Celeste!”

  19 A cry of greeting went up when Celeste stepped inside the kitchen.

  20 “I told you not to come. Why did you come?”

  21 “Mam’selle Milford, you should have seen my cousin.”

  22 Celeste massaged the tense shoulders beneath her hands.

  23 Most men would not feel so grim when they woke in the morning . . .

  24 “Thank you, Celeste.”

  25 “But you have to marry me. I’ve never had such pleasure with a woman.”

  26 Milford stepped into his dark cottage, weary from the effort of helping . . .

  27 A murmur of voices came from the breakfast room.

  28 He loved her.

  29 Celeste tossed the sheet back from Garrick’s bare body,

  About the Author

  Praise and Acclaim

  Books by Christina Dodd

  Copyright

  About the Publisher

  Prologue

  BLYTHE HALL, SUFFOLK

  1843

  Adorna, Lady Bucknell, admired a man who thought honestly and spoke without artifice, but Garrick Stanley Breckinridge Throckmorton the Third gave new meaning to the term tactless.

  “Milford,” he said, “it has come to my attention that your daughter is moping.”

  Milford, the head gardener of Blythe Hall and a dignified East Anglian yeoman of at least fifty years, turned his hat in his work-roughened hands as he watched his employer. Apparently he was used to such direct speaking, for he neither flinched nor cowered. “Celeste is young, Mr. Throckmorton, only seventeen years. Given time and the right man, she’ll settle.”

  Adorna pressed her fan to her lips to conceal her amusement. The sun shone into the old walled garden, displaying young Throckmorton’s lack of expression.

  Adorna wasn’t so sure. Sometimes when she glanced at Garrick Stanley Breckinridge Throckmorton, she suspected she saw . . . more.

  “Yes.” Throckmorton was seated on one of the wicker seats he had brought back from India six years ago. “Perhaps.”

  Of course, Throckmorton wasn’t handsome like his brother, Ellery. He could never have been, for where Ellery’s blond, blue-eyed allure oozed from every pore, Garrick was plain, dark and somber. Tall, but all Throckmortons were tall. Big boned and strongly muscled, betraying the common origins of the Throckmorton family. So conservative in dress and manner Adorna wished occasionally to shake him until he betrayed some real emotion. But if the birth of his younger and fatally captivating sibling had disturbed Garrick, that time had been long ago. Now the guarded gray eyes assessed events and weighed characters without revealing anything, and to Adorna such caution seemed out of place in a twenty-seven-year-old man—unless he concealed depths within his soul.

  But if depths were there, he hid them well, for she had no idea what treasures they hid.

  He gestured to Adorna, her arm draped across the back of the love seat in a graceful curve. “This is Lady Bucknell, the proprietress of the well-respected Distinguished Academy of Governesses in London and a dear friend of my mother’s. She is visiting with her husband, and has observed your daughter. Lady Bucknell has expressed an interest in having Celeste return with her to the Distinguished Academy of Governesses in London and there be trained as an instructor.”

  Adorna smiled at Milford. He didn’t melt, as most men did, at the application of her charm, but watched her steadily, weighing her with his gaze. The head gardener at Blythe Hall was an important personage, after all. He had to be a man of good sense.

  “With all due respect, my lady—why Celeste?” he asked.

  “Celeste would be an admirable governess. Children follow her, and she is endlessly patient. She’s well spoken and well educated, thanks to the Throckmorton family, I believe—”

  Milford nodded. “Grateful, I am.”

  “She seems responsible, but aimless, with no goal in sight.” That was a lie. Celeste had a goal, and that goal was the love of Ellery Throckmorton. She followed Ellery about, speaking to him when she had the chance, spying on him from ill-concealed hideouts.

  Indeed—Adorna’s glance flicked to the wall behind Throckmorton—young Celeste seemed to have developed a penchant for spying.

  Ellery never noticed Celeste was alive. Oh, he knew her name, but not that she’d grown from a knobby girl into a handsome young woman. Adorna planned to remove Celeste before Ellery did notice and thoughtlessly take what was offered.

  Opening her fan, Adorna moved it slowly before her face. The branches on the willow that grew beside the wall were swaying, yet no breeze ruffled any of the other trees. Pitching her voice a little louder than her normal, husky tone, she said, “Celeste speaks French well, I believe.”

  Milford almost smiled. “Her mother was French.”

  “Our cook,” Throckmorton supplied. “A master of sauces, and a way with fish that has never been matched. Even after six years, we miss her.”

  Milford’s dignity grew to combat the dangerous weakness the mention of his wife invoked. “Aye, sir.”

  With a tact Adorna hadn’t given him credit for, Throckmorton turned his head to inspect the hedge of roses nearby, giving Milford a chance to regain his composure. The bushes were in full bloom, a mighty explosion of pink and scent which Adorna had appreciated but which, she knew, Throckmorton had scarcely noticed. “First class work,” he complimented Milford.

  “Thank you, sir. The rose is called Felicité Parmentier, and she’s a magnificent bloomer.”

  The two men stared at the blossoms until Adorna rescued them. “At any rate, Milford, a woman with Celeste’s gifts will make an admirable addition to the Distinguished Academy of Governesses.”

  “She’s a scatter-brain,” her father said flatly.

  The willow rustled violently.

  Eyes narrowed, Throckmorton glanced behind him. Rising, he strolled around to lean against a low-hanging branch.

  “Most girls are at seventeen.” Adorna watched him while she mused that Celeste w
ould, with a little coaching, add luster to the reputation of the Distinguished Academy of Governesses. Most of the ton were waiting for Adorna to fail so they might chuckle at her folly in buying such a business. Indeed, Adorna’s own dear, pompous husband had been less than understanding about her desire to fill her days with something more than gossip and needlework. Her eyes narrowed as she considered the strong language Lord Bucknell had used to describe her purchase.

  She would prove all of them wrong, most especially her dear husband, and young Celeste would help her do so. “When I am done with Celeste,” Adorna said, “she will be polished, independent, and a force to be reckoned with.”

  Milford looked to Throckmorton.

  Throckmorton gave him a small nod, reassuring the anxious father.

  Milford sighed heavily and displayed the wisdom that allowed him to take charge of dozens of undergardeners and acres of flowers and orchards with such success. “Very well. I’ll miss her sore, but if she stays, she’s going to get in trouble. So, my lady, take her.”

  The willow swayed.

  With his eyebrows lowered in a fierce and violent fury, Throckmorton shook the tree.

  The girl, Celeste, tumbled downward in a silent confusion of faded skirts and lop-sided blond braids.

  Throckmorton caught at her, breaking her fall, but she landed hard in the flowerbed, mashing columbine and yellow alyssum. Her petticoats flew up to reveal black woolen stockings tied with a string around the knee. She gasped painfully as her breath left her.

  Throckmorton looked thunderstruck. “Celeste!”

  So he hadn’t known who was up there, Adorna realized, only that someone was spying on them, and he had reacted violently. Fascinating.

  Milford didn’t appear surprised to see his daughter. He only shook his head mournfully. “Scatter-brain.”

  As soon as she caught her breath, Celeste looked up at Throckmorton and with all the passion of her youthful fury, she said, “I won’t go. I won’t be polished, and independent, and a force to be reckoned with. You can’t make me.”

  1

  BLYTHE HALL, SUFFOLK FOUR YEARS LATER

  “Garrick, you must tell me—who is that beautiful lady I met at the train station?”

  Lifting his attention from the row of figures, Garrick Throckmorton stared at Ellery. His younger brother stood framed in the doorway of the study, his clothing exquisitely cut, his blond hair styled perfectly, his tanned cheeks flushed with becoming color.

  Throckmorton had hoped to finish writing instructions on the accounting to his secretary before putting in his first appearance at the reception, but as he studied his over-excited, excessively handsome younger brother, he realized that would not be possible. He recognized trouble when he saw it, and in this family, trouble almost always came in the shape of Ellery Throckmorton. “A beautiful lady?” Throckmorton blotted his pen. “Your fiancée, I would hope.”

  “No, no. Not Hyacinth.” Ellery waved off his intended with a sweep of his elegant hand. “Most certainly not Hyacinth.”

  The sound of violins, cellos and French horns drifted in from the terrace and the drawing rooms along with the babble of guests, arrived just this afternoon for five days of festivities celebrating Ellery’s betrothal to Lady Hyacinth Illington. Therefore, Throckmorton realized, their own voices could be heard—not that such a paltry consideration would occur to Ellery. “Shut the door,” Throckmorton instructed, and waited until Ellery had complied. “Hyacinth is quite a handsome girl.”

  “She’s handsome enough.” Ellery glanced at the cut-glass decanter of brandy on the sideboard. “But this was a woman, and what a woman! She—”

  Determined to halt this liaison before it started, Throckmorton interrupted. “Starting an affair at your betrothal celebration is in extremely poor taste.”

  “An affair?” Ellery’s long, elegant face grew longer. “I couldn’t start an affair with that girl! She’s dewy with innocence.”

  If Ellery didn’t want an affair, what did he want? Marriage? To a girl whose name was unknown to him?

  Oh, yes. Such a romantic flight of fancy was bound to appeal to Ellery. Handsome, frivolous, light-hearted Ellery, who wanted nothing so much as to remain an available bachelor forever.

  Removing his glasses, Throckmorton rubbed the bridge of his nose. “Dewy. Hm. Yes. But, as I’d like to point out, so is Lady Hyacinth—and she’s your betrothed.”

  In a daring rush of words, Ellery said, “My betrothed, not my wife.”

  Damn. Throckmorton should have known this whole arrangement had gone too easily. He’d been waiting for the other shoe to fall, and by God, it had—not surprisingly, in the form of a woman. “You didn’t object to the engagement before.”

  Ellery stiffened. He stalked forward. Placing his hands flat on the desk, he leaned toward Throckmorton and glared, his blue eyes narrowed. Only the length and sweep of his eyelashes detracted from the menace he projected. “Object? I most certainly did object, but you had high-handedly put the announcement in the Times without consulting me.”

  “Pah. You could have raved and shouted until I withdrew my offer on your behalf. You didn’t.” Throckmorton neatly corked his ink, placed his pen in his desk drawer and started to slide it closed. Something caught his eye, and he opened it again. A pen was missing. Two pens. “Have the children been playing in here again?”

  “I don’t know, and don’t try and change the subject!” Ellery rapped his knuckles on the desk.

  The governess couldn’t get here too soon, Throckmorton reflected. The girls were running wild . . . or rather, Kiki was running wild and half the time dragging Penelope with her. The loss of his pens were the least of the problem.

  Ellery said, “I didn’t object because you never gave me a chance.”

  “And because Lady Hyacinth is a very handsome female, and an heiress, and the daughter of the Marquess of Longshaw. And because you know it’s time for you to settle down.” Reflecting bitterly on the fate of his pens, Throckmorton shut the drawer. “An aging roué is an ugly thing.”

  “I’m only twenty-six.”

  “I married at twenty-one.” Throckmorton waved his paper briefly to dry it, then placed it in the wooden box on top of his desk. Locking the box, he dropped the key into his pocket.

  Ellery observed his every movement. “Father married at forty.”

  “He had to make his fortune first so he could afford to buy an aristocratic bride.”

  “Mother would tack your ears to a slateboard if she heard you talking about her like that.”

  “Probably.” Throckmorton pushed back his chair. The plain brown leather furniture slid on a thick Oriental rug of rich azure and peach on a background of winter white. The stripped drapes, accented with gold, echoed the azure and peach, as did the Oriental vases and the flowers they held. Each artifact, each knick-knack, each ornament was placed with taste and gave the chamber a sense of tranquility, which belied the chaos of Throckmorton’s business life.

  For the refined touches he could thank his mother. Lady Philberta Breckinridge-Wallingfork had been but twenty years old and the daughter of one of England’s oldest earldoms when she had been forced by her family’s impoverished circumstances to wed. Yet she had been a dutiful wife to Stanley Throckmorton and a good mother to the boys. Because of Lady Philberta and her family’s prestige, the Throckmortons were able to circulate among the ton, to give parties like this one and see London’s finest in their drawing rooms. The ton might whisper about them behind their fans, but never did those whispers reach Throckmorton’s ears, as the Throckmorton males had a reputation for swift and righteous retaliation. “Lady Hyacinth will add just as much luster to the Throckmorton name as Mother did when she married Father.”

  Turning, Ellery leaned against the massive desk, crossed his arms, and gave his impression of an ill-used man brooding. “It doesn’t hurt that Hyacinth’s family owns those tea plantations in India.”

  Throckmorton went to the mirror and ran his fing
ers through his hair. “It doesn’t hurt that you’re handsome enough to turn any girl’s head, either, but I don’t throw your prettiness in your face.”

  Discarding the brooding like a wet cloak, Ellery turned. “Which brings us back to my mysterious lady.”

  “I’m glad you’re not attracted to her for shallow reasons.”

  Throckmorton should have known it was too much to expect that Ellery would play his part in this betrothal without balking. Ellery was good at racing, whoring and drinking, but he’d been thrown from his horse too many times lately, been caught in the wrong bed too often and been unpleasantly, staggeringly drunk one too many times. It was time to get the lad married and settled down before he broke his neck—or someone shot him.

  Throckmorton straightened his cravat. “Tell me about this mystery woman.”

  Eagerly, Ellery recited her virtues. “Her hair is light brown with streaks of gold flowing like honey. Her teeth are white and even, like a string of the most precious pearls. She’s petite and curvy, like a marble Venus.” With his hands, he indicated the shapeliness of the young woman in question. “Her skin is like—”

  “Alabaster?”

  “Yes!” Ellery smiled, his own alabaster teeth flashing.

  “Of course.” Throckmorton rolled down his sleeves and re-pinned his cuffs. “I suppose her nipples are like two perfect rosebuds.”

  Ellery’s brow puckered. He seldom comprehended Throckmorton’s gibes.

  One didn’t tease the golden boy.

  “I don’t know about her nipples.”

  With heartfelt sincerity, Throckmorton said, “Thank God for that, at least.”

  “Yet.” Ellery’s white teeth gleamed in a smile.

  Perhaps Ellery did comprehend more than Throckmorton gave him credit for. But Ellery didn’t comprehend how important this betrothal to Hyacinth and her Indian plantations were to the family interests—and more than family interests—or he wouldn’t be babbling about some unfamiliar female guest with good teeth and rosebud nipples.