by Claudia Dain
Raithby stood as Kit approached; he had hardly aged since Oxford. The scar upon the upper curve of his cheek was flatter, his hair was shorter, his cheeks leaner. He looked a man in the sweet center of a well-ordered life, a man with nothing to worry him and no one who expected anything of him.
“Culley,” Raithby said, nodding. “Good to see you.”
“Raithby, it’s been too long,” Kit said.
Raithby sat first, his long legs crossed neatly. Raithby had always impressed Kit as being a quiet, self-controlled man, a man of few words. Raithby devoted all of his passion and energy to his horses, his stables, and the racing schedule. There was no man alive who knew more about horseflesh.
“Are you in Town to find a wife?” Raithby asked when the drinks had been served.
Kit just kept from raising his brows in surprise. This was far more direct than he was accustomed to from Raithby.
“Not to find one, precisely. To look for one, perhaps,” Kit answered. “But don’t tell my mother that,” he said, smiling. “And you? Are you shopping for a bride this Season?”
Raithby grunted and lifted one eyebrow sardonically. “I hadn’t thought to marry so young.”
There was a disquieting vagueness in that response.
“Too young, the both of us,” Kit said.
“There is no one who has snared your interest, I take it.”
Kit felt the memory of Emeline and her blooming bodice knocking. He refused entrance. “I’ve only just arrived in Town,” he said.
Raithby stared at him over his glass, his blue eyes mildly speculative. “You won’t find anyone this Season to interest you. A most uninspired crop.”
There was something purposefully subversive about that. It was not like Raithby at all.
“It’s early in the Season, not even June yet,” he said, feeling that he was being led off into the weeds on a hunt he had no interest in. Or hadn’t ten minutes ago. “Who knows what beauty may show her pretty head?”
“Yes. Who knows?” Raithby agreed.
They drank in companionable silence after that, the mood between them as cordial as it ever was. Raithby seemed off somehow, though Kit could not have said in what way.
“Your mother is eager for you to marry?” Raithby said after an interval of several minutes.
“Of course.”
“My father is not eager for me to marry,” Raithby said.
“Takes the sting out of it, I should think. I will do my duty, certainly, but there doesn’t seem to me to be any need to rush about beating the bushes of Society for a bride. A man should take his time, be prudent about it all.”
It sounded very reasonable to him, saying it out loud that way. He might try just such a line with his mother. He couldn’t see an argument against it, as to that.
“My father would agree with you,” Raithby said.
“But you do not?”
Raithby looked down at the space between the mahogany chair leg and the turned edge of the tabletop, lost in thought. “I should,” he said.
“Of course you should,” Kit said. “It’s irrefutable, logical.”
Raithby nodded, his gaze still on the empty space between chair and table.
“Have you been in Town long?” Kit said, changing the subject very intentionally.
Raithby raised his head. “Long enough.”
Most mysterious. Equally perplexing.
“And no one interesting, no one to arouse a man’s interest in marriage?”
“Did I say that?”
“You did. Most emphatically.”
“True enough, then. The marriageable crop is uninspired,” Raithby said. “You shall not be tempted. No man could be.”
For some strange reason, likely the strangeness of the entire episode, Kit felt he had to defend Emeline, who was in Town for the Season and was most certainly looking for a husband.
The thought, never before put into words, even in his own mind, tickled at something entirely uncomfortable. He couldn’t think why. Certainly he wished Emeline every success and every happiness. Of course he did.
“Are you acquainted with Miss Emeline Harlow?” Kit asked, doing his best to be a valiant friend, ignoring the tickle as unbecoming of him. “She is an old family friend; we grew up together like brother and sister, very nearly.” Raithby looked at him, a polite expression on his face. “She’s in Town for her first Season.”
“And you’re offering her to me? I’m flattered, Culley. Most generous of you. But perhaps not entirely brotherly.”
Kit bit back a sharp retort and smiled instead. “Hardly that. I am merely speaking highly of a woman I admire greatly. Would you like an introduction?”
“I should be pleased to make her acquaintance. You will not be insulted if I do not make her an offer?”
“Don’t be absurd, Raithby,” Kit said, his tone sharp despite his best efforts. “It will please her mother to have the introduction made and therefore it will please Miss Harlow.”
“She sounds most . . . biddable.” It sounded almost like an insult.
“She is,” Kit said. It still sounded like an insult. It also sounded untrue. Emeline wasn’t what one would term biddable. She was fun.
Strange, but he would never have thought a woman could be fun, nor would he have thought it a desirable trait. Yet she was, and it was. In her, anyway. He wasn’t certain he wanted his wife to be fun.
“You seem eager to foist her off on someone,” Raithby said. “Is something wrong with the girl?”
“Not at all,” Kit said, sounding quite sharp, indeed. “Her mother and mine are close friends. We grew up side-by-side, as I explained. The introduction would please her mother, and hence, my mother.”
“And perhaps you shall enjoy a marriage reprieve if your mother is distracted by Mrs. Harlow’s happiness at her daughter’s successful Season?”
“A reasonable expectation, wouldn’t you say?”
He didn’t know why he said it. He wasn’t offering Emeline up for Raithby to run away with; no, he was merely making all the women in his Wiltshire circle happy. There was nothing amiss about that. Raithby was an honourable man, and in no hurry to marry. Emeline was safe enough.
“Women are not often reasonable,” Raithby said.
How true that was.
“She’s a very nice girl,” Kit said. Now she sounded dull.
“I would assume so,” Raithby said, a smile teasing a corner of his mouth. “One does not often enough meet truly nice girls Out in Society.”
As this was Kit’s first Season in Town, he wasn’t quite sure what that was supposed to mean. “She’s quite good-natured, too.” Like a well-heeled hound. He could not seem to put Emeline in the appropriate light. Nothing he said painted the true picture. He signalled for another brandy.
“Would you say she’s pretty?” Raithby asked, shaking his head in refusal of another brandy.
Emeline. Pretty. The words refused to bond. Kit was dumbfounded and dumb struck.
“Not pretty, then?” Raithby prodded. With a hot poker, he prodded. Emeline? Not pretty?
“She’s quite pretty,” he said. It was true, wasn’t it? She was truly quite pretty.
“Hair?”
“Light brown. Or perhaps golden brown. Dark blond?”
“Should I know?” Raithby said, smiling without remorse. Raithby had been a more congenial, placating fellow at Oxford.
“Light hair. Light eyes,” Kit said, grappling for hard reality, firm statistics. “Trim figure. Piquant features.”
“Piquant?”
“Piquant. Definitely,” Kit said. Her narrow chin, high cheekbones, tilted . . . gray eyes. Yes, gray eyes.
“Blue eyes?” Raithby said.
“No,” Kit said, memories knocking at his heart with such staccato determination that the door banged open and he was flooded.
Emeline chasing a barn cat into a deserted stall and coming out with a three long scratches on her face, grinning victoriously, the squirming cat
in her arms.
Emeline astride her father’s oldest mount, her stockings stained, her smock stained, her hair ribbons mud-splattered, laughing as she attempted to run him from the ring. He grabbed the halter instead and she slipped off the horse’s rump, landed on her arse, and kept laughing.
Emeline, her hair piled high on her head for the first time, scratching at the pins holding it, biting her lip, looking miserable and mutinous and marvelous.
Emeline playing whist with the boys, cheating adroitly, displaying bland innocence when accused.
Emeline dressed in muslin with blue embroidery, a straw bonnet with blue ribbons trailing down her back, her hair gleaming gold, her skin shining, her eyes glowing . . . blue. Sitting in church, looking pure and impossible and so much like a strange and unknowable Emeline that he’d looked away and lost his place in the hymn.
Emeline. Pretty. Yes, she was pretty.
No, she was not pretty. She was so much more than pretty. So far beyond prettiness.
“Yes,” Kit said. “Blue eyes. I think.” He took another deep swallow of brandy.
“You’ve known her all your life, but not long enough to be certain of the color of her eyes,” Raithby said.
“They’re difficult to describe,” Kit said.
“They must be. I suppose I shall have to see for myself. When shall you make the introduction?”
Kit jerked his head up to look at Raithby, truly looking at him. Raithby, Lord Raithby, heir to an earldom as Lord Quinton’s only son, was lean, dark-haired, blue-eyed and eminently eligible. Mrs. Harlow would likely faint at his feet.
But, no, Mrs. Harlow was not a woman to faint. She was more likely to throw Raithby over her shoulder, cart him off, and drop him at Emeline’s feet. A titled, eligible man was exactly the sort of husband that would suit Mrs. Harlow for Emeline.
Would Raithby suit Emeline?
Well, and why not? Did not every young chit want a man exactly like Raithby?
Would Raithby want Emeline?
If he had any sense at all, he would. He’d be a damned fool if he didn’t.
“Whenever,” Kit said. He sounded abrupt to his own ears. He took another swallow of brandy and tried to amend his tone. He should sound pleased, perhaps even grateful.
No, he could not possibly attempt sounding grateful. Pleased was going to be quite enough of a challenge.
“As I am not privy to their social schedule, I’m afraid I can’t be much help at the moment,” Kit said. “Perhaps we’ll be fortunate enough to be in attendance at the same event. Sometime.”
“Perhaps we shall,” Raithby said, standing. Kit stood as well, abandoning his glass. It wasn’t even half empty. “I am eager to meet Miss Harlow. I will look for you both. Good to see you, Culley.”
“And you, Raithby,” Kit said.
Raithby left. Kit stayed. His glass wasn’t even half empty, after all. And he had no where else to be until . . . what was on for tonight? Oh, yes, a musicale at the home of . . . damned if he could remember whose home.
That damned door of memory, still open, still flooding his thoughts.
Emeline tumbling off the second branch of the oak next to the pond, his frantic run, her landing in his outstretched arms, the breath rushing out of them both, her eyes so pale a blue that they looked like rain clouds, her cheeks pink, her mouth pink, her tongue pink, and the shiver that ran through her, a shiver he caught and felt in the center of his bones . . . that day, that moment, that instant . . . Emeline in his arms. Emeline in his bones. Emeline in his life.
Emeline, who was like a sister. Yet who was not his sister.
This was why he avoided brandy. This was the instant that he had been determined to forget, to deny, to destroy.
Kit pushed his glass across the table and stood, following in Raithby’s footsteps, out into the afternoon light of a soft London day.
“Don’t you think we should go home?” Emeline said. “We have to dress for our evening at Lady Jordan’s.” It was just four o’clock. They were expected at Lady Jordan’s at nine. Dressing, even in one’s finest, did not require five hours.
“We simply must find the perfect hat for that new cotton gown,” Mama said. “Perfection cannot be rushed. What do you think of this shape, Mrs. Culley? Is it too severe for Emeline’s profile?”
Mama made a rippling motion with her fingers, Emeline turned to present her profile to Mrs. Culley, and the milliner, and the milliner’s assistant. They studied her face with all the solemnity one gives to translating a difficult Latin text, and then, without a word, the hat was set down. Apparently it was too severe for her profile.
Mama had never said a word against Emeline’s appearance. She did not pounce when Emeline requested a second portion. She did not scowl over Emeline’s figure. She did not even shake her head when Emeline’s hair had darkened to an unremarkable shade of not-quite-blond and not-quite-brown. Emeline knew that she was fortunate in having a mother who did not fault her for, well, for anything. She knew there were many upon many mothers who made a study of fault-finding.
“What shade is the gown again?” Mrs. Culley asked.
“Ivory bisque with the most remarkable shade of pink as the overlay,” Mama said. “We should have had the dress sent over. It is extremely foolhardy to buy a hat without the gown to hand.”
“I remember the shade of pink, Mama,” Emeline said.
“And you cannot find its match in the shop.”
“Perhaps it need not be a precise match,” Emeline said.
Mama gasped. Mrs. Culley hid a smile. The milliner, Madame Lacroix, looked horrified.
“Perhaps that straw bonnet, with a bit of pale gray ribbon?” Emeline suggested.
“With pink and mauve roses just above the brim,” the milliner said, looking far less horrified. “Madame, I believe it would suit. Miss Harlow has the sort of face and the bearing to manage it. It would be very fashionable, very much of the moment.”
“A bit of a risk?” Mama said.
“Is this not the time and place to take a risk?” Emeline asked, knowing the problem of the hat was solved. Mama was not, and never had been, afraid of risk.
Sensing she had made the sale, Madame Lacroix said, “Perhaps a few violets of more blue than purple hue, to add a spark of excitement to the effect?”
“Very daring,” Mrs. Culley said.
Mama loved to be daring, within limits.
“Very well,” Mama said. “Make it up and have it sent round to Dover Street. Not too daring, mind. My daughter must be seen as fashionable, not forward.”
“Of course, Madame.”
The problem of the bonnet was resolved. Emeline was not adverse to shopping. She could shop for hours and not tire. Shopping in London should have met, and exceeded, her every shopping desire. It might have, if Kit had not been in London at the same time and if Kit did not treat her like a sister. She had to convince him she was not his sister, even though it was flatly obvious that she was not, and she could not convince him if she was in one shop after another. Kit was not going to stroll through the shops, and if he was not at her elbow, she could not convince him of anything. It was extremely frustrating.
“Are you in need of a hat, Mrs. Culley?” Mama asked. “Those ostrich feathers look interesting.”
Oh, Lud, would they never leave this shop?
It was just then that Kit walked by the shop, his very elegant profile illuminated by a stray sunbeam.
“Christopher?” Mrs. Culley said, her face breaking into a smile. Then she drooped a bit, her shoulders dropping, her head tilting, her spirit sinking a bit into the coarse boards of the shop. There was nothing unusual in that. Mrs. Culley wore a face for Kit that she did not wear for others of her acquaintance.
Emeline darted to the door, opened it so fast that she hit her toes with it, winced, and called, “Kit!”
Kit turned at the word, saw her face, blinked, braced, and then smiled. Braced. Then smiled. When had she become the woman Kit steeled hims
elf to face?
What was happening to them? They had always been so easy in each other’s company, so relaxed and so prone to laughter. In the last year, since her come-out had been arranged, her temper flared whenever she was with him and he turned as stoic as a stone. All the easiness was gone. In its place was prickling awareness, tension, stampeding emotion. She hated it. Usually. Some days she thrilled to ride in the midst of the stampede.
“Emeline. I had not thought to see you until this evening.”
He dipped his head in a bow, his hair falling forward to touch his brow; he flicked it back with an abrupt toss of his head. Two women in their forties, passing them in that moment, made murmuring sounds of flirtation and appreciation, she was certain of it.
“We are hat shopping,” she said, watching the women until they were well out of earshot. “Your mother would like a new hat, one with ostrich feathers. I do think that she would relish your opinion on the matter,” she said. All one had to do to get Kit do what one wanted him to do was to use his mother as a whip.
She had known Kit and Mrs. Culley all her life; was she expected to not know how things worked?
“Of course.”
“You’re not otherwise occupied? I thought your mother said you had an appointment?”
“I did. With Lord Raithby. At White’s,” he said, walking behind her as the milliner’s assistant held the door open for them.
“Christopher,” Mrs. Culley said, casting a melting gaze upon her eldest.
“Mother. Emeline said you were shopping for a new hat?”
“With ostrich feathers,” Emeline said.
“Good day, Mrs. Harlow,” Kit said.
“Mr. Culley,” Mama said, dipping her chin.
It was all very tedious. They had seen each other nearly every day for more than a decade. This Town formality could hardly be necessary, no matter what Mama said.
“Kit is so very eager to help you choose a bonnet, Mrs. Culley,” Emeline said. When Mama gave her a stern look, Emeline smiled and looked at Kit. “We are in the midst of a dilemma, Mr. Culley,” she said. “Mama is of the belief that it is of the utmost necessity that you be referred to as Mr. Culley whist in Town. I am of the belief, the most resolute belief, that, given our years of intimate contact, such a change in terminology is not only unnecessary but ridiculous. What is your decision on the matter, Mr. Culley? We will abide by your judgement.”