by Ashley March
The noise should have been overwhelming, the wealth intimidating in its brash opulence of crystal and gold, marble and jewels. The sight of so many people, each with the potential to sneer or unmask him for the common upstart he was, should have been at least the tiniest bit disconcerting.
Instead, it felt like a welcome.
A lex smiled and bent his head toward his mother’s ear. “I was hoping at least for elephants to ride upon. Or a river of gold. Harem girls would also have been nice—”
“I don’t want to hear about harem girls,” Susan said, her skin pale and the corners of her mouth pinched.
Behind him, a finger jabbed his ribs. “They’re pushing us back here,” Jo complained. “Keep going!”
A lex led his mother down the stairs, pointing out the strange and ludicrous to ease her nerves. “There appears to be a bull over there by the terrace. See his horns curved above the mask? No, don’t smile—he’ll surely see us and charge.” Halfway down. “A h, a unicorn! A nd it appears she even applied some sort of paste to her face. Now, that, Mother dear, exhibits a fair amount of creative dedication.”
“Hmm.” His mother’s hand still clung to his arm, as if she would tumble down the stairs to her death if he were to withdraw his support. He had never seen her afraid, not once in his life, not even after his father had died. Yet now her touch held the slightest tremor—she who had always been his definition of strength and bravery—and he felt like a damned monster for forcing her to come. She’d refused at first, hadn’t she? She hadn’t wanted to relinquish her widow’s weeds for a ball gown, her melancholy expression of mourning for one of pretense. But he’d coaxed and charmed as he did best until she agreed to attend the masquerade, knowing that neither Jo nor Kat would come without her acquiescence to his knowing that neither Jo nor Kat would come without her acquiescence to his plans. She’d agreed for his sake. A lex’s jaw clenched. God help anyone who dared to scorn her tonight.
“It might take a bit of creativity if she were the only one masked as a unicorn,” Jo said snidely behind them. “There’s another one by the refreshments. Do you suppose they’re unicorn lovers?”
“Were we meant to dress as animals?” his mother asked.
“I wish I was a swan,” Kat said.
“No, not at all.” A lex looked at his mother, at the golden bolts radiating from the eyes of her purple mask, at the deep violet skirts flowing gracefully from step to step as she descended. Regal, he’d told the modiste. Though he still hadn’t replicated the color of the Queen’s Madonna gown, which she adored, she deserved to look like royalty. A nd she did. “He would have approved,” A lex murmured.
“Thank you.” It wasn’t precisely what he expected in response to the reference to his father, but it was better than silence. A nd she didn’t immediately try to exit the room as she did at home. When the touch of her hand lightened on his arm, it seemed like true progress. If nothing else, her reaction proved that they’d been right to come to the masquerade; for a few hours, at least, she would be distracted from the memories.
They reached the bottom of the stairs and A lex drew her to the side, trusting that Kat and Jo would follow. It was difficult to move through the throng, and a few “beg pardons” later, he simply stood and waited to be pushed along like the others around them. Someone bumped into his shoulder and he turned, then smiled at the woman who glanced up at him with wide green eyes behind her peacock-feathered mask.
“Oh, good evening,” she exclaimed, then twisted to tug at her skirts, which had been caught under another man’s heel. “I’m certain he did that on purpose,” she told A lex. “If that’s not Sir A lfred Crowley, then my name’s not . . .” She paused and winked, her smile mischievous.
“What is your name?” A lex asked.
She shook her head and leaned closer.
“What is your name?” he asked again, more loudly.
“Why, Lady Peacock, of course, sir. A nd you must be Mr. Midnight.” A lex inclined his head, then scanned the other nearby male guests, several of whom also wore simple black masks. “There appear to be many Mr. Midnights at tonight’s ball.”
“I think you all do it deliberately, so we— Oh!” Lady Peacock jostled against him again as the crowd shifted, then grimaced. “I must go before I’m trampled. A pleasure to meet you, Mr. Midnight.”
“A nd you as well, Lady—”
She had already turned, holding her hands to her mask to protect the peacock feathers as she shoved her way through the crowd.
“She was nice,” his mother said beside him, a tight smile on her lips as she
“She was nice,” his mother said beside him, a tight smile on her lips as she nodded at the greetings directed toward her.
“Yes, very nice.” If one could draw such a conclusion from a minute of conversation.
“A good quality to have in a wife, but unfortunate that you don’t know her name. We could leave and you would already have a lady to begin courting tomorrow.”
A pparently being distracted did not mean that his mother was enjoying the event. A lex smiled. “I see you’re anxious to return home in the ca—” He nodded toward those inching past. “Good evening. I beg your pardon. Yes, good evening to you.” Each syllable spoken required great concentration; even after several years of tutelage, the crisp aristocratic pattern of speech still felt foreign on his tongue.
His mother sniffed. “The carriage?”
“Yes, the carriage.”
“Perhaps you can ride in it next time, while the girls and I take a hansom cab.” A lex grinned. “I’m heartened to hear you say there will be a next time.”
“You know very well I meant later this evening.”
Loudly, a few feet away, over the other voices: “No, I won’t dance with you!” Heads swiveled toward A lex’s left. He groaned.
“Surely you’re not surprised,” his mother said.
Of course he wasn’t. Why should he have been surprised to find his older sister shouting a refusal to a man who’d probably complimented her on how lovely she was and then kindly asked her to dance?
He tugged his mother toward Jo, intent on intervening and reminding Jo of her good manners, even if he did have to wade through a sea of peacocks, bulls, and unicorns to do so—when another woman crashed into his side.
He stumbled, lifting his hands to steady himself and the masked stranger. He half expected to see Lady Peacock again, with her large green eyes and wide smile. Instead, as the woman removed her head from his shoulder and looked up, he found himself staring into blue eyes—eyes the color of the ocean, surrounded by a landscape of diamonds and bordered by gold. She glanced away, laughed, then looked back, her eyelashes sweeping. “Oh, I do beg your pardon!” He knew her.
The thought was faint but immediate, a shock of familiarity. How did he know her? Was she someone he’d met on the Continent, or the daughter of a duke Lunsford had pointed out during a ride in Hyde Park?
The mouth beneath her mask curved, waiting for his response. But before he could reply, she said, “I believe this is the part where you assure me it wasn’t my fault.”
Framed by the sleeves of her violet gown, her shoulders were slim beneath his hands. A fool would have mistaken their slenderness for fragility and not sensed the strength poised beneath his fingertips. He had hoped his mother’s purple dress would make her feel like royalty, but it was apparent the woman before him dress would make her feel like royalty, but it was apparent the woman before him needed no such ruse. Though the crowd had made her clumsy, “strength” and
“poise,” “grace” and “charm” were all words that he associated with her after only a moment’s passing. “Beauty,” too, if he were to judge based only on a study of her lips and eyes.
A nd he had no doubt that if he gave her an apology she would dismiss him and be on her way.
“I assure you, my lady, it was entirely your fault. A fter all, you were the one who crashed into me.”
Her chin lifted
. Behind her excessively gaudy mask, he imagined that her eyebrows did the same. “You believe I bumped into you deliberately?” A lex didn’t remove his hands from her shoulders. He knew she was also very aware of this fact, and yet neither of them gave voice to the impropriety. The crowd kept them close, gave him reason to hold on to her for balance for both their sakes. “Or perhaps I saw you veering toward me and made it inevitable that you would fall into my arms.”
She lifted her fingers to his wrists and freed herself from his touch. His arms fell to his sides. “My apologies for the collision, my lord. I will take the blame.” Her voice held the musical air of bells, softening the aristocratic syllables into something warm and inviting. It lingered like an echo in his mind, and A lex sifted through memories, intent to locate her. A ny hint of a recollection dissipated at the slow, intimate turn of her lips. “I also bear the responsibility of taking pleasure in such a meeting. If you see me again later in the evening, my lord, please—feel welcome to crash into me next.”
The short exchange ended, the rest of the ball attendees surging and pushing and edging past them. But whereas he’d turned away when the Lady Peacock left, A lex’s gaze remained on the woman with the ocean blue eyes for several minutes, following her path as she threaded her way through the other guests.
“She seemed nice, too,” his mother said behind him. A lex glanced over his shoulder. A wisp of humor, so faint others might not have seen it, hung at the corners of her mouth.
A lex smiled. “Possibly even nicer than the first.” He offered his arm again. “Now, let’s try to find Jo lest she offends half of London on only our first night. I’d expected it would take at least three.”
But as they gradually shuffled through the crowd of ill-conceived animal costumes, gods and goddesses, and a few random historical figures, his mind held fast to the vision of a slender blond beauty gowned in violet. A woman with ocean eyes, gracefully slim shoulders belying her strength, and a mask that offered the most overt display of wealth he’d ever seen.
The Lady in Diamonds.
Chapter 2
Willa Stratton blamed her presence at the Winstead masquerade on Mr. Andrew Woolstone. He was supposed to have been at his bachelor’s residence. He was supposed to have sold the information about the Madonna dye as soon as she offered. Instead, he was missing, and Willa didn’t have a clue as to his whereabouts. Yes, it was true he didn’t know who she was, nor had he expected for her to come to England to meet him, but those facts weren’t as important as the very distressing realization that Woolstone had disappeared.
Of course, her suspicions immediately focused on A lex Laurie, current owner of the competing dye maker Laurie & Sons. He was the son of her father’s former business partner and now her father’s rival. Three years ago he’d become her rival as they competed for the same investor. A nd although she hadn’t heard that he was interested in acquiring the dye for himself, if there was anyone who could ruin her plans quite so thoroughly, it was A lex Laurie.
Instead of celebrating her possession of the dye and informing her father that she had no intention of returning to A merica to marry Harold Eichel, she’d come to the masquerade as her father had always intended. He expected her visit to England to result in swaying A lex’s greatest investor to their side, but Willa had other plans. Or rather, she didn’t have plans any longer, now that Woolstone was missing; she had desperation.
She danced; she smiled; she laughed. She didn’t simper, of course—Willa Stratton never simpered—but she certainly engaged in more than her fair share of flirting with Mr. Lunsford, A lex Laurie’s largest investor and close friend. A fter a cotillion, they stood on the perimeter of the dancing, Willa pointing his attention to another couple in the quadrille closest to their position.
She knew her companion was Mr. Jack Lunsford, second son of the Viscount Carews, though they hadn’t shared their names. Even though he was masked in a red domino tonight, she could have drawn his every feature almost as clearly as a mirror’s reflection. She’d long since memorized the portrait she’d been given of him, the accounting of his habits and vagaries a tuneless litany in her head.
She didn’t care for any of it now; all she wished was to somehow charm Lunsford into telling her what A lex Laurie knew of the Madonna dye. A nd whether he had anything to do with Woolstone’s disappearance. The blackguard.
Of course, that was assuming that A lex was involved. If he wasn’t, then she must work even harder to find Woolstone before he did.
A lthough they danced and flirted back and forth just as expected, it didn’t seem to take long for Lunsford to realize that Willa didn’t engage him out of amorous to take long for Lunsford to realize that Willa didn’t engage him out of amorous interests. A nd Lunsford, she knew, was a man who cared greatly about amorous interests.
His suspicions were evident when he suggested they escape from the heat of the ballroom. “It’s a lovely evening, my lady. Shall we take a stroll on the terrace to find relief from the crush?” Though his gaze lingered on hers with all sincerity, there was a knowing tilt to his smile that convinced her that the question was but a test. There was also a slight mocking to his voice, though he covered it well with the tones of consideration.
Upon arriving at the Winstead masquerade she’d been desperate. Upon recognizing Lunsford she’d been determined. A nd now, unfortunately, after having crashed into the man in the black mask a little while ago, she was distracted. Her attraction to a complete stranger who was of no consequence at all couldn’t have come at a worse time.
Willa, who understood very well what occurred on terraces out in the moonlight
—from experience—refused. Her business flirtations didn’t extend into that distant a territory. Or rather, they had once, but she preferred to learn from her mistakes.
“No, thank you,” she said, another line of perspiration rolling between her shoulder blades. “I’m very comfortable.” She liked Mr. Lunsford. She enjoyed his banter and sly observations of the guests milling about them. But she knew enough of his love for women—all women—to wish to keep her lips from becoming yet another pair to pledge their surrender.
The other side of his mouth lifted in a curl, presenting the full extent of his smile
—a smile which would have made other women consider fainting, if only for a chance to be caught against his chest.
“I am not the sort of man to complain when a woman wishes to spend the entire evening with me,” he said. His smile grew wider, yet still she didn’t feel at all like fainting. “I enjoy spending time in your company, my lady. Yet I find myself suddenly questioning why you prefer mine.”
“I think you very handsome,” Willa said automatically, obviously, flirting with the ease of practice. She regretted it at once, nearly laughing when his eyes narrowed. Perhaps some level of enthusiasm was called for.
“Do you?”
“The most handsome man I’ve ever seen,” she added, fluttering her eyelashes.
It was the closest to simpering she’d ever come.
“A nd I suppose you’ve gathered all this from staring at my mask tonight?” Well, blast.
It was the lack of breathlessness, she decided. She needed to affect a loss of oxygen in the quality of her voice whenever he looked at her. Heave her breasts a little to distract his attention. She should feign something similar to the way she’d truly felt earlier in the evening in the company of the other man.
A s she’d done at least a dozen times since leaving him, Willa’s gaze swept through the throng of masks for a simple black domino tied to a dark head. There were many such men nearby, and none of them him. She knew this, for not one were many such men nearby, and none of them him. She knew this, for not one caused her breath to stutter in her lungs, or her heart to race as it had done before, when his brown eyes had captured hers and his strong, warm hands remained settled on her shoulders.
Foolish. Tonight she was here for the Madonna dye, nothing more.
W
illa tilted her head as if to consider Mr. Lunsford’s attributes. “Your chin is very fine,” she acknowledged.
“A h, but many men have fine chins,” he said. “You claimed me to be the most handsome man.”
She pressed her lips together. “Your nose is nice as well.”
“The one behind my mask?”
“It’s the only one you have, isn’t it?”
He chuckled, his gaze stretching over her shoulder. “A nd what of this approaching fellow?” he asked. “Shall you say that his nose is nice, too?” Willa turned to find him approaching, the man with the black domino and the dark hair. She shouldn’t have allowed her gaze to linger, should have returned her attention quickly to Lunsford. But the stranger succeeded in distracting her yet again, and as he neared, thoughts of everything else fled from her mind. Her palms perspired in her gloves. Her chest heaved. A nd she became breathless.
He halted before her, his gaze flicking to Mr. Lunsford. He nodded, then met her eyes. A nd the thought came, swiftly—and yes, foolishly—that perhaps if all else failed when it came to the dye, she might marry an aristocrat. A rich one who loved her, to be sure, one who didn’t need her father’s money, for Daniel Stratton had made it abundantly clear that she would have neither dowry nor inheritance unless she married Harold Eichel.
“I beg your pardon, sir,” the man addressed Mr. Lunsford, his gaze still locked on hers. He had brown eyes. Dark and rich—she could almost feel herself melting into their warm depths. “I believe she agreed the next dance to be mine.” To Willa, he lowered his voice and said, “You shouldn’t have turned around. I had every intention of accidentally running into you.”
She smiled, disarmed by the simple pleasure of hearing these words. They’d met before for only the space of a minute, and yet already they shared a secret jest. “Shall I turn again and wait to be knocked to the ground?” From behind her, Mr. Lunsford said, “I suppose I’ll simply stand here and pretend as if I’m also included in the conversation.”