by Laura Martin
‘Are you sure you’re just not too embarrassed to take me as your guest to Almack’s?’ Ben asked, grinning at her.
‘I think you’d actually go down well there,’ Francesca replied. ‘The patronesses seem to favour a good-looking man, even if his pedigree isn’t quite as noble as some. It’s me they have an issue with.’
They crossed the street and hurried towards the Assembly Rooms, Francesca’s pace quickening further as she realised she couldn’t feel her toes.
At the door she produced her ticket and felt the familiar soaring of her mood as they stepped inside and heard the first jaunty notes of the quartet who would provide the music for the evening’s dancing.
‘First drinks are served and there is the chance to socialise a little, and then the dancing will start in half an hour.’
They walked arm in arm through the entrance hall and into the ballroom proper. Around the perimeter were a few groups of people, but from past experience Francesca knew in this early part of the evening most of the guests would be gathered around the card tables in the third room.
She nodded a greeting to a few of the regular attendees, men she’d danced with and women she’d talked with. All in all most were friendly and it was certainly a more welcoming atmosphere than at Almack’s.
‘Who do you normally dance with?’ Ben asked, eyeing the gentlemen who were dotted around the room.
Anyone who asks, Francesca thought, but didn’t say. When you loved to dance as much as she did you weren’t overly picky about partners.
‘Just like a society ball, really you should wait to be introduced before a man asks you to dance,’ Francesca said, but in fact the rules were a little looser here. She’d danced with plenty of men who she’d never met before. If her mother knew she’d be scandalised, as would the rest of society, but for Francesca the risk was worth it.
‘Correct me if I’m wrong, but you take a big risk to come here. If anyone found out, wouldn’t you be the subject of scandal and speculation?’
‘Yes.’
‘But you do it anyway.’
‘I love to dance.’
If she was honest there was more to it than that. An unconscious desire to have a little freedom in her choices, to be the one to decide where she went and when. To be able to choose whether to accept or refuse a dance partner herself without always having to think whether her actions might damage the family in some way. For so long she’d shouldered responsibility for her father’s mistakes, but here she didn’t have to worry about any of that.
And the risk that she might get caught and exposed as a shameless widow who socialised below her class, that just made it all the more appealing.
Ben chuckled. ‘You always did like taking risks, Frannie,’ he said.
When they’d run around as children she’d never had a problem with taking risks, with her and Ben as bad as each other, spurring the other on to climb higher, jump further, be that little bit more mischievous. Things had been different as she’d grown up. Her mother had withdrawn more and more, leaving the responsibility of running the household and raising her younger sister to Francesca. And then her father had revealed he’d lost all the family money and it had been down to Francesca to marry well to try to save them. It hadn’t worked out, with Lord Somersham almost as skilled at losing money as her father, but she’d done her bit all the same.
‘Shall we get a drink?’ Francesca asked.
He let her lead him to the room where refreshments were served and they both took a glass of the brightly coloured punch that was offered. Ben took one sip and handed it back to the young woman who’d served it and after tasting the artificial sweetness Francesca did the same. With replacement glasses of lemonade in their hands they wandered around the room, waiting for the dancing.
‘Would you like a game of cards while we wait?’ Ben asked.
‘No,’ she said a little too vehemently, causing Ben to look at her with a raised eyebrow. ‘No, thank you,’ she said more calmly, ‘But please feel free to play if you wish.’
Her heart sank a little when she thought he might. Both her father and late husband were unlucky and unskilled when it came to cards, but more importantly they both seemed to think they were much better than they were. It was just another example of their poor judgement, and Francesca had spent many a painful evening watching an increasingly desperate Lord Somersham bet money they did not have in an attempt to claw back some of what he’d lost already.
‘When I have you for company?’ he asked. ‘A man would be a fool to leave you for a game of cards.’
‘Does that charm come naturally or do you work to say what a lady wants to hear?’ she asked.
‘Completely natural,’ he said with the smile that made her heart flip inside her chest. ‘Never trust a man who has to work to give a lady a compliment.’
‘I’d wager you’ve left a string of broken hearts behind you,’ Francesca murmured.
‘A gentleman never breaks a lady’s heart,’ he said, but from the slight shift of his eyes she knew it was true. He probably told himself he only got involved with women who understood the short-lived nature of any affair they would share together, but she would wager her only remaining set of pearls that no matter how hard they tried the women always fell in love with him.
‘Only cherishes it?’ Francesca asked. From his expression she could see he had never let anyone get close, let alone take responsibility for their happiness. She felt a pang of sadness. As a boy, Ben had been warm and loving, with genuine affection for his friends and family. He deserved more than passing flings, he deserved true love after all he had suffered.
‘When a lady entrusts me with her heart I will let you know,’ he said quietly and Francesca felt her pulse quicken and her skin flush.
‘I hear the music,’ Francesca said, glad for the distraction. ‘Shall we dance?’
Obligingly he gave her his arm, leading her back to the main room where couples were beginning to assemble.
‘How do you know how to dance?’ Francesca asked.
‘When I was a young boy I had an irritating young girl who would follow me around,’ he said, keeping a completely straight face. ‘She loved to dance and to oblige her I learned the steps to one or two of the most common dances. I merely had to refresh my memory before returning to London.’
‘You used to follow me,’ she murmured, ‘not the other way around.’
‘I remember it rather differently.’
For a moment everything was easy between them and Francesca found herself smiling a true smile for the first time in a very long while. Then the dance began and she was swept away in a flurry of steps and laughter.
Chapter Eight
As he watched her laughing and smiling Ben felt an unfamiliar tightening in his chest. It had pained him to see Francesca looking so sad at the masquerade ball and he wanted to banish for ever that despair from her eyes.
He’d only been momentarily surprised at her choice of where to take him this evening. She’d always loved to dance, but more than that Francesca had always been a bit of a rebel. Over the years she might have suppressed that part of her, but he wasn’t surprised to find she still did a few of the things she shouldn’t, even if it was carefully hidden from the people who might judge her.
‘The mauves and greys have gone,’ he murmured in her ear as they joined hands at the end of a particularly energetic dance.
‘Just for tonight.’ She grimaced. ‘Just while no one of significance can see me and start to gossip.’
‘Blue suits you,’ he said, admiring the contrast of her almost-black hair with the deep blue of the evening gown she was wearing.
‘Is that a compliment, Mr Crawford?’ Francesca asked.
He leaned in closer, ‘Although I much prefer you in white.’ He waited until she remembered the incident earlier where she’d stripped down to
her white cotton chemise to get into his bed and watched her cheeks colour.
‘A gentleman would never mention that ever again,’ she said primly.
‘I’m no gentleman, Frannie, and you’d do well to remember that.’
Her eyes widened a little before narrowing almost completely.
‘You’re toying with me,’ she said. ‘No one toys with me.’
‘They should. It’s great fun.’
‘Fun isn’t expected for a widow.’
‘Even a widow who disliked her husband?’
‘Be quiet,’ Francesca hissed and Ben could see it took all her self-restraint not to punch him on the arm as she had when he’d teased her when they were children.
He was actually enjoying himself. Here in a stuffy Assembly Rooms, mixing with the snobby upper-middle classes with the woman whose father had ruined his childhood on his arm, he was enjoying himself.
‘Care for some air?’ he asked.
‘Only if you promise to behave yourself.’
‘You wouldn’t like me if I did.’
She mumbled something under her breath, but allowed him to escort her through the now-crowded room to the terrace at the back of the Assembly Rooms. It was cold outside and Ben could see his breath on the air, but it was a welcome change from the heat of the room. He watched as Francesca leaned elegantly against the stone balustrade that separated the terrace from a small courtyard a few steps below. Without thinking he pushed himself up on to the balustrade, sitting on the cool stone, his feet still touching the ground.
‘Get down,’ Francesca hissed.
‘Why?’
‘You’re not supposed to sit up there.’
‘Who says?’
She spluttered, then regained control of herself. ‘I do.’
He grinned. ‘Don’t pretend you don’t wish you could be up here with me, sitting comfortably and resting your weary feet.’
Opening her mouth to deny it, just to be perverse, Francesca thought better of uttering the lie and pressed her lips together again.
‘If you get me thrown out, I won’t be very happy,’ she said.
‘Surely once you’re married again, once you’re Lady Huntley, they won’t be able to deny you a voucher for Almack’s,’ Ben said.
She shrugged and he could tell it was a subject she didn’t want to discuss, but he pushed on nevertheless.
‘Lord Huntley is an earl, isn’t he? So you will be a countess?’
‘Can we talk of other things?’ she asked, turning so her back was against the balustrade and she was looking back inside the Assembly Rooms. ‘Or, better still, dance some more.’
‘In a minute. I want to know why you’re even considering marrying a man like Huntley.’
‘You say it like I have a choice.’
Ben knew there were many reasons people got married—for money, connections, even love—but he was intrigued to know why Francesca was allowing herself to be trapped into another unhappy marriage.
‘Don’t you? You’re a widow, a woman, not a scared young girl who has to do her father’s bidding.’
‘I might be a widow, but I have no independence. Lord Somersham left me no provision in his will. He was completely broke. The title and lands have gone to his second cousin, but there was no money to go with it.’
‘So you still rely on your father to support you?’
She nodded.
‘And that’s why you have to marry whomever he chooses?’
‘No.’ This was said vehemently and Ben wondered whether to push her further.
‘Why then?’ he said. ‘Make me understand.’
‘My father owes a lot of money,’ Francesca said quietly.
From the rumours Ben had heard that was an understatement. Lord Pottersdown had more debt than all the inhabitants of a debtors’ prison and then some.
‘Lord Huntley has offered to clear the worst of the debts,’ she said, ‘and provide a dowry for my sister.’
Ben screwed up his face as he searched for a name. The little girl had been no more than an infant when he’d been sentenced to be transported and he’d only ever seen her from a distance with the nursemaids or nanny.
‘Felicity,’ he said eventually.
‘Yes. She’s twenty and the sweetest, most wonderful young woman.’
‘With no dowry.’
It seemed ridiculous to him, this business of a dowry, but he knew in society it was one of the most important factors when agreeing on a match between two people.
‘No one has offered for her,’ Francesca said sadly. ‘Or at least no one in the least bit acceptable. They don’t want to tie themselves to our family.’
‘And you feel like this is all your responsibility? To keep a roof over your parents’ heads, to provide a dowry for your sister?’
‘Of course it is. They’re my family.’
‘You deserve to be unhappy so they can live better lives?’
‘Someone has to make that sacrifice,’ Francesca said and it was clear from her tone that it wasn’t going to be either of her parents. She was the responsible one, the one caring about the happiness and survival of everyone else but herself.
Ben pushed himself down from the wall and waited for Francesca to turn to him. She looked radiant even with the frown on her face. In the moonlight her skin was pale and perfect, contrasting beautifully with her full, rosy lips. He wanted to see her smile again, even though he felt an almost uncontrollable desire when she did. As she turned towards him her arm brushed against his and he knew from her expression that she felt the same frisson of excitement as he did every time their bodies touched. He wondered for a moment what it would be like to have her in his bed and with absolute certainty he knew it would be incredible. Part of him regretted refusing Francesca earlier that afternoon, but he knew it was only a matter of time before they would fall into each other’s arms.
‘Couldn’t your sister marry Lord Huntley?’ he asked, trying to distract himself from the spot just above her collarbone where he could see her pulse ever so faintly. It was tempting to place his lips there, to taste the sweetness of her skin, but he had to remember they were in a public place.
‘No,’ she said vehemently. ‘That is not an option.’
He waited for her to elaborate.
Sighing, Francesca continued, ‘He has a reputation—there are rumours.’
‘What sort of rumours?’
‘He was married before and his wife seemed to have rather a lot of accidents.’
‘He beat her?’
Francesca shrugged, ‘As I say, there are rumours, but who really knows what goes on behind closed doors?’
‘Frannie, are you telling me you wouldn’t let your sister marry this man, but you’re willing to risk a lifetime of beating and abuse?’
She shrugged, but wouldn’t meet his eye.
Ben let out a disgusted sigh. It wasn’t his place to care, he knew that, but some part of him wanted to wrap her up in his arms and protect the girl he’d once loved.
‘Let’s forget this,’ Francesca said, forcing a smile on her face. ‘Let’s dance.’
Ben could tell by the set expression on her face there was no reasoning with Francesca now so he offered her his arm. He shouldn’t interfere; she was perfectly capable of making her own mistakes, but the thought of her spending the rest of her life with a man like Lord Huntley made him feel nauseous.
* * *
They stepped back into the Assembly Rooms, the temperature inside at least twenty degrees warmer than the freezing air outside. Francesca just wanted to dance, she didn’t want to think about the way her life was going to be in just a few short months, she didn’t want to think about the rumours that circulated detailing Lord Huntley’s first wife’s little accidents or the possessive way her future husband already looked at h
er. When she danced, especially when she danced in Ben’s arms, she could forget all these worries and get lost in the music.
Turning to suggest they ready themselves for the next dance, Francesca stiffened, her whole body seizing up with panic. Without any explanation to Ben she let go of his arm and rushed behind a pillar, flattening her back against the cool plaster.
‘I thought you wanted to dance?’ Ben said casually, regarding her with a frown.
‘Lord Huntley,’ she hissed. ‘He’s here.’
There was no reason for the man who was determined to become her future husband to attend DeFevrett’s—on the contrary, it should be a place a man of his class and status vigorously avoided. The only possible reason he could have for coming here was her. Someone must have seen her, someone must have told him of her less-than-acceptable behaviour, and here he was, seeking her out. Whether to reprimand her or end his association with her she wasn’t sure, but she didn’t want to wait around to find out.
‘Looking for you?’ Ben asked as he casually took a step back and cast his eyes around the room. ‘So he is. He’s standing by the entrance looking like someone has stolen his favourite toy.’
‘Someone has,’ Francesca muttered. ‘I need to get out of here.’
‘There’s no way to sneak past. We’ll have to go out through the back.’
For a moment the burden of getting out of this impossible situation didn’t seem quite so heavy as she realised Ben was right there beside her.
‘Move slowly, but keep your head down,’ he instructed her, ‘You don’t want to draw attention to yourself.’
Doing as he commanded, they strolled back the way they had come, Francesca trying to keep the panic she was feeling from overcoming her and making her run, which she knew would be counter-productive. Once back out on the small terrace they paused and Ben took a moment to glance over her shoulder into the ballroom they’d just left.
‘He’s coming this way,’ he murmured, no hint of panic or stress in his voice. Either he was very good at controlling his emotions or he felt the stakes weren’t that high.