by Maya Rodale
And it would be purely his pleasure.
Society would not welcome a dressmaker to the ranks of duchess. Being cut from the haute ton would damage his sister’s prospects. The roofs would still leak. His tenants would still hunger. And Adeline would probably hate being a duchess, especially if it meant giving up her craft.
“It’s almost as if you don’t actually wish to wed,” she pointed out.
“What I wish is to do my duty to those who depend on me, to honor my family’s legacy,” he said, surprised at how deeply the words resonated. For better or for worse, this is what the world asked of a man of his position and he wanted to provide. It was simply in his nature, who he was, to do the decent, gentlemanly thing. He would do it by wedding an heiress; there was no other way.
“If you’re truly intent on this, then the real one to catch is Miss Alice Van Allen.”
Adeline inclined her head to the right and discreetly pointed out a fair-haired young woman in a golden yellow gown that put him in mind of canaries. “Her family has been here since it was still just the colonies and had the foresight to buy up vast tracts of Manhattan real estate. I’ve heard their cottage in Newport is a sight to behold. It’s a mansion with all the modern conveniences. To say nothing of their palace on Fifth Avenue.”
“She is beautiful,” he said without emotion, as if it were a mere fact, which it was. Honey-hued hair piled atop her head, a creamy complexion showing off cheeks flushed pink with excitement at whatever was happening on the stage. She seemed like a ray of sunshine in the darkness of the opera house.
“As you can imagine, she has countless suitors. You might even have competition.”
There was no good reason for him not to at least make her acquaintance tonight; indeed, it seemed absurd that they had not already danced twice and been linked in the newspapers. No good reason, other than she wasn’t Adeline. And that was not a reason he could share.
The curtain dropped at the conclusion of the first act and by mutual agreement, Adeline and the duke retreated to the back of the box. He had said something about champagne and she had thoughts of a respite from everyone’s attentions. Heavy velvet curtains created a small, dimly lit and private alcove between their seats and back of the box.
Adeline was not accustomed to being so noticed. She may have turned heads on the sidewalks, but that hardly compared to the height of Manhattan society focusing their attentions upon her.
Or her dress.
She hoped they were focused on her dress.
The duke followed her to the back of the box. Between the darkness and close quarters, it was almost inevitable that he should misstep and accidentally place his shoe on the small train of her gown. When he did, she was inadvertently tugged back, back, back into his arms.
She gave a sharp exhale as she slammed against his chest. Again. His arms closed around her. Instinct, probably. Nothing more, she told herself.
But heaven help her, Adeline surrendered to the urge to take a deep inhalation and breathe him in. She couldn’t quite describe his scent—all sorts of good, clean smells—but it had an effect on her. Made her crave more of him, all of him.
“My apologies,” he murmured. “Are you all right?”
He was still holding her, clutching her to his chest. She did not mind. It was decidedly erotic feeling his breath steal across her neck as he murmured low words only she could hear. His hands were splayed across her belly, her waist.
“More importantly, how is my dress?”
“It doesn’t matter. You’ve already made your first impression.”
“So I could go home right now,” she teased. But she undercut her own words by sinking against him. Reveling, for just one second, the feeling of someone else supporting her weight. He stood still and strong and held her. With each passing second, the expectation, the desire that something more would happen increased.
Adeline waited for him to make a lighthearted quip, something to diffuse this explosion waiting to happen. Instead he simply whispered, “Stay.”
Undone. She was utterly undone. The simple sweetness of his request had something to do with it. That heat unfurling within her was not irrelevant either. Her body was aching for more of his touch.
The duke, ever the gentleman, obliged.
His hands skimmed higher, higher but not high enough.
Lower, lower but not low enough.
It was a caress, to please her. It was an exploration, as if he wanted to memorize her for later.
He might even be mussing up her dress and she did not care.
Because desire was a mighty feeling that had a way of drowning out all other concerns. Adeline reveled in it. She did not want to subdue her most intense craving, as that lady speaker had claimed. She was a woman of life and passion with a devilishly attractive man intent on pleasing her, only because they both wanted it. Needed it. Now.
She tilted her head back and turned her face up to his in a pose that said kiss me. He slowly lowered his lips to hers.
She’d be mad to deny this indulgence.
Just a kiss. Just this once.
Then the door to the box burst open. The duke jumped back at the intrusion and swore mightily under his breath, and Adeline was quite in agreement.
“Freddie. Marian.” The duke greeted the two interrupters. “How good of you to turn up to your own box at the opera . . . now. You have only missed the first half of the performance.”
Lord Hewitt looked from Kingston to Adeline and back again.
“Did I miss anything else?”
“No. You did not,” Kingston said tightly.
But I did! Adeline thought. I missed a kiss I’ve been hungering to have!
“I should think the best entertainment is right here,” Freddie said, and the woman on his arm giggled. She didn’t see her husband give Adeline a roguish smile. Like he knew. Like he thought she let just anyone muss up one of her dresses and almost claim her lips for a kiss. “Everyone is buzzing about the mystery woman you are attending with tonight.”
“Miss Black, this is my cousin, Lord Hewitt. He has a knack for showing up when he is unwanted. Freddie, this is Miss Black.”
“The seamstress!”
“The dressmaker,” she corrected.
“The one with the shop. I remember,” Freddie smiled. “It’s not every day the duke drags me into a ladies’ dress shop for a fitting. Or for any reason. I have heard all about you.”
“Have you really?” She glanced at the duke, intrigued by the idea that he might be discussing her. He smiled, but it did not reach his eyes.
“Somewhat,” Freddie said with a laugh. “Although, he’s a British male, which means he’s not very forthcoming with sharing his innermost thoughts and feelings, especially if they pertain to women. But I’m now putting the pieces together. You must be the seamstress who has captivated him completely—”
“Freddie.”
“—who has remade herself into a dressmaker and is now in the process of enchanting him again with that dress, which everyone is talking about.”
“I do love your dress,” Marian cooed. She glanced up at her husband with a pout. “Freddie, I want a dress just like hers.”
“I know just the place to get you a dozen, darling wife.” He patted her arm. “I’ll take you tomorrow.”
Adeline smiled. This whole evening was now so, so worth it. The duke, however, was scowling.
“Oh, look, there is Miss Pennypacker!” Marian said. “I must go say hello. Care to join me, Kingston? I know she’s been asking why you haven’t called upon her recently when you were so attentive before.”
“I should stay with Miss Black.”
“All right.” She giggled. “Ta-ta.”
“So what’s your story?” Freddie asked, once his wife had gone. He leaned against the closed door and gave Adeline a wolfish smile, like he was the lord’s gift to womankind. A good number of women had probably not disabused him of the notion: like the duke, Lord Hewitt was handsom
e in a dark and dashing way. He spoke with a cultured and attractive English accent. Plus, he had a title.
“You must provide everyone with some explanation. You obviously cannot tell the truth,” Lord Hewitt said.
“Much as I hate to admit it, Freddie is right,” Kingston said. “We do need a story.”
He stepped toward their seats in the front of the box and Adeline and Lord Hewitt followed. In moving from here to there, Lord Hewitt’s hand brushed against hers. An accident, certainly. Lord Hewitt was married. Rachel had mentioned that the duke’s friend was “handsy” when he’d been in the shop with the duke, but Adeline hadn’t given it much consideration—she had too many other matters on her mind. She thought of it now, though.
“So, Miss Black, what shall we tell everyone?” What will explain what a duke is doing at the opera with a woman like you when he is in the throes of heiress hunting?”
“A woman like me?”
She glanced at Kingston and his expression was dark. She glanced back at Lord Hewitt. Surely he did not mean it the way she feared he did. But his gaze tracked from her lips to her breasts to lower still. Something about the way his attention lingered on her felt different from when Kingston took a long, deep look at her.
Perhaps it was because Lord Freddie had a wife.
Perhaps it was because she did not want his attentions.
“Not exactly duchess material,” Lord Hewitt answered. Adeline glanced at the duke and saw that he, too, possessed the same tight, polite smile as her.
“The story should be something that confirms my respectability,” she said pointedly. “The sort of women I wish to attract as clients won’t frequent dressmakers who are not respectable. I am already taking a risk in being seen with the duke.”
“We’ll tell everyone that she’s the widow of a school friend,” Kingston declared. “Someone we went to Eton or Oxford with.”
“And you, ever the noble gentleman, wish to ensure that she is faring well, not too lonely in this big city, that sort of thing,” Lord Hewitt added. He turned to Adeline. “As a widow, you’ll have more freedom.”
She smiled blandly.
“As a widow, I will take pains to remain respectable.”
It was a sound explanation. Many dressmakers established their businesses after the loss of a husband forced them to find their own employment. Others merely pretended to be widows as protection.
“I shall bring Marian to the shop tomorrow. The missus does love to shop.” He sighed in the manner of long-suffering husbands everywhere, but Adeline paid him no mind. Dressing Lady Hewitt would be a stunning achievement, but unfortunately Adeline had a feeling there would be a catch.
Chapter Fourteen
The Duke of Kingston was seen attending the Metropolitan Opera House with a woman unknown to polite society and all anyone can talk about is that her gorgeous evening gown had pockets!
—The New York World
The House of Adeline
The last person Adeline expected to see barging into her shop the next morning was Madame Chalfont, but there she was, in a huff and shaking a newspaper clipping. She paused—briefly—to survey the shop, taking in the chandeliers and extravagant gowns on display and she smiled. A wry, bitter, I knew it kind of smile.
“Good morning, Madame Chalfont. How good of you to stop by.”
Adeline stepped from behind the counter. Her former employer marched forward until she stood directly in front of her, nose to nose. Last night she had felt glamorous and adored; now she felt like a young, recalcitrant girl about to get in trouble.
Big trouble.
“I knew it was you the minute I read about the pockets,” Madame said, thrusting the newspaper clipping at Adeline. She didn’t even bother with her feigned French accent, and her Midwestern voice rang true. “Just as I knew he wasn’t just a friend or whatever nonsense you tried to tell me the day I fired you. I knew you were up to something . . . something nefariously wanton.”
“I’m sure I don’t know what you are speaking about.” Adeline took a step back.
“A night at the opera with a duke?” Madame laughed. “For a girl of your position, it can only mean one thing. It doesn’t flatter you.”
Adeline’s cheeks reddened. Yes, they had concocted that story to protect her reputation, but it wouldn’t wash with anyone who actually knew her. Like Madame.
“I assure you, it’s not what you think.”
“Don’t play the fool with me. I know you, Adeline. I took a chance on you—a poor girl from the tenements—when no one else would and when you had no one else in the world. I trained you myself, spending hours teaching you to sew, cut, and fit. And what have you done? Set up your own little shop. You stole my two other best girls, Rose and Rachel. Ungrateful girl.” She threw up her hands in outrage. “Unforgivable!”
“Might I remind you that you fired me, Madame.”
“Because you were walking the streets with a bachelor in broad daylight when anyone could have seen you!” It was the truth and yet not the truth all at once; Madame made it sound like she committed the worst sin imaginable.
“I’ll thank you not to make such aspersions on my character,” Adeline said icily, in an effort to adopt the duke’s imperious tone. But it had no effect on Madame.
“Then don’t act in such a way as to invite them. I see I failed to impress upon you the importance of a dressmaker’s impeccable reputation. Not for lack of trying, though.”
Adeline didn’t argue. She’d heard Madame’s lectures before and knew she was right, but Adeline couldn’t get past how unfair it was that people thought women doing honest work outside the home were up to no good. The only defense was to be perfectly virtuous and give no one cause to think otherwise.
But how was she to succeed if she stayed cooped up in her shop and never showed off her dresses? And the truth was, Adeline was perfectly virtuous. And that hadn’t protected her at all.
Madame turned and stalked around the room, making sharp note of every detail, from the plush crimson carpet to the way the light reflected off the cut-crystal chandeliers. To the way everything was new, fresh and full of promise, whereas Madame’s shop was . . . well established. When she finished her perusal, she turned to Adeline, a jealous, seething fury in her eyes.
“You took my customers, too. You took Miss Burnett. Others followed when they heard she’d found a new dressmaker.”
They must be Ladies of Liberty, Adeline thought, for the women of that secret club were her first customers.
“I’m sorry for that.” It was easier and kinder to apologize than to point out that if Madame had just listened to her and trusted her about both the pockets and the duke, Adeline would be in her employ right now and making all those customers happy indeed.
“The facts of the matter are this, dear girl. Your business success is a threat to mine,” Madame Chalfont said in a voice laced with menace. “And as long as you associate with that duke, giving rise to questions about your morals, then your business is a threat to all dressmakers.”
Adeline knew a warning when she heard one and a grand exit when she saw one. She also knew that Madame was right: further entanglement with the duke would be dangerous to her business, to say nothing of her heart.
Later
Adeline was in something of a state after Madame Chalfont’s visit when Lord Hewitt came to call with his wife a short while later. Her feelings were mixed upon seeing them. On one hand, Lady Hewitt was considered a tastemaker among the Four Hundred. To dress her would be a coup and would help assure her success as other women strove to emulate her style.
But Lord Hewitt had given her an uneasy feeling at the opera with his lingering gazes and insinuations. Adeline told herself that she was probably just reading too much into the situation. It seemed like the height of self-flattery to assume that he had designs upon her person, a lowly orphan dressmaker.
To have this fashionable and attractive young couple in her shop was another lucky opportu
nity that she should seize without a second thought. One did not come this far—with so many dear people relying on her success—to suddenly develop qualms or worries. No, she needed every customer she could get. Especially if Madame Chalfont was determined to run her out of business.
Adeline greeted them both with a warm smile.
“Good afternoon, Lord Hewitt. Lady Hewitt. How lovely to see you both again. Welcome to the House of Adeline.”
“Hello again, Mrs. Black,” Lady Marian said, easily adopting the Mrs. that Freddie had added to her name for her protection. “I so loved the dress you wore last night that I’ve decided I must have a few made for myself. Especially with pockets. I’m forever losing my things,” she said with a giggle. Her husband winced.
“Then we shall make you some beautiful gowns with pockets. You will look stunning—and you won’t lose anything.”
“How perfect.” She giggled.
“Rose will help you get ready for the fitting.” Rose emerged and guided Lady Hewitt to the fitting room in preparation for a conversation about the gowns she liked and the fabrics she preferred, and to have her measurements taken.
Rose and Adeline exchanged excited looks at having such a fashionable and chatty society darling frequenting their shop. She and Rachel had left very secure and decent positions to join her in this mad and risky venture, a fact that was never far from Adeline’s mind, especially on days when business was slow.
Which was, until today, most days.
But now Adeline felt hope rise in her chest. Perhaps this scheme with the duke would work. Perhaps she would be a successful dressmaker after all. Perhaps all her hard work and mad risks would pay off. Perhaps she could live the dream. Perhaps she wouldn’t change the world but perhaps she could transform her own.
Smiling she turned back to the shop and to Lord Hewitt, who had not yet taken his leave. She didn’t think her establishment was the sort where a gentleman would want to linger, but . . .
. . . Oh, very well then. Apparently it was. Lord Hewitt was leaning against the counter now, effectively entrapping her where she stood.