Seducing Mr. Knightly

by Maya Rodale

  Chapter 6

  The London Coffeehouse: Meeting Place of “Gentlemen”

  FASHIONABLE INTELLIGENCE BY A LADY OF DISTINCTION

  The London Weekly’s own Mr. Knightly was seen waltzing with Lady Lydia Marsden, whose talents and elegance in the waltz surpass all others. We can only wonder what they discussed; perhaps he has uncovered the secret to her missing season?

  The London Weekly, as edited by D. Knightly

  GALLOWAY’S coffeehouse was full of men, high- and lowborn alike, sipping coffee and delving into the assortment of periodicals offered. Everything from literary publications to periodicals devoted to sport. The air was full of men’s conversations both serious and bawdy, cigar smoke, the heavy fragrance of coffee, and the shuffling of pages.

  Knightly was in the habit of meeting at Galloway’s every Saturday, joined by Peter Drummond, a playwright and theater owner—who had been his comrade in trouble since Cambridge—and their scoundrel of a friend, Julian Gage, a renowned stage actor who was better known for his disastrous romantic entanglements than the quality of his acting.

  After all, it’s not like White’s would admit the likes of them as members. They hadn’t the birth, status, wealth, or connections required for access to that exclusive enclave. Galloway’s was their club instead.

  “Women never bloody listen to me,” Drummond muttered into his newspaper. He grasped a handful of his salt and pepper hair in utter vexation. “I vow, I could tell a lass to get out of a sinking boat and she’d protest.”

  “Is that in reference to something specific or the general lament that women don’t take the advice of a man who makes up stories for a living?” Knightly asked casually. A copy of Cobott’s Weekly Register lay before him.

  “It’s playwriting. And your mother would have your head to hear you dismiss the theater like that. If you must know, I am grumbling about your Dear Annabelle,” Drummond answered. He punctuated this with a frustrated shake of the newspaper.

  Knightly coolly lifted one brow. The conversation had suddenly turned toward the unexpected and possibly unfathomable.

  “She took my advice!” Julian grinned triumphantly in spite of Drummond’s vicious glare.

  Knightly frowned at his friends. Both usually read the theater reviews, gossip column, and naught much else. Julian, in particular, usually read only articles that were about him.

  They certainly never read the advice column in the back, next to the advertisements for hats, corsets, and miracle cures of all kinds. It was women’s stuff, presided over by the Dear Annabelle column in which Miss Swift, who was sweetness and innocence personified, doled out advice to the lovelorn, socially unsure, etc, etc. He tried to recall her last column and why she would be in search of advice, especially from these idiots.

  “Oi!” Drummond shouted when Knightly snatched the paper from his hands. He found her column on page seventeen and began to read with annoyance (because something in his paper had escaped his notice) and intrigue (because it was Annabelle. What could she be writing about?):

  DEAR ANNABELLE

  This author was humbled and heart-warmed by the outpouring of advice from her loyal readers in response to last week’s solicitation for desperately needed advice on how I might attract a particular man’s attention.

  Never has this author received so many letters! One reader wrote that I ought to steal into the gentleman’s bed at the midnight hour as a wicked surprise. I fear that is too bold, but we shall see what desperate acts I am driven to. Nancy suggested perfume “delicately applied to my décolletage” and a gentleman named Peregrine offered to compose love sonnets that I might dramatically recite, thus captivating the object of my affections with his verse. Dozens of letters advised me to lower the bodices on my gowns. My friends greatly encouraged this endeavor and I found myself at the modiste before I knew it.

  Readers, I know not if it was the dress itself, the ample display of my person, or the confidence I possessed from such fine garments, but I daresay this worked! While it failed to attract the object of my affections (that nodcock!), I certainly basked in the attentions of other charming gentlemen. This week I shall alter the rest of my wardrobe accordingly. But as I shall settle for nothing less than true love, I suspect I require more schemes to enact. Your suggestions are welcome and will be put to the test!

  Miss Swift requesting love advice from all of London?

  This was not the Annabelle he knew. This was not the work of a shy girl who spoke softly, if at all. The girl who usually wore her hair in a bun and dresses in the style best described as Spinster Auntie. The girl who had rambled quite charmingly when they bumped into each other the other night and who hadn’t once made him think of her as a Spinster Auntie during that darkened interlude.

  Quite the contrary. It seemed Annabelle possessed the sort of luscious curves best kept for sin. It wasn’t an altogether unpleasant discovery, even though nothing would come of it.

  He had thought there was something different about her, something more. His suspicions were confirmed. It seemed a lot of things were different with Annabelle all of a sudden.

  She usually advised the masses on proper manners, or offered practical household tips, or consulted, gently, on the love lives of readers.

  Annabelle did not use words like “nodcock.”

  Thus it was the damnedest thing to read this column from a girl, so sweet and fair, publicly pursuing a man with advice from strangers. Annabelle didn’t know any of these people she was courting information from!

  They could be like . . .

  Drummond and Gage. Drummond, who had three broken engagements in his past, and Gage, who had a tempestuous relationship with Jocelyn Kemble, the famous actress, and who never refused female company when offered. As a popular actor, it was offered to him. Often.

  Heaven help them all, Annabelle especially.

  “I thought she ought to send him an anonymous letter. Perfumed. Romantic like,” Drummond explained. “There is nothing like the power of the written word to seduce the mind, and the heart will follow.”

  Knightly snorted. What romantic rubbish.

  “That’s pathetic. My advice was better, which was why she followed it,” Gage replied arrogantly with a smug smile.

  “Lower her bodice?” Drummond scoffed. “Like that’s original.”

  “Annabelle doesn’t want original, she wants what works,” Gage said, and Knightly frowned at this lout referring to one of his Writing Girls so intimately. Gage didn’t notice and barreled on. “Since time immemorial, women have flaunted their figures and men have been slaves to their baser natures.”

  Case in point, Knightly thought. Idiots.

  And yet . . .

  Was that what was different about Annabelle at the ball? He’d seen her chatting with the Writing Girls, and then waltzing with some young buck. He’d connected intimately with her person for just a second, but it had been enough to discover she had a figure for sin.

  But he had not really noticed her lowered bodice. Why? Was he ill? No, there was nothing the matter with him. He just wasn’t in the habit of looking at his female employees In That Way. From the start he had treated his female writers the same as the men; it was just easier.

  Should he have noticed?

  He should have noticed. If it concerned his business then the answer was yes.

  This concerned his business. Thus, he would make a point to look when he saw her next. For the sake of his business. No other reason, such as a dawning intrigue.

  “We don’t even know what Annabelle looks like,” Drummond mused, sipping from a steamy mug of coffee. “For some women, amply displaying their bosoms is ill advised.”

  “That’s true. If they’re too small. Or too old,” Gage concurred, pulling a face.

  “One does wonder about Dear Annabelle. We know nothing about her, except that she hasn�
�t been able to get the attentions of some bloke for years.” Drummond continued his dissection of Annabelle’s situation with the same seriousness with which he examined Hamlet.

  “She could be a grandmother,” Gage whispered, aghast. Color drained from his face. “I might have just written a letter to someone’s grandmother telling her to show off her you know whats.”

  “Oh for God’s sake,” Knightly cut in. “Annabelle is young and pretty.”

  “Why hasn’t this nodcock noticed her, then?” Gage challenged.

  “Damned if I know,” Knightly said with a shrug. He had no idea who this bloke was and nor did he care, so long as Annabelle’s quest sold issues of the paper. It seemed like it was well poised to do so if these corkbrains were so fascinated with it. “She’s very quiet.”

  “Young. Pretty. Quiet. I think I’m in love,” Drummond said dreamily.

  “You don’t even know her,” Knightly said, bringing a dose of much-needed logic to the conversation. One did not fall in love with strangers. Although, his father had fallen in love with his mother at first sight. But that was rare. And neither Drummond or Gage had even seen Annabelle.

  “I’ve heard enough. My next suggestion to her will be to forget that nodcock and marry me,” Drummond said with a grin.

  Chapter 7

  The Dangers of Sultry Gazes

  FASHIONABLE INTELLIGENCE BY A LADY OF DISTINCTION

  There are two questions burning on the lips of every Londoner: Who is the Nodcock and what will Dear Annabelle do next?

  The London Weekly

  Offices of The London Weekly

  ANNABELLE’S heart pounded. Any second now Knightly would stroll through that door and the butterflies in her belly would take flight.

  He would flash them all a devilish grin, and she couldn’t help but imagine him grinning at her like that, just before he kissed her under a starry, moonlit sky. Without fail, a blush would suffuse her cheeks.

  Then Knightly would say “Ladies first” and she would sigh, a world of longing, desire, and frustration contained in that little exhalation.

  This routine occurred like clockwork every Wednesday afternoon at precisely two o’clock when Knightly met with the writers of The London Weekly.

  But this week things would be different. Of that, she was certain. She had a plan.

  “Annabelle, I adored your column this week, and it is the topic du jour in all the drawing rooms,” Julianna said as she sashayed into the room and took a seat next to Annabelle, who had arrived early.

  Previously, her reason for arriving a good quarter of an hour prior to everyone else had to do with a terror of arriving late, interrupting everyone and finding herself the center of unwanted attention. But lately she thought not of that potential embarrassment, but the potential magic that might arise should she find herself with Knightly, alone.

  Sophie and Eliza followed right behind Julianna and took their seats. The rest of the writers began to file in, talking amongst themselves.

  “Lord Marsden liked it as well,” Annabelle said, and could not hide her smile.

  “He’s such a charming rake,” Sophie said, smiling. “Almost too charming.”

  “That charming and attentive rake that actually reads my column,” Annabelle corrected gleefully. “He sent flowers on Saturday afternoon because he was so pleased I had obliged him by using the term ‘nodcock’ in my column. Can you believe I used such a word? I have shocked myself.”

  “You might be wicked after all,” Julianna replied.

  “Let’s not get ahead of ourselves,” Annabelle cautioned.

  “And let’s not forget that the gentleman sent you flowers!” Eliza said.

  “Pink roses. Blanche and her awful friend Mrs. Underwood couldn’t let that pass without an array of snide comments. She couldn’t fathom they were for me, and then she wondered what sort of shenanigans I had engaged in to oblige a man to send these to me, and then she said they would look very fine in Fleur’s bedroom.”

  “Fleur is such a whimsical name. I’m quite surprised by it . . .” Sophie said.

  “Indeed, coming from my brother and his wife,” Annabelle said. “They suffer terribly from a lack of imagination. Fleur’s fancy name is the one thing that gives me hope. I later stole them out of Fleur’s bedroom and put them in mine. I’m certain I’ll find them in Blanche’s chamber when I return.”

  “But you have received flowers. From a gentleman. A very eligible and marriageable one,” Julianna said, smiling.

  Annabelle beamed. She had also spent hours with a needle and thread to lower the bodices on her dreary old gowns. When Blanche saw what she was doing, she asked why Annabelle wished to look like a dockside harpy. Because a dockside harpy can attract the attentions of men. So I can marry and move out of this suffocating household.

  If only Blanche knew about her silky underthings and her phenomenal corset—which she wore now, of course, for confidence, along with the pretty blue day dress she’d ordered on that wonderful life-altering trip to the modiste. Sophie had been so very right about the dresses and the underthings, although Annabelle knew she was not yet wicked enough to mention her unmentionables in mixed company.

  Ever since that fateful day, she had entertained that wicked thought, “Why me,” and life in the Swift household had become more stifling. And after she wore that silk dress, waltzed with a marquis, received a bouquet of pink roses from an eligible gentleman, and had an actual conversation with Knightly, she started to think less about Old Annabelle who did Blanche’s bidding and more about New Annabelle who might do anything.

  “But what does this mean for you know who?” Eliza asked in a conspiratorial whisper.

  “Oh, I have more tricks up my sleeve, thanks to my readers,” Annabelle replied in a hushed voice. As per the instructions of “A Courtesan in Mayfair,” she had spent hours before the looking glass, as she practiced lifting and lowering her lashes and gazing smolderingly.

  Today, Annabelle was armed and ready in a fetching new dress with a remarkably low bodice and sultry glances for her beloved Mr. Knightly.

  The clock struck two. First the pounding heart. Next, the butterflies. And then, the sigh.

  KNIGHTLY strolled into the room and began the meeting as he’d begun every other one, with a grin and a cheeky nod to the Writing Girls.

  His gaze was immediately drawn to Annabelle. To be exact, specific parts of Annabelle. The conversation in the coffeehouse came galloping back to mind. Lowered bodices. Advice from idiots. Young. Pretty. Quiet. Significantly lowered bodices that revealed . . . a handful. A mouthful. A woman.

  He cleared his throat.

  “Ladies first,” he said, hoping not to sound . . . distracted.

  Julianna launched into the ton’s latest scandal and Knightly didn’t listen to a word of it. His gaze kept shifting one seat to her left, to Annabelle. When he managed to wrench his focus away from her very low bodice and up, he saw a dreamy expression on her face. Her blue eyes were focused on something far off and far away. Her full pink lips were curved into the slightest trace of a smile. Annabelle was daydreaming.

  In a meeting.

  Which he was leading. He would not be ignored.

  “Miss Swift, you and your column were the topic of conversation in the coffeehouse Saturday last,” he said briskly. He fought to keep his expression neutral as he recalled that bedeviling conversation with Drummond and Gage. He’d be damned if his staff saw that he was affected by her. It was bad enough to mention this topic of her bodice in a room of mixed company, in a professional setting, however indirectly.

  He wanted to look. He could . . . not . . . look.

  “Oh? It was?” Jolted from her reverie, she fixed those big blue eyes upon him, the force of which stunned him for a second. Then she lowered her lids and lifted them again. And pouted her lips, almost as if she were su
cking on a lemon. Was she unwell?

  “I urge you to take care with the advice you elect to follow. I’m not sure if indelicate or idiotic is the right word for some of these bloke’s suggestions,” he lectured. In the back of his mind, he wondered when he’d become so stuffy.

  Her eyes seemed bluer today. Why was he noticing her eyes? Was it her blue dress? Didn’t she always wear brownish-grayish dresses? His gaze dropped to Annabelle’s dress, and he did not take note of the color at all. He saw creamy white skin rising in tantalizing swells above an extremely low bodice.

  “With all due respect, Mr. Knightly, it seems to be working.” She said it softly, with a hint of defiance mingling with deference. Her mouth reminded him of an angel’s pout—sulky, sweet, mysterious and mischievous.

  The kind of mouth a man thought of kissing.

  And thoughts like that were exactly why women were not oft employed with men. Damned distracting.

  “Annabelle’s column has taken the ton by storm,” Sophie said.

  To Knightly’s surprise, Owens—the most promising young rogue reporter who covered all manner of sordid stories—spoke up. “My mum and sisters keep yammering on about it. Miss Swift, they are of the opinion that you should try a different manner of styling your hair. I told ’em blokes don’t notice that sort of thing. Instead what they really notice is—”

  “That’s enough, Owens,” Knightly said sharply. If that cad mentioned anything below Annabelle’s neck . . .

  Knightly snuck another glance.

  Damn.

  She had caught his eye and then closed her eyes for a second or two, slowly lifting her lashes, fluttering them, and then sort of pouting again. How odd. Truly strange.

  “Is this more rubbish about attracting a gentleman’s attentions?” Grenville muttered. “Because the word in Parliament is that an inquiry is being formed to examine journalistic practices in light of The London Times reporter’s arrest and subsequent imprisonment. I for one am concerned about what this means for our own publication.”