Pheasants in October—”
Chloe turned her head to look at him and the potato she was lifting with the tongs broke and fel into her lap. “Oh—”
Henry offered his napkin to her. But before anybody noticed Chloe’s faux pas, Grace squeaked like a mouse, and spouted a very deliberate “Oh, dear!” Al heads and cameras turned to Grace as she squirmed, then shot up out of her chair.
One of her breasts had popped out of her low-cut gown!
At first, a wave of shock rol ed through Chloe, and she would’ve stood up to help, but for the broken potato on her lap.
Grace paused for a moment, her hand over her pursed lips, looking down at her breast while the cameras jockeyed around her. Sebastian’s eyes bugged out. He dropped his spoon. Henry sighed and looked away. Kate scratched at her arm furiously. Julia folded her arms.
And that’s when it final y hit Chloe that Grace had orchestrated this stunt. Chloe kept reminding herself that a lady could never appear too angry, especial y in public, but her hands shook and she wanted to tel Grace off. How dare she ruin Chloe’s debut dinner at Dartworth!
“Oh my!” Grace squealed. As if in slo-mo, her gotta-be-a-fake boob stood there, erect, en plein air, until Sebastian burst out of his chair, ripped off his coat, and slid it over Grace’s shoulders, careful y covering said breast.
Fish think, but not fast enough, Chloe thought. She plucked the broken potato from her lap. She whispered to Henry, “What do you think that reveals about her character?”
Henry didn’t reply, but instead signaled one of the footmen over to help her clean up the potato. It was as if Grace didn’t exist.
Grace hugged Sebastian’s coat around her. She hurried behind a painted screen in a far corner of the room, and her chaperone joined her.
Leave it to Grace to stage a strategic wardrobe malfunction that wouldn’t soon be forgotten. Al the women had, for days now, joked about their bodices slipping down, but it never did happen. Chloe shook her head. Grace had to have cut her corset to pul this one off. Everything put away now, Sebastian seated Grace at the table again.
Both Sebastian and Henry looked flushed and they talked about the wine from nearly opposite ends of the long table.
Gil ian narrowed her eyes at Grace.
Grace held her wineglass up to the candlelight. “It has great body, don’t you agree?”
Chloe raised her glass. “But a rather empty finish if you ask me.”
Gil ian smiled.
If only she could get that image of Grace’s breast out of her head—and out of Sebastian’s.
A footman brandished a platter with a pheasant, purple plumage stil attached, encircled with roasted rabbits, their furry heads reattached.
“Any hope of what we in America cal ‘salad’?” Chloe whispered to Henry.
“You know ful wel that greenery is bad for your digestion, and tomatoes are poisonous.”
Chloe didn’t have a barb to fling back at him. She was surprised and impressed by his knowledge of Regency England. But maybe instead of picking up Regency trivia from Henry, she could glean information about Sebastian. “You’re absolutely right about the salad. What was I thinking?
Perhaps you can enlighten me on another subject: your brother. Does he really like to hunt?”
Henry set down his knife. “Most country gentlemen do hunt and fish, Miss Parker, for sport as wel as for food. But my brother’s bark is bigger than his bite.”
“Bon appétit,” Grace announced. She helped herself to a slice of rabbit.
“Are you saying it has something to do with machismo? Is your brother overly concerned with his image?” Chloe asked.
“I didn’t realize American heiresses were familiar with Spanish words like machismo, nor that they were trained in the wiles of journalism.”
Chloe squirmed in her chair. Tapping Henry for information wouldn’t be easy, but it was worth the effort. And it was fun to spar with him. Stil , she felt comforted by the fact that Sebastian must’ve been overstating his hunting prowess to impress the women. He did have the reputation of a Regency squire to live up to, after al .
Sebastian stood, and al eyes moved toward him. “Yes, bon appétit, and, I’d like to invite al the ladies, and Henry, too, of course, to join me in a mock foxhunt on Sunday, nine in the morning. Ladies, we won’t be pursuing a real fox, so not to worry.”
Chloe looked toward the windows. Forget the fox. This meant she’d have to ride a horse sidesaddle. And, no doubt, this was another reality-show task with Accomplishment Points attached and nonparticipants asked to leave.
Julia practical y bounced up and down in her chair and her chaperone glared at her until she calmed down.
“A hunt,” Grace said.
Surely, Chloe thought, Miss Parker didn’t have enough status to ride. Chloe hadn’t ridden a horse since col ege. Could she stil do it? Plus, here it would have to be sidesaddle.
Mrs. Crescent leaned toward Chloe and said across the table, “We’l spend the next three days riding, Miss Parker. Count on it!”
Chloe stared at the arrangement of smal woodland animals in front of her.
“Miss Parker,” Sebastian asked from the head of the table. “Are you quite al right?”
English men were so attentive. Chloe was about to respond when suddenly Mrs. Crescent pushed herself up out of her chair, her hands propped on the smal of her back, sweat gathering under her curled bangs. “It’s time!” she said, putting one hand on her bel y. “It’s time!”
Chloe’s stomach tightened as she remembered the night she gave birth to Abigail. Abigail came a week early, and Winthrop was in Washington on business.
Chloe hurried over to Mrs. Crescent, but Henry was already there, guiding her to a fainting couch by the window. He took the watch from his watch fob and started timing the contractions.
Sebastian and Grace gawked. The chaperones and their charges crowded around Mrs. Crescent.
“Breathe. That’s right,” Henry said. He took her hand.
Mrs. Crescent did her breathing, stood, and paced. Chloe paced with her.
“We should cal her OB,” Chloe said to Henry. “An ambulance to take her to the hospital.”
“Contractions are stil wel over three minutes apart.” With his back to the camera, he spoke a mile a minute to Chloe. “We won’t be cal ing anyone. She wants to have her baby here. Nineteenth-century style.”
“What?! There is no way—”
“Perhaps instead of being so dogmatic, you could do something useful, Miss Parker?”
Chloe gulped and stepped back. Sebastian had disappeared and so had the al the footmen and servants. Grace took backward steps toward the door. Was Grace snagging some alone time with Sebastian—now? Chloe couldn’t let it happen. But she also couldn’t let Henry think she was a dogmatic idiot either. She released her arm from Mrs. Crescent’s. “Julia, Gil ian. Stay with her. I’m going to get the kitchen maids to boil some water.” She dashed out the door and almost banged into Sebastian. Again.
Sebastian looked worried. “I—I’m not good in these situations. I’m an artist, not a doctor.”
He was an artist? What kind of an artist? she wondered. Then Mrs. Crescent groaned. “Come help me boil some water,” Chloe said. “I don’t even know where the kitchen is.”
Grace stood next to her chaperone at the dining room doors, her hands on her hips.
“We have to hurry,” Chloe said. “Which way?”
“Fol ow me,” Sebastian said.
Chloe was right on his coattails. She smiled to herself. She was chasing him—literal y now. And al this dashing through the marble hal s lined with antiquities would have been fun had it not been for the gravity of a woman giving birth without a hospital, without an epidural! After scrambling down the servant stairway into the kitchen, Sebastian stopped. Servants and footmen were bustling about, frantical y boiling water on the old stove and in the kitchen fireplace. So this was where they had al gone.
“What can
I do?” Chloe dove into the fray.
A kitchen maid scowled at her. “You shouldn’t be down here!” She spotted Sebastian and curtsied. “Excuse me, miss, but we’ve got it sorted.
Best if you get upstairs.” She shooed Chloe out.
Chloe hurried up to the top of the stairs and Sebastian fol owed.
“Now what?” she asked.
“I don’t know.” Sebastian rubbed the cleft in his chin. “I told you I’m not very good at this sort of thing.”
Chloe snapped her fingers. “They’l need linens. Where’s the linen closet?”
Sebastian smiled. “My valet takes care of everything. I hardly know where he keeps my boots.”
He was sweet, real y sweet. Like a boy. Chloe racked her brain, trying to figure out what they could do. She leaned up against a marble column and blew a strand of hair that had fal en into her eyes.
Sebastian moved closer, waiting for her to take the lead.
A camerawoman bounded toward them from down the hal . Footmen lumbered up the stairs with pots of boiled water and kitchen maids carried up stacks of white linens. Al Chloe and Sebastian could do was fol ow.
When the entourage arrived in the dining room, Mrs. Crescent sat, fanning herself and smiling.
Henry stood with his hands on his hips, glaring at Sebastian and Chloe, who came in last. “False alarm,” he said. “Her contractions have stopped.” He pul ed Chloe aside and lowered his voice to a whisper. “Wel done, Miss Parker. You may be the smartest person in the room, but a lot of help you were, using this opportunity to take off with Sebastian. So glad I can count on you.”
Chloe wavered, feeling dizzy, surprised by his snarky reaction, which complimented and scolded her in one fel swoop. It crossed her mind, but only for a moment, that he might be jealous of his own brother. “You—you can count on me.”
Henry took off his glasses. “I hope so. Mrs. Crescent wants you to help me deliver the baby when it’s time. Do you think I can rely on you, or shal I consider you otherwise engaged?”
Chloe was shocked. Whether it was because of Mrs. Crescent choosing her to help deliver her baby, or how good Henry looked without glasses, she wasn’t sure.
“Can I count on you, Miss Parker?” Henry folded his arms.
“Of course.”
L ater that night, in her boudoir, Chloe woke up to a nightmare of Henry asking over and over, “Can I count on you?” She got out of bed and stumbled to her chamber pot, sicker than a girl who’d drunk negus al night at her coming-out bal . She leaned over it, her stomach sloshing. Could have been that spoonful of fish soup, or the fact that she’d have to spend the next two days riding sidesaddle, and if she didn’t ride, she’d be sent home. Would she stil be able to ride after more than twenty years? As she hugged her chamber pot, she realized, though, she was sick over disappointing Henry. Ugh! She liked Henry, but—real y! The fact that she cared so much about his opinion of her made her sick, literal y. She felt overwhelmed and confused.
At home she could’ve turned on music, the TV—hel , even the computer to distract herself. But here? Her own thoughts could torment her relentlessly. Final y she decided to play the footage in her mind of her moments alone with Sebastian, and that made her feel better.
He felt the same way about her as she felt about him! She had to take the reins and come up with a plan that put her in control. She decided to host a tea after the foxhunt. It would take some doing, and she’d have to put aside her painting, but it would be her show and she could cal the shots. Before she snuffed out her candle, she settled her eye on the stack of painting paper and tubes of oil paint that Sebastian had given her. He, too, was an artist. But what kind of artist? A vision of Dartworth Hal floated in front of her. Could he be the one? He was stacking up to be a most interesting man. Instead of snuffing out the candle, she blew it out and made a wish.
Chapter 9
E ven though she’d only just arrived, every day Chloe asked James, the Bridesbridge butler, if there were any letters for her. She couldn’t wait to hear from Abigail.
“Not today, miss,” was his reply as he offered letters from his silver salver to the rest of the women.
Mail from overseas took at least a week, sometimes two, so how could she expect something in just four days? She spent the morning arranging the hunt-tea menu with Cook, thril ed that hosting the tea would bring her fifteen Accomplishment Points, and the afternoon working on mounting and dismounting sidesaddle, until she earned five Accomplishment Points for that. Grace and the other women earned ten Accomplishment Points because they were ahead of her, practicing their jumps.
James arrived at her side during teatime with the silver salver.
“Letter for you, Miss Parker.”
The other ladies at the tea table set their teacups down and eyed the overnighted envelope with curiosity.
Chloe ripped open the cardboard envelope and almost bolted to the foyer, but then she remembered to ask first. “Mrs. Crescent, might I take this to the Grecian temple to read? I won’t be long.”
Mrs. Crescent, completely recovered from her false labor and feeling no il effects, fed Fifi a lump of sugar under the table. “Go ahead, dear, but watch for rain. Soon as you’re back, you must make your ink and start your needlework project.”
Chloe’s cameraman fol owed her as she trounced past the herb garden in her bonnet and walking gloves, parasol in hand, blue day dress flouncing at her ankles. Once under the green dome of the Grecian temple atop the hil at Bridesbridge, she sat on a stone bench and ceremoniously opened the envelope.
Abigail had painted the two of them surrounded by hearts and flowers. The painting had been wrapped around a plain white envelope, sent first-class mail, and addressed to her in care of her parents’ house. Her mom had put a sticky note on the envelope: We miss you. Write again soon!
All’s well here! This just arrived. We sent it off ASAP . . . Love, Mom.
The cameraman knelt on the grass, probably to get a better angle at her smile. She opened the enclosed white envelope only to reveal a flimsy sheet of paper laser-printed entirely in Helvetica. The top of the page read: State of Illinois Judicial Court, and in bold: Motion Regarding Custody.
It was a motion to change the custody agreement and it had been served to her on a silver platter.
Winthrop was prepared to show a substantial change in circumstances, as the motion read, to warrant increasing his rights in regards to legal and physical custody of Abigail.
From what she could tel , the attached list of circumstances included not only his impending marriage on July 15 but the fact that as the new senior vice president of PeopleSystems, he and his new wife would be moving to his company’s headquarters in Boston. He would no longer be traveling for work. He was motioning to change his custody to summers and holidays.
In Boston.
The hearing was scheduled for July 30.
Chloe folded the painting, then the motion, and ran her fingers along the creases. She looked at her cameraman, who stood up now and backed away a bit. Her lips quivered. She swal owed. Off in the distance, Bridesbridge stood, as it had for the past two hundred and fifty years or so, stalwart and elegant. Its strong ocher-colored exterior had held up despite whatever untoward events had gone on within its thick, ivy-covered wal s.
Starlings crisscrossed in the cloudy sky above.
She couldn’t go back to Bridesbridge just yet, despite the impending rain. She couldn’t face the women and more cameras. The weather suited her mood, so she took a turn toward the deer park, where the leaves of the trees were fluttering in the wind. Her cameraman fol owed, and for once, his presence gave her a sense of security. The clouds moved quickly overhead, but they weren’t ominous looking yet. She watched her brown lace-up walking boots move along the path, one foot in front of the other.
Winthrop couldn’t possibly take Abigail for entire summers in Boston, could he? How could this be happening? How could she stop it?
A brown hawk circled
overhead when she reached a grassy clearing. Then it tucked its wings, took a sudden dive, and flew just a few feet off the ground, fast and sure. Suddenly the hawk slowed, alighted on a man’s outstretched, gloved left hand, and just as quickly soared overhead again, circling. The man wore a long, tan greatcoat and black boots. Was it Henry? It looked like him.
A servant stood by him, as did a cameraman filming. No sooner did he hold his arm out to the side than the bird dove and landed again.
Chloe had only ever seen falconry like this in the Andrew Davies TV adaptation of Sense and Sensibility. It wasn’t in any Jane Austen novels, but it was historical y correct. She focused on the exquisite choreography of man and falcon, and it took her mind off of her abrupt change in circumstances.
It began to rain, of course, sporadical y at first, then steadier. Chloe opened her parasol, but the rain quickly soaked through. Water dripped from the edges of her bonnet, and raindrops rol ed down her cheeks. Or were they tears? She could hardly tel .
The man in the clearing had turned with the bird on his arm. It was Henry. The falcon opened its wings to fly, and the wingspan had to have been three or four feet. The tips of the bird’s wings brushed against his face, but Henry was unfazed. He handled the bird with complete mastery. The bird tucked its wings in, and that was when Henry saw her. He signaled to his servant, who gathered the bird’s perch.
Chloe didn’t know what to do. Was she on Dartworth property? Henry handed the bird off to the servant, who seemed dwarfed by it. While the servant headed in the opposite direction, Henry strode quickly toward her, his cameraman struggling to keep up. Final y the cameraman turned back. Chloe looked up at Henry. He seemed tal er, somehow.
“Miss Parker. Whatever are you doing out here?” He took off his falconry glove and his greatcoat, bowed, and smiled. “Do you real y need to go to al this trouble just to avoid your needlework?”
Chloe choked up with laughter and tears as he wrapped his greatcoat around her. The coat was heavy and warm and had a piney aroma.
“I hope I’m not on Dartworth property,” Chloe said into the camera.
Definitely Not Mr. Darcy Page 14