by Lynne Barron
Henry’s butler’s booming voice bounced about the cavernous room and Olivia found herself the center of attention, a fate she’d hoped to avoid this evening.
There was nothing for it but to brazen her way through it.
She gave a toss of her head to show off the jewels in her tresses, pasted a practiced smile upon her lips, and sailed down the stairs on her brother’s arm, her gaze resolutely turned from the man lounging against a pillar with the ghost of his wife all but in his arms.
Chapter Thirteen
“Oh look,” Miss Madeline Dumfries whispered in awe as she turned toward the marble staircase that marked what Jack was beginning to think of as the Gates of Hell.
He followed her gaze to the landing above in time to see a dark-haired woman enveloped in yards of rich dark-red silk spin about and all but tumble into the Earl of Hastings’ arms.
It defied logic, but Hastings had become quite the rake in the years Jack had been away from Town. He kept two mistresses and had still managed to seduce a good dozen women in the first month of the Season.
And it appeared as if he’d found the woman to share his bed tonight.
Jack ran his gaze over the back of the woman draped in silk the color of the finest red wine. The gown was cut daringly low, exposing the lady’s shoulders and upper back, and hugged her body like a glove almost to the tops of her legs, legs that promised to be incredibly long. A row of tiny buttons trailed down her spine and over a backside shown off to perfection by the astounding fit of the gown.
“I doubt very much Hastings is looking for a wife,” Jack said to Madeline, the lady who’d thus far been the only entertainment to be found in the crowded, gaudily decorated and slightly malodorous ballroom.
“Oh hush, you naughty man,” Madeline cooed, her fan raised to take another swipe at his shoulder.
He feinted left and her fan glanced off his upper arm. “You are deadly with that thing.”
“I only use it to keep naughty men like you in their places,” she replied with a rather toothsome smile.
“How’s that working for you?” he asked.
“As you continue to flirt shamelessly, I would have to say not very well.” She peered up at the landing once more. “I thought I saw...”
Jack caught a movement, a blur of red, from the corner of his eye and turned fully around to face the raised dais that was the upper landing.
“The Countess of Hastings, the Countess of Palmerton and the Earl of Hastings.”
The voice announcing their hosts for the evening echoed off the walls and a steady hum filled the air.
Olivia stood poised beside her mother and her brother, her hand lying upon his forearm, her head held regally high.
Christ, if the gown had been astounding from the back, seen from the front it was nothing short of miraculous. Deep-red shimmered over her breasts, barely covering them as she drew in a deep breath. Candlelight glimmered over her exposed shoulders and dark curls, setting tiny jewels in her hair winking like fiery stars.
With slow, graceful steps Olivia descended the stairs, her hips gently swaying, the froth of her skirts flowing out around her. She kept her head tilted up and her shoulders back as she stepped onto the marble floor a dozen feet from where he stood transfixed.
She looked neither left nor right, her gaze fixed upon some point across the room.
Her profile might have been carved in granite, so cool did she appear, so completely composed, as the assembled guests swirled around her. Her full mouth was pulled into a soft smile. Impossibly long, dark lashes hid her eyes, but Jack imagined her eyes glowed silver in the candlelight as she looked out over the crowd like a queen assessing her domain.
It struck Jack that Olivia was in her element in the crowded ballroom, ladies and gentlemen clamoring forward to greet her, to curtsy and bow to her, to be among the first to welcome her back into the fold.
“Isn’t she lovely?” Madeline whispered from beside him.
“Lovely,” Jack agreed even as he watched her greet her adoring fans with that tranquil smile firmly in place. She spoke little, merely nodded and smiled, smiled and nodded.
This was the lady he’d watched over the years on his infrequent trips to Town, regal and poised, entirely at home in the glittering ballroom. This was the lady he intended to take as his wife, the future mother of his children. She would elevate him from outsider to insider, ensure that his family was accepted and see his daughter well-married when the time came.
If he felt a moment’s confusion, a puzzling suspicion that the lady before him was a stranger, that she could not be the same woman who had charmed and seduced him during their time at Idyllwild, he pushed it aside. This was the true Olivia, the noblewoman who held his future in the palm of her hand.
“Devilishly daring of her to toss off her mourning precipitously, and in so dramatic a fashion.”
Jack turned back to Madeline in surprise. “Precipitously?”
“The grays and lavenders of half-mourning would render her quite pale,” Madeline mused.
“How long is she expected to mourn?” Jack asked in alarm.
“A full year of black and another of those dreadful grays,” his companion replied. “When my sister’s husband passed on, I was only required to observe a month of each and that was long enough for me to wish every member of my family a long life.”
Jack made no reply, his mind spinning with the notion that he’d be forced to wait another six month to publicly court the lady.
“Lady Palmerton is putting everyone on notice,” Madeline continued breathlessly. “She is telling the entire world she is quite finished with her mourning.”
“Is she?”
“She is telling all of Society that she is a lady of substance, a woman not be trifled with but rather to be reckoned with.”
“You comprehended all that from her gown?” Jack asked doubtfully.
“From the cut and color,” she agreed with a wave of one slender arm. “And from her tousled curls and the gems winking in them. Oh, and just look at those slippers!”
Olivia spun about to face Viscount Moorehead and two petite ladies wearing nearly identical white gowns, her dress belling out around her and giving him a peek at her slender ankles and the ribbons twisted and tied above them. Those ribbons were attached to impossibly high-heeled silver slippers.
Jack watched as the lady in question smiled at Moorehead, the first genuine smile to lift her lips since she’d stood above surveying the crowd, and something tight eased in his chest.
“Oh look at her, she is a jewel,” Madeline breathed as Moorehead took Olivia’s hand and twirled her about for his inspection, his laughter soaring about the room. “She’ll lead the gentlemen on a merry chase now that she’s thrown down the gauntlet. Merry chase, now that’s funny.”
Jack smiled at his pretty blonde companion before bowing over her hand with a murmured reminder of their forthcoming dance.
He turned to find Olivia looking at him with wide, dark eyes and a frown puckering her lips. Jack met her gaze and watched as the frown disappeared as if she’d mentally scrubbed it from her lips.
Once again she wore what he was coming to think of as her Countess Countenance.
He strode forward, dodging a matron in a bright yellow tent of a dress, and nodding to the Earl of Hastings who stood just beyond Olivia conversing with the Earl of Somerton.
“Lady Palmerton.” Jack bowed over her hand, felt it tremble in his light grip and gave it a gentle squeeze.
“Mr. Bentley,” she replied, smoothly extricating her hand, her gaze roaming about the room.
“I was beginning to think you would never arrive,” he told her as he took her in, as relief coursed through him.
“I can’t think why,” she replied with a wave of one long, elegant arm. “My mother’s annual ball is the event of the Season.”
“No, it wasn’t your arrival tonight I doubted,” Jack replied around a huff of laughter. “Rather I’d begun to despair of your ever ret
urning to Town.”
“Had you?” she asked, her eyes fixing upon a spot just behind him. “I don’t believe I’ve made the acquaintance of your lovely young companion.”
Jack looked to his left just as Madeline Dumfries appeared at his side and dropped into a perfect curtsy without awaiting an introduction, her hand extended to Olivia.
“Lady Palmerton, Miss Madeline Dumfries,” Jack said into the awkward silence that followed. It occurred to him that the lady was likely younger than he’d first thought, perhaps just out of the schoolroom.
Olivia hesitated the merest moment before lightly touching the offered hand, her fingers barely brushing the tips.
The blonde girl rose with a wisp of a smile drifting over her lips.
The two women, both beautiful in their own right, eyed one another carefully, and not the least bit covertly.
“Are you enjoying your first Season?” Olivia asked, glancing away to nod at a passing servant. Like magic a tray bearing a single glass of champagne appeared at her side.
Jack nearly groaned. Miss Dumfries was just out of the schoolroom. The manner in which she’d eyed him the moment he’d walked into the ballroom, the way she’d angled to put herself in his path as he made his way around the room, and the knowing look in her eyes as she’d invited him to flirt with her had all combined to lead him to think he was whiling away the time with a sophisticated woman who would see a bit of flirtation for what it was.
A debutant in her first Season would likely expect him to call upon her on the morrow with a bouquet of roses in one hand and a noose in the other.
“Champagne for Miss Dumfries and Mr. Bentley, Thomas,” Olivia murmured to the servant before bringing the glass to her lips and sipping from it until she’d drained a good half. She lowered the glass and held it at her waist, one gloved finger slowly circling the crystal lip.
And all the while she kept her eyes on the younger lady.
“How did you know it was my first Season?” Madeline asked.
Olivia’s lips twitched.
“I curtsied before we’d been introduced, didn’t I?”
The Countess dipped her head in acknowledgment, her mouth tilting at the corners.
“Mother always says I rush about without thought.”
“Your sister was the same during her first Season,” Olivia told the girl, finally allowing the smile free rein.
Jack tilted his head to catch her eye, wanting to share that smile, give her one of his own in return, but she kept her gaze on Madeline.
It was then that it hit him that Olivia had not looked directly at him since he’d approached her. She’d looked everywhere but at him.
“You know Felicity?” Madeline asked in surprise. “Did you come out together?”
“Felicity was a few years behind me,” Olivia replied.
“Truly? You look years younger than my sister.”
“Thank you. Sometimes I feel positively ancient,” the Countess of Palmerton replied wryly.
“Well, you look lovely,” Madeline gushed. “Mr. Bentley and I were commenting on it just moments ago.”
“Oh?” Olivia arched a brow and looked at him, finally.
Her gaze was direct, her eyes a dark pewter-gray. There was a question there, perhaps even a dare, one that Jack found himself unable to decipher.
“We were actually discussing your gown,” he replied and immediately wished the words back. No such luck. He imagined they hovered there in the space between them.
Miss Dumfries darted a surprised look his way.
“I’m pleased to know that you found my gown lovely,” Olivia said without a trace of humor. “If you’ll excuse me, Mr. Bentley.”
Without thought Jack reached for her, his hand seeming to move without volition to touch her arm, to keep her before him long enough to fix his gaffe.
Olivia smoothly stepped away from him, the movement graceful yet decisive.
“It was a pleasure to meet you, Miss Dumfries,” she told the other lady graciously. “I hope we see one another again before the Season ends.”
Jack was left with no choice but to drop his hand and watch her walk away, her head high and her back, beneath dozens of tiny gray buttons, ramrod straight.
“We were actually discussing your gown,” Madeline mimicked, her tone withering. “And here I thought I was practicing with an accomplished flirt.”
Chapter Fourteen
In the days following what she liked to think of as her second debut into London Society, Olivia set about creating a new life for herself and her children. She hired Miss Amherst to act as Fanny’s governess, toured a seemingly endless list of possible homes, and valiantly attempted to put thoughts of dark alcoves and lazy, passion-filled afternoons from her mind.
Jack called at Palmerton House the day after her mother’s ball. Olivia had taken the children to play at the park, returning to find a lovely posy of wildflowers tucked in amid the roses and hothouse bouquets lining the front hall and overflowing into the parlor.
She knew who they were from without having to look at the card that sat propped against the cut-crystal vase. So she didn’t look, didn’t stop to sniff their delicate fragrance, to caress their velvety petals.
She ignored them as best she could as she walked past them on her way to change for dinner with Beatrice and Simon.
The following day she was immersed in her first violin lesson, Mr. Cartwright patiently instructing her on the proper handling of the instrument and gamely smiling as she drew the bow over the strings with enthusiasm, sending frightfully discordant noise bouncing about the room.
“You’ve a caller, my lady,” Johnston informed her in his customarily stoic manner.
“Thank goodness,” Mr. Cartwright murmured.
“I’m not at home,” Olivia replied without a moment’s hesitation. She could not think of a single person she cared to receive at half-past ten on a Monday morning.
“Very good, my lady.” The butler bowed and made to back out of the room.
“Who is it?” Olivia asked in spite of herself.
“A Mr. Bentley, my lady.”
“I am most definitely not at home.”
“Perhaps you should receive him,” Mr. Cartwright suggested.
“Come now, good sir, surely you’ve encountered far worse pupils than myself,” Olivia replied with a wry grin.
On the third day Olivia made certain to be away from home from just past nine in the morning, an unfashionable hour to be out and about, until it was time to change for a night at the theater with Henry.
Again she ignored the flowers, an outlandish display of tall lilies and cattails that towered almost to the ceiling, and the cream card that sat before them. She couldn’t think why he felt the need to call upon her unless he intended to offer some explanation for his behavior at her mother’s ball, an explanation that was neither necessary nor desired. Affairs ended every day. Olivia could not image discussing the reason for the end of theirs over tea and cakes.
Wednesday she was on pins and needles as she received one caller after another into her formal parlor, groups of matrons in search of gossip, shy debutants and their mothers in search of lofty connections, and a surprising number of perfectly nice, perfectly respectable gentlemen in search of a perfectly proper wife.
Jack Bentley was not among them and when the last of her callers departed precisely as the tall clock in the foyer chimed twice Olivia allowed herself to relax.
Clearly the man had given up in his attempts to see her. If there was a dollop of sadness mingled with the relief she felt, Olivia chose to ignore it just as she’d ignored the tears that had trailed over her cheeks in the deepest hours of the night and the pangs of loneliness that greeted her with the coming of dawn.
Jack wanted a wife.
Olivia could not, would not be that wife.
It was right and fitting that he’d come to accept her refusal during the months they’d been apart. If she’d hoped to enjoy his company throug
hout the Season, hoped to revel in the desire he evoked with his fierce kisses, warm hands and amazing cock, he’d shown her quite effectively she’d been pinning her hopes on nothing more substantial than mist.
And if she was left feeling restless and edgy in her good moments and downright surly in her bad, she would grit her teeth and bear it. She’d born far worse.
Including weekly calls upon her mother at her Portman Square town house.
Olivia arrived at half-past eleven on Thursday, both anticipating and dreading the time it would afford her alone with her mother.
Just as she alighted from her carriage and started toward the stately gray stone mansion the front door flew open and a whirlwind of lavender silk careened into her.
Olivia stumbled back, nearly losing her balance on the cobblestone walkway.
Long, slender fingers ensconced in delicate white lace gloves wrapped around her upper arms and Olivia looked up into eyes of the most astonishing shade of periwinkle blue surrounded by impossibly long golden lashes.
“Pardon me,” Olivia offered as her gaze wandered over the face that contained those amazing eyes.
A dainty chin, coupled with flawless, pale skin and delicately arched brows might have given her a certain pixie-like beauty, had she not possessed a long thin blade of a nose with a bump just below the bridge, sharp cheekbones over gaunt hollows, and a mouth that was simply too wide.
Long tendrils of hair more orange than red drifted from below an outrageous bonnet of white straw adorned with all manner of flowers, feathers, and bows. Her gown was nearly as extraordinary as the bonnet. Yards and yards of lavender- and white-striped silk draped over the woman’s tall, willowy form, hugging her nearly flat chest and miniscule waist before belling out around her hips and legs in froths of fabric and looping ribbons and lace.
It occurred to Olivia as she met the gaze of the woman before her that the lady was conducting her own perusal of Olivia’s amber silk day dress, her cropped tresses beneath a small black pillbox hat, and her gray eyes, and committing the entirety of it to memory.
“I beg your pardon, my lady,” the woman said, her voice a shockingly husky, soft drawl laced with a faint Scots burr.