by Cora Lee
“Precisely.”
Whitby grinned. “Did I ever tell you how many times I proposed before Lady Whitby accepted? It was four. Four times I asked her for her hand, and four times she turned me down. I don’t even remember the reasons she gave—you’ll have to ask her, she tells the story better than I do—but she damn near broke my heart each time. I almost didn’t try again, but I’d discovered that life was invariably sweeter when I was with her. And there’s that stubborn streak that runs in the family, too—I had to try one more time.”
“I’m not asking for Honoria’s hand five times, cousin.”
Whitby’s grin turned into a laugh. “You will if she keeps turning you down.”
Benedict groaned. “How did you even find the courage to talk to her again? Or to go out in public when the whole of the ton knew what happened?”
Whitby’s expression faded into something more serious. “I knew she was worth it. I didn’t care what I had to go through, I just needed her with me.”
Benedict blew out a heavy sigh. “I do love her, but I don’t know if I can handle another rejection.”
“You’ve not recovered yet from this one,” Whitby said, rising from his chair and ambling the few steps to his cousin. He clapped a hand on Benedict’s shoulder and gave it a squeeze. “Take some more time with Homer, or whatever you’re reading. Drink some ouzo, or whisky, or lemonade if it makes you feel better. When you’re ready, try again.”
“It’s Sappho. And next time I’ll have a solid plan.”
“That’s the spirit,” Whitby smiled, giving his cousin another pat. “A better plan gives you a better chance.”
“That explains this disaster, then—I had no plan at all.”
Whitby returned to his chair, his eyes and mouth wide with exaggerated horror. “No plan? No wonder she refused you.”
“Shut up.” Benedict rubbed his hands over his face. “You know I have no improvisational skills. I didn’t intend to ask her to be my wife that day, it just sort of happened. And I’ve never been good with ‘just sort of happened’.”
“True, but you’re more at ease with people you know well. And you know Lady Honoria better than just about anybody. Don’t over-think it.”
“Good advice,” Benedict said, reaching for his abandoned glass of ouzo. “You know me rather well, too.”
~*~
“He’s here.”
Honoria walked into the enormous ballroom at Almack’s with her Aunt, her eyes instinctively roaming the crowd of people—as they had for the past week—looking for Benedict. He topped most men by two or three inches, making him easy to spot even among a sea of gentlemen wearing similar dark tailcoats. Whether she wanted to seek him out or avoid him, she didn’t know. Nor had it mattered—she’d seen not a whisper of him since she refused him and ordered him from her home.
Until now. To her surprise she found him here in the Assembly Rooms, not in the throng of onlookers but in the midst of the dancers. He was partnering a girl—and a girl she was, looking as though she still belonged in the schoolroom—only a few inches shorter than he was in a country dance. Her chestnut hair glinted in the light from the candles in the chandeliers above, her white gown swirling about her as she moved.
“Who is here?” Aunt Cecilia asked, trying to follow her niece’s gaze.
“Benedict. And he’s dancing.”
Aunt Cecilia craned her neck, heedless of decorum. “He is—and doing it rather well. You should be proud of your pupil, my dear.”
“Who is that he’s with? I don’t recognize her.”
“I don’t either. She must be a new debutante.” Aunt Cecilia tilted her head slightly. “He seems to be enjoying her company, whoever she is.”
Drat the man, he did seem so. His face was animated when he spoke to his partner between figures of the dance, and when he wasn’t speaking he was smiling.
He had never looked that merry during his lessons with Honoria.
She shook off the thought, and the feeling of discontent that it brought. What did it matter to her who Benedict danced with? She had no claim on him.
“Well, good for him,” she managed. And a part of her was truly happy to see him so much at ease in public—it had simply never occurred to her that he could be so with someone else.
Another part of her, though, longed to be the one he smiled at, the one who took his arm as he led her from the dance floor. She wanted his hazel eyes to light up when they saw her, and to be swept up in his arms and kissed witless. She wanted to share confidences and opinions and plans and...
And she had said no when he offered it all to her.
“Aunt Cecilia, might we return home? I’m suddenly not feeling very well.”
“Are you certain? We’ve only just arrived.” Her aunt turned toward her and put a hand to Honoria’s cheek. “You do look a bit pale. Perhaps some lemonade and a dance would help?”
Honoria shook her head. “If I wasn’t feeling ill, that awful lemonade would surely make me so. And I don’t feel like dancing.”
Aunt Cecilia’s eyes widened. “You must feel poorly indeed. I’ll call for the carriage.”
They waited together near the entrance, Honoria hooking her arm through her aunt’s and holding it more tightly than she meant to. By the time the carriage arrived, Aunt Cecilia looked genuinely worried, seating herself beside her niece and wrapping an arm around Honoria’s shoulders.
“It’s Mr. Grey, isn’t it?” she asked softly.
Honoria laid her head on her aunt’s shoulder. “I am a fool. A blind fool. It was never supposed to turn out this way.”
“Things rarely end up the way we plan them.”
“Nearly everything did this time—but that’s the problem.”
Aunt Cecilia gave Honoria’s shoulders a little squeeze. “What happened?”
“You know about the promise I made to Papa when he thought he was dying. Well, I didn’t want to marry just anyone. In fact, I didn’t want to marry anyone at all unless he loved me.”
“Not an easy thing to do.”
Honoria shook her head. “Then I ran into Benedict at Lady Whitby’s ball.” She smiled in the darkness of the carriage, recalling how literal that statement was. “He needed help polishing his society manners, and I offered him a bargain. I’d teach him to dance and make himself agreeable, and he would act as if he were courting me. We were going to announce a betrothal for Papa’s sake, then I was going to cry off after...”
Aunt Cecilia nodded against the crown of Honoria’s head. “But your father recovered.”
“And Benedict asked for my hand—a real offer, not the subterfuge I’d concocted. I-I sent him away.”
“That was the day your father’s letter arrived. I wondered why Mr. Grey left without so much as a word.”
Honoria turned her face toward her aunt’s silken sleeve. “I refused him. He couldn’t tell me he loved me so I refused him.”
“Then you saw him with another lady tonight.”
Honoria lifted her head from Aunt Cecilia’s shoulder and snorted indelicately. “Lady? She was half my age if she was a day. What can she give him that I cannot?”
“A ‘yes’.”
Honoria frowned in the dark. “I deserved that.”
“It’s true.” Aunt Cecilia found Honoria’s hand and clasped it in hers. “And you have a decision to make. You can make up your mind to let Mr. Grey go on to whatever happiness he might find without you. Or you can float along like a paper boat on the Serpentine and wait to see if he comes back to you.”
“But he was never really mine to begin with. It was all for show.”
“Was it?”
Was it? Had Honoria missed something her aunt had seen? “Or?”
“Or,” Aunt Cecilia continued, “you can play an active part in your future.”
Honoria gestured with her free hand, even though she knew her aunt couldn’t see her do it. “I tried that, and look how it turned out.”
“You did try—once.
The question is, are you going to try again?”
Honoria had no ready answer, and leaned against Aunt Cecilia for physical support as well as the emotional kind. “What would you do?”
Aunt Cecilia put both her arms around her niece and hugged her. “It doesn’t matter what I would do. It only matters what you will do.”
Honoria bid her aunt good night and went to her bedchamber as soon as they reached Alston House. What would she do? There wasn’t a passive bone in her body, she was certain of that. But when she had tried to take her future in hand, she’d made a complete mess of her oldest friendship. And she loved Benedict, despite his own ambiguity. If she went to him and an agreement was struck, could she spend the rest of her life with a man who very possibly didn’t love her in return? Was she settling to try to soothe her heart?
If she let him go, she knew there would be more nights like this one. He would eventually find a woman who was satisfied with his affection and respect. Honoria would see them together when they came to Town for the Season—if they came to Town. Perhaps Benedict would find a lady who was content to spend her days in the country, or the museums. Or one who would travel with him to excavation sites all over the world. She’d never see them together in those cases.
She’d never see him at all.
Chapter 8
Benedict stood in the morning room of his townhouse, staring at a potted sapling sitting in the middle of the breakfast table—a cutting from an apple tree that lived in the orchard he and Honoria used to frequent. He had sent for it the same day he sent the note to Honoria pledging his participation in her pretend courtship, and it had arrived this afternoon. He’d meant it as a gift to her, thinking a reminder of the good times they’d shared would be comforting when her father was so ill.
What was he going to do with it now?
A footman stepped tentatively through the open door. “Lady Honoria Maitland has arrived, sir.”
What? She was in his house? “I’ll see her here.”
The footman bowed himself out and Benedict combed his fingers through his hair. A thousand reasons for Honoria’s visit ran through his head as he straightened his cravat and waistcoat. Was it her father? Had some evil befallen him on his journey to Town? Had one of her suitors offered for her? Had her aunt fallen ill? He hadn’t put on a tailcoat this morning. Did he have time to do it now?
“Hello, Benedict.”
She stood alone in the doorway, clothed in a pinkish dress with little flowers embroidered all over it and looking as beautiful as he’d ever seen her. Her bonnet was still tied securely under her chin, though, and the brim shaded her face enough to keep her expression a mystery.
At least she had called him Benedict, not Mr. Grey. “Hello, Honoria. Your maid can wait in the kitchen if she chooses. I don’t have much in the way of staff, but she’ll find some company there.”
“I didn’t bring a maid.”
His brows drew together. “You didn’t come here alone...did you?”
She nodded, making the silk rose on her bonnet flutter. “I took a hackney so no one would see the Alston crest on the carriage.”
“You don’t think my neighbors may have seen you at the door?” He reached for her arm and tugged her into the room. “You’ve all but ruined your reputation.”
“I don’t care. I needed to talk to you.”
She would care one of the gossip rags got wind of this. “Very well. But take off your hat—I’ll not have a conversation with half your face.”
He pulled out a chair from the breakfast table and she sat, carefully pulling her bonnet off. When she began to pluck her gloves from her fingers, he seated himself beside her. But she didn’t speak. She kept her eyes on her hands as if her gloves were dangerous items that might go off at any moment.
But he could not take the silence. He turned himself sideways in his chair and leaned forward, inelegantly pulling her gloves off and depositing them on the table where she’d placed her bonnet. The faint scent of apple blossoms clung to her skin. “Now, what would you like to talk about?”
Her eyes remained focused on her hands. “I-I don’t know. I didn’t get that far in my plan.”
He couldn’t help but smile. “You risked being compromised—rendered unmarriageable and unfit for society—to come here, but you don’t know what you wanted to say?”
She raised her eyes to his, one brow arched with a touch of defiance. “I did.”
Oh, did he love her! How could he have ever doubted it? “Why don’t we talk about this specimen on my table then?”
“All right.”
Her uncertainty seemed to bolster his confidence, and he took both her hands in his. “Do you remember the spring you father and stepmother were wed?”
“I do. Papa insisted we have the wedding at Orchard Lake and turned it into a week-long fête.”
Honoria wrinkled her nose, and Benedict laughed. “You liked that estate best out of all His Grace’s properties. Don’t pretend you didn’t.”
“I didn’t like being dragged back into the country in the middle of my second Season.” The expression on her face softened. “You came down from Cambridge for the ceremony.”
“Mmhmm. I stayed at Whitby’s Westbrook next door. Remember?”
She was leaning slightly forward now, a small smile on her lips. “Half the ton came, too, so I got to finish my Season after all. Papa hired that orchestra to play in the little folly behind the house, and we danced outdoors until it was too dark to see. Except when we’d sneak off to the orchard and read when the crowd got to be too much for you.”
“I used to read,” he grinned. “You would sit beside me on the blanket and talk about your beaux, your dresses, the dresses other girls had worn, your new stepmother, how happy your father looked, the weather—”
She freed one of her hands to smack his knee. “I didn’t talk that much.” Her fingers slid back into his grasp. “Did I?”
“Yes, you did. But I didn’t mind. I liked being there with you, having you close to me.”
“I liked spending that time with you, too. But what does that have to do with this?” She nodded toward the sapling.
Benedict released her hands and rose from his chair, bending across the table to grab hold of the pot and drag it closer. “We always sat near that enormous apple tree—”
“The one that seemed to have more blossoms on it than the others, every single year. It smelled heavenly.”
“Is that why you wear apple blossom perfume?” he asked, allowing himself to be diverted for a moment. It was a question he’d been meaning to ask her.
A pink tinge crept into her cheeks. “I only started wearing that a few weeks ago. I-I noticed your applewood scent during one of our dancing lessons...”
A fluttery sensation flooded Benedict’s body and he felt giddy. She wore apple blossom perfume because he wore applewood, and had risked her future with the beau monde to talk to him alone.
“Do you know why I chose applewood?”
“I figured it had to do with our orchard.”
Our orchard. How right she was. “That spring in the orchard? I think that’s when I fell in love with you.” He pushed his chair back with one foot and knelt before her, clasping her hands in his once more. “And I have loved you with all my heart every since. I was just too addle-pated to know it.”
Honoria laughed—a bright, bubbly laugh that sounded like a hundred years worth of happiness in one burst. “I’m afraid I was just as slow as you were, my love. But the important thing is that we get it right at some point in time.”
“I believe that point is now.” He brushed his lips over the backs of her hands. “I will never be comfortable in society, never enjoy it the way you do. But if you will always save me a dance and sit with me in the orchard, I’ll find a way to manage. I love you too much to do otherwise. Will you marry me, Honoria?”
She jumped from her chair and pulled him to his feet, throwing her arms around his neck. “Yes!”
/> His arms slid around her and held her against him as she lifted her face for a kiss.
He didn’t disappoint her.
~*~
“Oh my goodness, your mother was right...”
Honoria was nestled snugly beside her betrothed on a sofa in his library, his arm wrapped securely around her. They’d migrated there from the morning room wanting to be more comfortable than the breakfast table allowed, knowing all the while that Honoria should return home as soon as possible. But Benedict’s fingers slowly stroking her arm turned “as soon as possible” into just “soon”. When she dropped a soft kiss on his jaw and laid her head against his shoulder, he declared that an hour together wouldn’t do any harm.
“What was my mother right about?”
Her fingers toyed with the buttons of his waistcoat. “When I visited Whitby House, she said she though you and I had fallen in love before you went to Greece. I told her she was mistaken, but she wouldn’t be dissuaded.”
“She saw it before we did.”
“Or it was wishful thinking,” she replied. “You had been away at university, and I’d had a few Seasons—we weren’t in each other’s company as much in those days.”
He kissed her hair. “Either way Mother will be happy.”
Honoria sat up, bracing a hand against his chest. “What about you? Are you happy? Truly?”
“Yes,” he said, brushing a finger against her cheek. “Can you not tell?”
He had a silly smile plastered on his face and she grinned. “To be sure.”
“What about you? Are you happy?”
“It just hasn’t sunk in yet, I think.” She settled back against him, taking one of his hands in hers and drawing his arm around her. “I made the decision to marry for love during my first Season, and that was quite a while ago.”
“And I’m enormously glad of it. I could not imagine myself leg-shackled to a girl ten years my junior. Plenty of gentleman do it, but I was looking for a wife I could partner, not one I had to raise.”
That triggered a memory from her brief sojourn at the Assembly Rooms. “Then who was that you were dancing with at Almack’s last night? She looked rather on the young side.”