by Mia Vincy
Joshua was not angry anymore.
“I apologize, sir, for any unnecessary trouble I’ve caused you,” he said.
The earl’s scowl faded into surprise. “You what?”
“That does not mean I condone or forgive what you have done. It mainly means I don’t care anymore.”
Treyford stared, bemused. But he quickly recovered. “That’s not much of an apology.”
“Better than your apology.”
“What apology?”
“Precisely.” Joshua tugged off his left glove, twisted the signet ring off his finger, and held it out to his father. “I believe this belongs to your heir.”
His father’s eyes narrowed and he extended his hand tentatively, as though he feared this were a trick. Joshua dropped the ring onto his palm.
His hand felt naked without it and he massaged the empty spot. He had worn that ring since he was twelve, moving it from finger to finger as he grew, and now it was gone. It had never been his; he had held onto it too long. Treyford turned it in his hands, inspecting it with a frown, then he slid it onto his own little finger for safekeeping.
Joshua put his glove back on, and once more held out his hand. This time, Treyford did not hesitate to shake it. He bowed. His father bowed. Then Joshua turned and headed for his wife.
Chapter 25
At first, Cassandra had eyes only for Lucy, whose dancing was perfection and behavior exemplary, and with each dance step more of Cassandra’s worry melted. If the whispers she overheard were any guide, London was already smitten.
But then her eyes were scanning the sea of dark coats, moving over them quickly, for the men inside them were tepid and dull. Only one was dynamic and alive, and when their eyes met, the music faded and he was the only man in the room.
For a beat of her heart—two beats, three—she was the only woman.
If they were the only couple in the room, why, he would cross the floor and sweep her into his arms, and they would waltz—
Waltz? Joshua? Not likely. And what need had she of a waltz, anyway? What need had she of a man who knew the right time to sit and the right time to stand and could say the right things while saying nothing at all?
None of that mattered. It was this man she needed: strong and true, caring and vulnerable. He lived by his values, he was buffeted by his emotions, he changed things for the better, and he had so much love to give that he did not know what to do and drove himself mad trying to hide it.
She almost shook with the intensity of her yearning. If only she could tell him: “It’s you. It’s only you. Don’t leave me. I need you.”
And he would laugh and say, “Been in the brandy again, Mrs. DeWitt?” and then he’d run as fast as he could.
Someone jostled her. She had to turn and when she looked back at him, couples blocked her view.
“With looks like that, your sister might survive your family’s shame.” The sly female voice slithered over Cassandra’s spine. “Then again, she might become a courtesan.”
Lady Bolderwood.
Disbelieving, Cassandra took in the fair curls, the extravagant gown, the nasty little smirk. No surprise that Lady Bolderwood was being insulting. No surprise, even, that she had addressed Cassandra when they had ignored each other for a week.
But a great surprise that the woman even attended the duchess’s ball.
Others were watching. Cassandra lifted her chin and, without a word, gave Lady Bolderwood her back: the cut direct.
She spied her grandmother three potted palms away and marched right to her.
“There you are, Cassandra, my dear,” the duchess said. “Shall we declare Lucy a success?”
“Why is Lady Bolderwood here?” Cassandra demanded.
The duchess cocked an eyebrow. “The invitations went out long before your little dramas came to town.”
“Grandmother, you should have revoked her invitation. This is my sister’s debut!”
“And my ball. I do not live to do your bidding, Cassandra.”
“We are family,” Cassandra said. “I thought I could count on your support.”
The duchess’s lips tightened. “You ignore my advice, you manipulate my husband, you force me to shelve my interests for the sake of your own, and then you have the impertinence to address me thus at my own ball?”
Cassandra struggled under the weight of the accusations. Put like that, she sounded awful. No wonder her grandmother resented her.
Habit had her ready to apologize, and yet—No, she decided. She had not manipulated or forced anybody. She was entitled to her own decisions and opinions, and she would never be ashamed of supporting her sister.
But before she could tell her grandmother exactly that, the music ended, closing the waltz with a smattering of applause. The crowd began to mill and the orchestra launched into a bright, fast reel, but they were too eager, it was too soon, and they stopped again abruptly, creating an unexpected silence, into which rose the voice of Lady Bolderwood.
“…but the old duchess has life in her yet. At least, she has Sir Arthur Kenyon in her. Indeed, I hear he’s in her most afternoons.”
The crude barb rose into the silence and exploded like a firework. A million scandalized faces turned their way. The duchess gasped. Her hand flew to her throat and the ugly color of humiliation mottled her cheeks. Her mouth opened, closed, worked, and she glanced about, wide-eyed and panicked. Titters rippled outward, and the proud duchess looked ready to faint.
With quick steps, Cassandra planted herself in front of her grandmother and indicated for her grandmother’s friends to join her in making a human wall.
“Oops,” came Lady Bolderwood’s giggle. “I ought not have spoken so loudly. Still, ’tis not as though everyone did not already know.”
Too much. Cassandra’s head spun, her elbows floated, and it vaguely occurred to her that rage acted upon her like a potent brandy. She seemed to grow to twice her height and her mind was clear and sharp. She pivoted slowly, dimly noting the audience, Joshua striding toward her, but ignoring them all. She was a fierce falcon now, and her prey was a rodent with sly eyes. She was hardly aware her legs moved and, when she spoke, she did not know her own voice.
“You disgusting, despicable viper!” Cassandra hissed in Lady Bolderwood’s smirking face. “Have you become so grubby that you must sully everything else too?”
Lady Bolderwood tossed her head. “You are so naive, Mrs. DeWitt.”
“The games you and your husband play in your bedchamber have distorted your view, Lady Bolderwood, and now you cannot tell what is real and what is not.” She stepped closer. The viscountess stepped back, so Cassandra stepped closer again. “How dare you mock and judge, you malicious, vile asp? How dare you let your own corruption pollute someone else’s honor? How dare you insult my grandmother?”
Lady Bolderwood screwed up her face, as Harry stumbled up to them. A strong presence warmed her side: Joshua.
“How dare you speak to me like that?” Lady Bolderwood snarled. “I am a viscountess and your better.”
“My better?” Cassandra scoffed. “You are not the better of the lowliest, filthiest worm crawling on its belly through the muck.”
“Here, don’t speak to her like that,” Harry broke in. “DeWitt, control your wife.”
Joshua pressed a firm hand to her waist. “Not a chance,” he said cheerfully. “She’s splendid when she loses control.”
“Leave,” Cassandra said. “Both of you. Now.”
“You are nobody, Mrs. DeWitt,” sneered the viper. “You cannot make us leave.”
“But I can.”
The Duke of Sherbourne.
Her grandfather was not a tall man, but as one of the most senior men of the age, he did not need to be. Harry, at least, was smart enough to duck his head in deference.
Also joining them were Arabella and Lord Hardbury, the Duke of Dammerton, and…was that the Earl of Treyford? Heavens. Arabella caught her eye and winked. Behold the vanguard of the DeWitt
army.
The duke looked down his nose at Harry. “You are not welcome here, Bolderwood. Years ago, I told my son he should have called you out for your treatment of Cassandra, but Charles said he wearied of bloodshed and was glad you had cleared the way for her to marry a good man. I did not understand what he meant until now. You disgust me.” He looked the younger man over coldly. “Do not think I am too old to call you out myself.”
“Nor I,” proclaimed Treyford, causing a dozen heads to swivel in surprise. “I used to love a good duel. Something about the smell of gunpowder in the morning.”
Cassandra was starting to wonder if she had hit her head and this was a dream.
“No duels, please,” drawled the Duke of Dammerton. “Much better sport will be watching Bolderwood’s face on Monday when the court hears the full story of how he stole Mr. DeWitt’s personal letters, bribed witnesses to provide false testimony, and prepared to perjure himself. All in a feeble plot to defraud Mr. DeWitt of money, because Bolderwood is too feckless to pay his own debts.”
Bolderwood looked around wildly like a cornered fox, edging closer to his wife, his sole remaining ally. He saw Joshua and prepared to attack—Joshua raised an eyebrow and he fell silent.
But the one thing an aristocrat always had was his composure, and Harry’s did not let him down.
“Come along, Phyllis,” he said. “I grow tired of this ball. Let us seek more diverting entertainment.”
With a sharp look at Cassandra, Lady Bolderwood took her husband’s arm and they swept out through the hostile crowd.
Cassandra could not applaud, but she did clap her hands together once as she turned to check on her grandmother. The duchess stood still and straight, her eyes locked with those of the duke, the couple engaged in the kind of silent conversation that was possible after a marriage of more than four decades. Then Her Grace inclined her head and swept out of the ballroom, two friends and her husband in her wake.
With the drama passed, the audience dispersed.
Joshua still had his arm around her waist. “Well done, Mrs. DeWitt! I am very impressed.”
Giggles bubbled up in her. “I think your father offered to fight a duel over my honor. What on earth is going on?”
“Don’t tell anyone, but I suspect your grandmother put something in the punch.”
“That would explain why everything tonight is topsy-turvy. This is the exact opposite of the first night we went out together.” She began to soften into him, then remembered where they were. “When you argued with your father and I tried to calm you down.”
“You mean the rout when you spent the whole time imagining women putting their mouths—?”
“I didn’t!” she protested. “Well, not the whole time.”
His laughter warmed her as no fire could, and all she wanted was more of him. To retreat to their own world and forget everyone else.
Which was difficult, when everyone else was in the same room and giving them little looks.
“Lucy is like an angel tonight,” she said. “I keep waiting for her to set fire to something, but she has not put a toe wrong since we left our house. Everyone already adores her and she will be a great success if…” She searched his eyes. “Do you think it will last?”
“I think you should stop worrying about her. Let her do the worrying for once. A wise woman told me we should enjoy things while we can.”
Cassandra felt odd, for as she opened her mouth to answer, she was sure that somewhere inside her lay the right words to fix everything.
If only she could find them.
But she did not. Because first the music started, and then the music stopped.
And then came the laugh.
Lucy’s laugh, washing over the crowd like a shower of stars, a laugh calculated to turn heads, a charm that turned thinking humans into automatons.
A laugh Cassandra knew too well.
“Oh no,” she muttered. “What has she done now?”
What Lucy had done, Joshua saw as they pushed closer through the crush, was commandeer a footman bearing a silver tray loaded with glasses of champagne. Most were full, a couple were empty; he suspected from Lucy’s color that they had been emptied into her. She had also gathered a small band of spellbound young men who feasted their eyes on her every move.
Lucy selected a full glass from the tray and raised it as if making a toast.
“Whoever catches this glass,” she announced, “that man shall have a waltz.”
She tossed back the champagne in a few neat gulps and then hurled the glass into the air. A scramble ensued and the men leaped high, displaying skills honed on the cricket fields of Eton and Harrow. One proud victor caught the glass with a “hurrah!”. His rivals sportingly slapped his back and they all turned back to Lucy, like so many panting puppy dogs eager to fetch a stick.
“I’m going to kill her,” Cassandra muttered. “This time, I’m truly going to kill her.”
Fair enough. Even Joshua could see that this was bad. He shouldered through the resistant crush toward Lucy.
Lucy raised another glass. “Whoever catches this glass, that man shall have a kiss.”
A cheer met this announcement. She drained the drink and sent the glass flying. The scrambling halted Joshua’s progress, until a victor flourished the glass to a fresh round of cheers. “A kiss! A kiss! A kiss!”
Lucy laughed again, raised another full glass, in an unsteady hand, champagne sloshing over the rim.
“Whoever catches this glass, that man I shall marry!”
The puppy dogs howled.
Joshua shoved closer, not taking his eyes off Lucy’s hand, the hand lifting the glass, the glass that must not fly, the glass that was almost at her lips, the glass that was almost in his grasp when—She spied him from the corner of her eye. Guessed his purpose.
And with a graceful swing of her arm, Lucy sent the still-full glass arcing through the air.
It tumbled end on end, dumping a shower of champagne on squealing ladies and hollering men, yet still arcing up, up over the reaching, grasping fingers, headed straight for the massive chandelier. In horror, he imagined it smashing into an iron arm and showering glass upon skin and eyes. But by the luck of Lucy’s devil, the glass lodged precariously between two branches. A few candles puttered out. The chandelier rocked. The glass slipped, the crowd gasped, the glass stuck again.
The young men jostled around under it. At the center, Joshua saw to his relief, was Lord Hardbury, tall, fierce, and safely married, scowling and ready to spring.
But one young man proved to be enterprising: He pulled off one of his shoes and threw it hard at the chandelier. The chandelier rocked. The glass slipped. Another shoe followed and the glass slid from its perch. The young men surged, arms outstretched, knocking even Hardbury off balance as they wrestled, jostled, forming a forest of seeking fingers. The glass bounced against those fingers, jumped, bounced further, jumped, bounced, jumped, and the best hope now was that it fell and smashed.
Until one hand broke through the others, a large gloved hand attached to the black sleeve of a tall, dark-haired gentleman, who plucked the glass out of the air.
Then hand and glass disappeared into the crowd.
Everyone froze. Silence fell. Joshua could not see the man’s face. A moment later, he could not see the man at all.
“Him!” Lucy bellowed, pointing. “I shall marry that man! Stand aside, London. That man is mine!”
Obediently, slowly, the scandalized, titillated crowd parted, murmuring, shuffling, craning their necks, to reveal—
A footman.
Everyone gasped.
The footman was short. He wore red livery and an expression of sheer terror.
“It wasn’t me,” the footman stammered, holding the glass away from him as though it were poisoned. “Please. I’m sorry. It wasn’t me.”
“Who was it, then?” someone yelled.
“I believe it was a, ah, a Scottish gentleman.”
Heads tur
ned, but the tall, nimble-fingered Scotsman had wisely made his escape.
“A Scotsman!” Lucy cried. “I’m going to marry a Scotsman.”
Most of the ladies looked suitably scandalized. Most of the gentlemen looked faintly bemused. But Lucy’s new circle of fervent admirers, a quartet of wild young bucks, clapped and cheered.
Which is possibly why Lucy flung her arms wide, tilted back her head, and broke into song.
“Should auld acquaintance be forgot—” Off-key, and more of a bellow than a tune; usually, she sang angelically, but usually, she was not drunk. “And never brought to mine—”
Hand flung out like an Italian soprano, she wobbled the last awful note, sounding increasingly like a sick cow as she ran out of air. The sounds faded into the hush of a crowd that did not know what to do next.
Then the young bucks slung their arms around each other’s shoulders and bellowed in response:
“Should auld acquaintance be forgot, And days of auld lang syne.”
Joshua gripped Lucy’s elbow.
“Time to go,” he said.
“I just need to—”
“You are not leaving my sight until you are locked in your room.”
“Are you pleased with yourself, Lucy dearest?” Cassandra had joined them. She looked frighteningly calm, but for the color staining her cheeks and the shrillness of her tone. This did not bode well. The last time Joshua saw her like that, she had overturned a chair. “Did you get sufficient attention? Have you ruined us enough or have you something else in mind?”
“Oh Mother Cassandra, isn’t this fun?” Somehow, Lucy had another full glass of champagne. “You should drink more.”
She lifted the glass to her lips, smiled angelically, and with a flick of her wrist, threw the contents straight at Cassandra.
Cassandra gasped, stepped back. She was quick, but not quick enough: The champagne missed her face and hit her square on the bodice. The bodice of her white, silk dress, pressing the thin fabric to her skin and—
Joshua nearly sprained something getting his coat off; certainly, he heard seams tear. Lucy was laughing, London was watching, as he wrapped his coat around his wife, who hugged it tightly over her chest.