Today she had nothing scheduled until evening, a rare and unusual occurrence. She filled her days with the general activities expected of a woman of her station—making calls, corresponding with her acquaintances, charity works, social events. Her days were perhaps fuller than most; she had been burdened with a surfeit of imagination since childhood and in the past three years she had accepted nearly every invitation that had come her way in a desperate bid to occupy her thoughts with something other than Adrian.
Over the years she had thought of him less and less often, although there were moments that could wrench her back into the past—or the future that had been snatched from her. Mothers snuggling their plump-cheeked babies. Couples sneaking off into the gardens for an illicit rendezvous. She had allowed these things to hurt her, however unintentionally. For once she wanted to see such things without those pangs of envy or regret.
“Here you are, my lady.” Victoria, her lady’s maid, careened down the stairs, a pair of gloves clutched in her hands.
“Thank you, Victoria,” Jilly said, accepting the gloves offered to her and drawing them on. “Are you ready?”
“I am. Mr. Fenton has got the carriage being sent round.” She peeked past Jilly to catch a glimpse of herself in the antique mirror situated on the wall just before the door. Victoria had a amusing tendency toward vanity, which perhaps ought to be unseemly in a lady’s maid, but had never bothered Jilly in the least. Between the two of them, Victoria might well have been the better dressed today, in one of Jilly’s old cast-off gowns. Out of style, perhaps, but still just as lovely, and Victoria wore it far better than Jilly ever had—the pink had clashed dreadfully with the red in Jilly’s hair, but looked quite elegant with Victoria’s blond locks.
Jilly’s own dress was a simple green cambric walking dress. Frills and ruffles had never suited her as they had the other girls. She didn’t have the sweet, delicate beauty that they had; she would have looked ridiculous in some of the popular fashions.
At least her advanced years had given her some freedom. Now that she had made it clear that she did not intend to cast her line out in search of a husband, she was afforded some choice over her own garments. Perhaps she was still limited from the darker colors that matrons could safely don, but she could choose between far more shades than just those favored by the new debutantes—shades that flattered her rather than making her skin look sallow or her hair carroty.
And there were only a few years remaining until she would have access to the funds that had been laid aside for her dowry. Once she had that in hand, her freedom would be absolute. No longer would she be forced to drag a maid along with her whenever she wanted to leave the house. She could travel, could see the world as she’d longed to do—perhaps she would take a tour of the continent, when the war was over.
“My lady?” Victoria touched her shoulder lightly, jerking her out of her reverie. “The carriage has arrived.”
Frowning, Jilly patted at her hair, tucking an errant curl that had slipped free of its pin back behind her ear. “Thank you, Victoria,” she said.
Fenton had returned to his post in the foyer, his ancient bones creaking with strain as he wrenched the door open, bowing as she and Victoria passed him on their way out the door. She thought she detected a hint of reproach in his watery blue eyes, as if he knew quite well that she had not asked permission of Aunt Marcheline—ostensibly her chaperone—to leave the house.
He knew, also, that Aunt Marcheline rarely rose before noon and certainly would not come downstairs until at least two. And Jilly was not so inclined to wait upon Aunt Marcheline until then. Besides, she was just five months shy of three and twenty, and so long as she took her maid along with her, there was nothing improper about it. She fluttered her gloved fingers at Fenton as she climbed into the carriage, and after Victoria situated herself on the seat across from Jilly, the carriage rumbled into motion.
The book shop was only a few streets away, well within walking distance, but David had insisted upon commissioning a new carriage bearing the crest of the Earl of Westwood, and if he had elected to pop off to Scotland, Jilly supposed she ought to get some use out of it. The black-lacquered exterior was elegant, the carriage well-sprung and tastefully decorated, which, given David’s regrettable tendencies toward excess, had come as a bit of surprise.
Though she didn’t exactly disapprove of her brother, it had been unfortunate that he had come into his title so early. He had been only eighteen and Jilly just twelve when their parents had passed to the scarlet fever that had swept through the village near their country estate. So many of their servants had lived in the village, coming up daily to perform their tasks, that it had been impossible to say which of them had unwittingly infected the late earl and his countess. And though Jilly had been safe in the nursery, and David away at university, their parents had taken ill and passed so quickly that there hadn’t even been time for the steward to write David of their parents’ illness before it had become necessary to inform him of their passing.
Jilly had been bewildered to find herself an orphan so suddenly. She had needed David then, but he had entrusted her instead to the care of her governess, and so she had grown up quite alone until she had been deemed old enough to make her debut in London.
She had always wished that she and David had been closer, but too many years and responsibilities had separated them, and if he thought of her at all, it was with vague, but absent, affection. Aside from Aunt Marcheline, he was her only family. She would have given anything to feel as if she had a brother in anything more than name.
She felt the carriage slowing and twitched aside the drapes covering the windows to reveal the street. They had stopped just before the book shop, its shiny glass windows revealing rows and rows of shelves lined with leather-bound volumes. A few new titles graced the display in the window, arranged with loving care.
This time of day the street was congested with foot traffic, not carriages, and so the coachman could safely wait outside the shop for her. He helped her down from the carriage, careful to touch only her gloved hand as she alighted onto the sidewalk, and jumped back into his seat once Victoria had also scrambled out.
Jilly watched Victoria’s face settled into a frown as she noted their destination. She did not approve of reading in general, said it gave a woman too many ideas, that no gentleman wished to take a woman to wife who knew more than he did.
Reaching into her reticule, Jilly withdrew a silver crown and tucked it into Victoria’s palm. “Go have an ice,” she said, nodding to the store beside the book shop. “And perhaps find something for lunch.”
Victoria’s face bloomed with a smile. “Thank you, my lady, I will,” she said, and trundled along, eager to sample something sweet rather than be cooped up within the musty old book shop while her mistress browsed. She ought not to have done—Aunt Marcheline would have stormed about it if she knew—but with the right inducement, nearly any guard could be slipped. Luckily for Jilly, Victoria’s price was simply a lemon ice and a slice of kidney pie.
The bookseller, Mr. Finchley, greeted her as she entered the shop. “G’morning, my lady,” he said, in his blustery, jovial tone. “Come for something new?”
She grinned back at him. Mr. Finchley was perhaps the only gentleman of her acquaintance who did not disapprove of her reading habits. His kindness might only be due to the fact that she kept coin in his purse with her dedicated patronage, but she suspected that he simply loved the written word as she did, and did not think that enjoyment thereof ought to be limited to one gender.
“Yes, sir,” she said. “Mansfield Park? I believe it is newly out.”
His face fell, and he adjusted the silver spectacles on his nose. “I’m right sorry, my lady,” he said. “But we only had the three copies, and they’ve all been sold.” He pulled out a ledger from beneath the counter and flipped through the pages, scouring his notes. “I’ve put in an order for more,” he said. “But it seems the publisher has been quite
overwhelmed by demand, and it may be some time yet before I get in any new copies. I’ll be happy to hold one over for you if you like, and send a note round when it comes in.”
Disappointment flared, but she shoved it aside. “Thank you,” she said. “That would be lovely. If you don’t mind, I’ll browse a bit.”
“Take your time, my lady, take your time. Do let me know if I may offer any assistance.” He snagged his spectacles off his face and scrubbed at them with a cloth in an effort to banish the motes of dust that had settled onto the lenses.
She turned to the stacks, relishing the distinctive scent of the paper and ink, the heady richness of the tomes bound in leather. She had probably half an hour or so before Victoria would return, before she would once again become captive to propriety’s dictates.
It was here amongst the shelves that she was happiest, she thought. Within the pages of the books she had collected, she could soar away to distant lands, forget for a while her own worries and live vicariously through characters who laughed, struggled, suffered, and loved. They became as familiar as old friends, and she frequently found herself rereading old favorites, rediscovering the magic of their journeys, and reveling in their victories once again. They were comfortable and predictable and constant—everything her life had not been.
The bell adorning the door of the shop jingled cheerily to herald the arrival of a new customer. She heard, distantly, Mr. Finchley’s greeting, and a low response. Her attention was caught by a book on a high shelf—The Corsair, by Lord Byron. Personally Jilly considered his work a trifle overblown, but he was a frequent subject of London salons and drawing rooms, and she had yet to purchase that particular title. She stretched onto her toes, reaching for the volume. A curl fell from its pins, bobbing before her eyes, and she puffed it away in annoyance. Blast, she was still some inches from snatching the volume from its shelf. An inarticulate sound of irritation broke from her throat as she debated calling for Mr. Finchley—the man was only an inch or two taller, and he would doubtless have to fetch a stool to retrieve the volume for her. It seemed an imposition, and not one she was sure she wished to make for a book she wasn’t even certain she actually wanted.
That blasted curl again—she pushed it back once more and fisted her hands on her hips, staring up at the volume as if she could will it to leap down into her hands.
As she considered her choices, she heard the approach of another patron, the clear staccato of booted feet on the floor behind her. She paid no attention, expecting the man to pass her by, but the footsteps paused, and a silky chuckle washed over her, eliciting a rise of gooseflesh upon her arms.
“Allow me.” A muscular arm clad in a dark blue coat sleeve slipped past her vision, handily reaching the volume that had so vexed her and fetching it down.
He had spoken only two words, but she had already known who she would find as she turned to accept the book. She drew in a bracing breath and looked straight into the laughing blue eyes of the Duke of Rushton.
Chapter Five
“Your Grace,” she said, between tightly clenched teeth. “Are you perhaps often given to following women into book shops?”
He blinked as if baffled by the tartness of her speech. “Not generally, no,” he said. “As it happens, I did not follow you by design. I was seeking a book for a friend, and you simply happened to be here when I arrived.”
Skeptically, she inquired, “Which book?”
“Mansfield Park,” he said. “It has proven difficult to locate. This is not the first book shop I’ve visited today.”
She narrowed her eyes, scrutinizing him. “And yet you continued browsing?”
“I saw you reaching for this,” he said, holding aloft the book. “I thought to assist you. Good God,” he said, as he read the title for the first time. “Byron? Really?”
“He’s quite popular,” she said defensively, snatching the volume from his fingers. “I don’t recall asking for your opinion of my taste in literature.”
“That’s good, because I surely would have offended you with it.” He scowled as if the book had rendered some heinous insult to him. “I doubt I will ever understand what it is that people see in his work. He says little of substance and yet somehow manages to go on and on about it.”
Jilly was startled into a flutter of laughter; he had somehow managed to echo the very thought she had had often enough about the much-celebrated author. While she did not precisely dislike him, she certainly did not hold him in the same regard that most of the Ton did.
“If you want something worth reading,” he said as he scanned the shelves and selected another book, “might I recommend this instead?” He offered the book to her, and she took it with a strange sense of astonishment, as if the very earth had tilted beneath her feet in an effort to cast her off.
“I have it already,” she said, staring down at the leather-bound cover of The Wanderer. It had been widely criticized upon release due to its portrayal of a woman desperately seeking control over her own destiny, its unflattering depiction of the upper class. But she had liked it quite a bit, and it occupied an honored space on her book shelf, a novel not intended simply to provide escape from a harsh reality but to remind the reader of it. That the duke thought it worth reading when she had yet to hear a single flattering word said of it amongst any of her acquaintances was surprising.
“I enjoyed it,” he said. “Despite what the critics said of it, I found it to be a compelling narrative.”
So had she. She had empathized with the protagonist, who had found herself cast adrift, toppled from her genteel life into poverty. In her life she had found that men frequently considered women good for nothing but decoration. It had come as no surprise, then, that the novel had been roundly condemned by them, as they were loath to consider that there could be anything of a woman’s struggles that was worthy of note.
“I wouldn’t have thought you were the sort that would enjoy it,” she said.
He arched a golden brow, his mouth curled into a sardonic smile. “I wouldn’t have thought you were the sort to enjoy Byron,” he said.
“I don’t,” she replied. “Not really—but he is discussed so often I thought I should at least form an opinion of his latest.” Why had she told him that? She didn’t care for his opinion of her.
And yet his smile of approval warmed her, like the sun emerging from behind the clouds. She felt her cheeks heating at the realization, and hoped that the interior of the shop was dim enough to hide it from his view.
By the ever-widening grin he gave, she guessed that it had not. She closed her eyes, only just holding in a groan of mortification. Something touched her ear—his gloved hand, tucking that stray curl back behind it. She felt the shock of that small touch all the way to her toes, which tingled in her shoes.
“Your Grace,” she protested, skittering back a step. “This is…entirely inappropriate.”
“It’s a public shop,” he said. “You are in no danger from me.”
But she was. If a simple touch could so rattle her, she was most certainly in danger. When he looked at her in that way, as if he could see every single longing she had kept sealed within her heart, all she could think of was how very soft his lips looked, what it would feel like if he kissed her. She was certain she’d gone at least a shade redder.
“My…my maid. She will be waiting for me.” The words sounded just as unsettled as she felt.
“Then you must return to her, of course,” he said. And after a long, tense moment of silence, where she could not quite make her feet move her away from him, he asked, “I suppose you will be in attendance at Lady Lennox’s ball on Friday?”
She nodded, alarmed by the way her heart had leapt in eagerness.
“Will you save a waltz for me?” he asked.
“Yes,” she heard herself answer breathlessly, like a silly young girl. “I mean, no. No, I—I don’t know.” And then, spurred by the amusement sparking in his eyes, she whirled with a dismayed gasp, and fled.
∞∞∞
She’d scurried away like a timid little mouse, abandoning The Corsair on a dusty shelf as she did. He’d smothered his amusement lest she think he had been mocking her, but he was pleased by her reaction—he would have sworn she was far too dignified to blush like a girl fresh from the school room. But blush she had, wildly, as if just the touch of his fingers to the soft skin just behind her ear had provoke all sorts of wicked thoughts.
He wondered absently what a woman like her would even know of wickedness. Surely if there had been even a hint of impropriety about her she would never be accepted in London. But she wasn’t an empty-headed young girl; she was a woman grown, and most of her friends were matrons. Surely they had nattered to her about their marriages, whispered secrets of what sort of pleasures—or lack thereof, given his understanding of men’s attitudes toward their wives—awaited there.
What, precisely, had crossed her mind in that moment where her face had flooded scarlet? He would have given his right arm to find out.
His brow furrowed as he became discomfited by the realization that the desire to know had nothing at all to do with his plans for her. Despite his scheme, he was beginning to suspect that his interest in her was something less than contrived—that, had none of this wretched business with her brother ever come to pass and he had simply seen her in a ballroom or at some other society function, she might very well have captured it all on her own.
∞∞∞
“Lemon ice?” Victoria proffered the treat as Jilly clamored into the carriage and dropped into her seat.
“Thank you, Victoria, but no.” The words came out steadily enough, but her heart was thundering in her chest as if she’d run a mile. Every bit of her was unsettled—she feared if she tried to eat the sweet that Victoria had offered, she might very well cast up her accounts on the floor of the carriage. She hadn’t felt like this since—
She had never felt like this. This was madness.
His Favorite Mistake Page 4