“I see you understand,” Mrs. Snowley said, obviously misinterpreting Bianca’s silent trip down memory lane.
What Bianca understood was that she hadn’t a single ally in this house.
She had to marry, but what if Mrs. Snowley was right and neither Lord Brimsbane nor Lord Rigsby intended to offer for her?
She couldn’t stay in a house with only her father and stepmother as the other residents. Where did that leave her? Traveling about, claiming a closer friendship with her many acquaintances than she truly had? Depending upon the kindness of others to house and feed her until her brother was home to act as some form of buffer?
She had to marry the first man who asked.
“Now”—Mrs. Snowley clasped her hands together—“I’ve arranged for your father to invite Mr. Mead and his son over this morning. I suggest you be at your prettiest because I’ve talked to Mr. Theophilus Mead, and the man might very well offer for you. Possibly even today.”
Perhaps not the first man who asked, then. How long could she manage to avoid Mr. Mead? Was marrying him better than living with the growing barbs of her stepmother? Was it better than watching the man she prayed and wished would notice her married to her sister-in-law? Was it better than entering into marriage with a man whose company she enjoyed but whose situation was a complete mystery?
When she looked at it that way, there wasn’t an appealing option in her life right now.
Mrs. Snowley curved her lips. It was a smile by definition, but there was no kindness to it. Perhaps some happiness, as she seemed to get a great deal of glee out of making Bianca miserable.
“Now. I’ve told Dorothy to ready your best morning dress. She’ll be upstairs to get you ready. You should probably remain in your room until Mr. Mead arrives. It will be quite dramatic if he sees you coming down the stairs.” She clapped her hands together. “It will also prevent you from being a distraction when Sir Joseph comes to collect Marianne. She and the baronet are going for a ride in his phaeton.”
A baronet. Marianne was trying to land a baronet, which was more than respectable for the daughter of a gentleman. It also explained why she was no longer hoping for a continued connection between Bianca and one of the viscounts.
To buy herself time, Bianca took a large gulp of tea. “You wish me to skip riding this morning?”
Mrs. Snowley waved a hand through the air. “You’ve plenty of time to ride once you get married. I chose Mr. Mead for that exact reason. You want horses, I’m giving you horses. Don’t think for one moment that once Lord Stildon marries his new wife they will take kindly to the amount of time you spend over there.”
Her stepmother raised her hands and pressed lightly at the edges of her eyes. “Rising at such an hour to talk to you privately is simply exhausting. Oh, the things a mother does.”
Bianca bit her lips to keep from laughing out loud.
“But you’ve thwarted me at every turn. Still, I’m watching over you. This offer from Mr. Mead will set you up in the life you want, or at least the one you’ve always said you wanted. There’s nothing I can do if you’ve spent all these years lying to me.”
Then she left the room.
Bianca pushed her plate away and stared at the mangled piece of toast. Her future was certainly looking bleak. One thing was certain, though—Bianca was about to thwart her stepmother once again.
She was going for a ride, and she’d be taking her father’s horse.
Whether her stepmother had meant to or not, she’d helped Bianca this morning. When faced with the possibility of gaining what she’d always said she wanted, everything in her said no. So, what did she actually want?
It was time to truly look at her life in a way she never had before.
She pushed back from the table and headed to the stables, hoping the horses were feeling sprightly because it was going to be a good, long time before she chose to come back.
THE BLUE SKY mocked her as she allowed the horse to plod along at a walk. Given that she intended to roam the Newmarket countryside until she knew what she wanted to do, she didn’t want to tire the horse out.
Still, the weather could have cooperated by being grey and dismal to match her mood. Instead, it was the sort of day that Hudson would have loved. Even now he was probably racing Hades along the Heath, glorying in the happy weather.
Did he wish she was with him?
She certainly wished she was.
But was that stopping her from seeing her true opportunities?
She dropped her head back and looked up at the sky, feeling entirely alone. She’d avoided the Heath and cut across the fields in order to have isolation, and the groom respectfully was staying several feet behind her.
It wasn’t helping.
“Lord,” she whispered, “I know it isn’t Sunday, but I hope you’re listening anyway. Have I gone too far down the wrong road? Is there no hope left for a happy life for me? Should I accept Mr. Mead?”
Nausea crawled up the back of her throat at the very idea of accepting that man, but wasn’t the Bible full of people who’d suffered because it was the choice God wanted them to make? Had He given her a lifetime of learning how to be alone because she was destined to be lonely for the rest of her life?
It didn’t seem right, but then again, what did she know? Should she ride over to the rectory? Would the priest laugh at her for such a question? Would he tell Mrs. Snowley, or worse, her father?
“Do you still deal in signs, God? Because I could use one now,” she grumbled.
“Good morning, Miss Snowley.”
The deep voice caused Bianca to jump until she’d nearly unseated herself. She had to grip the reins, mane, and even the front of the saddle to keep herself from spilling to the ground. She turned to look at the speaker.
Lord Rigsby was riding toward her atop the glorious animal she’d seen him on before. She had adored many a horse in her time, but never had she seen an animal like this. His powerful legs and intelligent eyes were the marks of a champion. It was obvious why Lord Rigsby hadn’t braved the crowd to meet Lady Rebecca.
Bianca fixed her seat and straightened her riding jacket. “Lord Rigsby. I see you are out enjoying the first truly fine day we’ve had in a while.”
“Yes.” He glanced up at the sky and then took in the area around her. “This isn’t where you told me you like to ride.”
He’d remembered their conversation from the assembly? That was a good sign, wasn’t it? Bianca might not wake up thinking about seeing Lord Rigsby, but he was a good man. She could learn to be happy with him.
She could.
She smiled. “I was thinking I’d try something different today.”
“Perhaps I could accompany you for a ways?” He turned his horse until he was facing the same way she was.
“That would be nice.” And it would be. Perhaps that was what Bianca needed. A ride without agonizing over her future, so that when she returned, everything would once more be in perspective.
They rode a path through a grove of trees, and the scattered shadows played across the horses’ manes and the man next to her. The groom continued to plod along behind them, his expression conveying that he wasn’t entirely sure what he was supposed to do in this situation.
Bianca wasn’t either.
“Your horse is lovely,” she said.
Lord Rigsby chuckled. “My father hates that I’ve chosen Sunset’s Pride as my mount. Said he should be protected at an estate somewhere in the country.”
“A beautiful stepper like that shouldn’t be ignored.”
He gave her a searching look. “I agree. I never saw the point of confining a horse to lack of exercise simply because he was good blood.”
The conversation fell into an easy discussion of their favorite horses, their difficulties, and how he was starting his own stock so his father couldn’t tell him how to run it.
Bianca bit her lip. “Do you think you’ll choose Newmarket?”
“I might.” He shifted in his seat. “I do
like it, but I haven’t decided yet if the society is the right fit. Since I intend to be involved with my horses, I want to choose somewhere I want to live.”
Bianca chuckled. “And you haven’t found everyone here to be to your liking?”
“I haven’t met everyone here.”
“How true. Have you ranged beyond the assembly-going set?”
“As social gatherings are where new people in town tend to meet others, no, I haven’t,” he said in a dry voice, accompanied by a tiny crooked smile that seemed somehow familiar. Perhaps it was simply the friendliness such an expression evoked.
“Well,” Bianca said, “there are wonderful people who don’t attend assemblies and card parties.”
“Friends of yours?”
Bianca thought of the fun she’d had with Hudson and Mr. Whitworth and even the grooms of Hawksworth. “Yes.”
“I would love to meet them, then.”
Bianca blinked at the warmness of his tone. “You would?”
He nodded. “If they are friends of yours, I would be interested in meeting them very much.”
As they approached the lane where Bianca needed to turn off and head home to give her poor horse a rest, Lord Rigsby nudged his horse closer. “We should do this again sometime—on purpose, instead of just by chance.”
She had asked God for a sign. Was this it?
“Yes, we absolutely should.”
They smiled at each other until the groom’s plodding horse came alongside them, then Bianca said her good-byes and turned her mount toward home.
The death of a dream she hadn’t even known she had cried through her as she rode the short distance back to the stable.
Respect was more than some marriages had, so she really shouldn’t be saddened over the prospect. When she considered her situation objectively, Lord Rigsby was a truly ideal choice. After all, she’d be a marchioness with horses and a kind man for a husband. What more could a girl ask for?
In time, she could possibly even learn to love him. It wasn’t as if she was in love with Hudson—she was simply attracted to him, drawn to his personality, and admired the way he’d handled the challenge of moving to a new land. Very well, she also considered him a superb horseman and liked the way he’d accepted Aaron as an equal in the stable and how he’d believed her about her stepmother. She found his humor appealing and liked how he could laugh at himself.
But how was she to know that Lord Rigsby might not have some of those qualities? How was she to know if he did?
For the first time ever, she wished that she’d listened a bit more to Marianne as she went on and on about how women handled men. Bianca could steer a horse anywhere she wished him to go, but Lord Rigsby would likely resent having a bit put in his mouth.
Whatever it was she needed to do, she needed to do it soon, because he just might be her best chance for happiness in a marriage.
An hour ago she’d been crying to God to give her a solution. Now that she had one, she wanted to cry all the more.
Twenty-Eight
To say that Mrs. Snowley was perturbed by Bianca’s missing the Meads’ visit was putting it mildly.
The fact that she once more sent regrets on Bianca’s behalf to a social gathering, took herself and Marianne off to it, and thought that was a punishment only emphasized how little she knew Bianca.
It also emphasized how little Bianca knew herself.
Not too long ago, she would have been devastated at being so intentionally left out of important events, but when the house settled quietly around her, she discovered it was somewhat easier to breathe.
Learning all these truths about herself was leaving her dizzy and insecure. How had she reached the age of four and twenty without having asked herself any of these questions before? She’d never asked herself if she enjoyed parties. She’d simply gone because it was what people did.
She read for a while and then wandered toward her father’s study. Was he in, or had he gone out for the night too?
A lamp sent flickering light across the area in front of the fireplace where he sat reading. He nearly jumped when she knocked on the door. “Oh, Bianca. You didn’t want to go to the party?”
Did he truly not know what Mrs. Snowley was doing? “I’m enjoying a quiet evening.”
He nodded. “I enjoy the evenings too. Everything gets still. It’s like you can hear God breathing.”
Bianca sat in the other chair. “What do you mean?”
“Morning air is always bustling about with the birds and the new day and everything, but now, I suppose it’s the peace of it. Like God’s laying everything in place for it to whirl up again tomorrow.”
“I’ve never looked at it that way.” She tilted her head. “When did you become a philosopher?”
He laughed. “When life needed meaning, I suppose. It was either find the purpose or allow pain and regret to bury me. The second one wasn’t an option. I had children depending on me.”
Bianca sighed as she looked at her father. He cared. He showed it in his own way, but she’d never had reason to doubt that he cared about her. How many other men would even be willing to have their daughters intrude on their quiet solitude?
She rose and kissed him on the head. “I love you, Papa. I’ll leave you to listen to God breathing.”
His chuckle followed her out of the room, and she paused in the corridor to listen to it fade into a happy sigh.
As she trudged to her room, her mind was awash with thoughts. She’d been allowing fear, desperation, and who-even-knew-what-else to push her around. Perhaps it was time she sought out their purpose instead.
THE NEXT MORNING her riding habits were missing. Every. Single. One. Dorothy hadn’t come to her room yet, and the sun was peering over the horizon.
All her steady resolve from the night before was set aside and replaced with utter confusion.
She opened her door and saw Dorothy slowly making her way up the stairs, holding a tray with Bianca’s tea and toast. All the way across the landing and down the short corridor and even into the room, the maid kept her face averted, refusing to meet Bianca’s inquisitive gaze.
Bianca waited until Dorothy set the tray down to speak, so that the fragile-looking maid didn’t drop the entire contents on the floor.
“Do you know where my habits are?”
“Yes, miss.”
Bianca waited. No more answer. Still no eye contact.
“Where are they?”
“In Mrs. Snowley’s dressing room, miss.”
“In Mrs. Snowley’s . . . why on earth are they there?”
Dorothy clasped her hands in front of her and lifted her face, but she still looked somewhere past Bianca’s left shoulder. “She said”—the maid paused to clear her throat—“she said that you needed to be available for visits today, but she refused to get up early in the morning for you again, since you’d been so ungrateful last time.”
Bianca dropped her head back on her shoulders and groaned. When she looked forward again, Dorothy was biting her lip and sneaking longing glances at the door.
“I am well aware that was a quote. I’m not mad at you, Dorothy.” At the end of the day, both of them were at the mercy of the older woman’s whims. “Did she also give instructions as to what I was to wear?”
Dorothy visibly relaxed and rushed to the dressing room. “Yes, miss. The yellow muslin with the green flowers.”
“Let’s put me in it, then.”
An hour later, still well before Mrs. Snowley ever graced the world with her presence, Bianca was settled in the drawing room, poking a needle into a piece of embroidery. She didn’t embroider often—in fact, this piece had been in her work basket for nearly two years now—but it gave her something to do, and she could pretend every stitch was her poking her stepmother with the needle.
After the visits commenced, she was far more occupied imagining ways in which the woman could be rendered mute.
Not anything truly harmful, of course, but something that
would cause the temporary cessation of the ability to talk. A scratched throat, a cold, perhaps even a minor injury, so long as it didn’t cause any real damage. Really, anything that forced the woman to stop making sly stabs at Bianca’s already-weakened confidence would be wonderful.
“It really is a relief that only one of my girls is so particular about her clothing. Bianca’s practicality makes trips to the modiste so much easier.” Mrs. Snowley gave out a tinkling laugh, as if she’d just given Bianca a compliment and not veiled criticism of the boring simplicity of her wardrobe.
Neither Lord Rigsby nor Lord Brimsbane ever seemed to find her clothing lacking. Of course, they’d never been overly complimentary about her appearance either.
Really, though, how did excellent fashion sense make a woman a better wife? Her clothing was sturdy and constructed in a way that it could be cleaned after a day in the stable. No matter how particular Mr. Knight was about the condition of the stable, horses were dirty. They walked about in the dirt and mud, got it caked in their coats and hooves, and occasionally—well, almost daily—some of that dirt got transferred to her. Silks and satins would be ruined in moments, whereas her wool habits had been in circulation through her wardrobe now for months.
Maybe wives weren’t meant to be practical.
Mrs. Addington laughed along with Mrs. Snowley and Marianne.
Marianne always joined in the laughter. When they’d been younger, Bianca had assumed the other girl didn’t truly understand what her mother was laughing at. As a woman full grown, Bianca could no longer grant her such an excuse.
One more relationship that should have—could have—been so much more than it was.
Bianca sighed and slumped into her chair. It wasn’t as if she had any hope of impressing her stepmother and Mrs. Addington. Why did people have to be so exhausting?
In truth, it wasn’t people so much who were exhausting. Most of the time, Bianca liked people in general. It was trying to navigate a relationship that went beyond occasional greetings that drained her.
“Madam,” the butler said, coming in with a card on a silver tray. “There is a lady requesting your permission to call.”
Vying for the Viscount Page 24
