All Dressed in White

by Charis Michaels

  Joseph made a clicking noise and reined the horses away from the bridge, turning back toward Mayfair. “Not a social call so much as . . . going home. To my family. Or, the closest thing I have to a family. The Earl and Countess Falcondale. In Henrietta Place.”

  Must we? thought Tessa, but she said, “Do they know about the baby? The earl and countess?”

  “Probably.”

  “What will we say?”

  “One of the many good things about calling upon the earl and his wife,” he said, “is that we do not have to plan out what we will say.”

  Tessa considered this, an answer that was not really an answer. The earl had been Joseph’s sponsor and mentor and his wife, Lady Piety, was held in the same esteem. Tessa had met them only once, at the wedding, and they had seemed lovely. Their affection for Joseph had been so very clear.

  But to call upon them now? Is this what Tessa’s request had driven Joseph to do?

  But he does not seem outraged, she thought.

  And he had not said no.

  And it was no small thing to be taken, finally, to the home of the people he considered to be his family.

  It was confusing, perhaps; but unless he intended for her to remain hidden in the phaeton while he went inside, it could mean . . . something positive?

  She settled back in the seat. “Of course. An earl and his countess. ‘Old friends.’ Alright.”

  They drove along in silence for a moment, and Joseph said, “I’m not disregarding what you’ve asked, Tessa. Please. Just give me time.”

  Chapter Twenty

  It had been careless and rude of Joseph not to have called on Trevor Rheese, the Earl of Falcondale, and his wife, Lady Piety, since his return from Barbadoes.

  He’d been back in London for more than a week. His correspondence during his ten months away had been spotty. Worst of all, he’d left without saying a proper good-bye.

  Joseph had told himself he’d been rushed, he’d been busy, but the real reason was that he cared about what Trevor and Piety thought of Tessa. Despite his own outrage at her duplicity, he would not have them dislike her. And they would have, immediately, if they had known what she had withheld from him. Their loyalty to Joseph was absolute, and they didn’t know Tessa at all. His solution had been to keep away after the wedding.

  Instead, he had scrawled a quick note before he’d sailed for Barbadoes. It said a hasty farewell and warned Trevor and Piety that his wife “wished for solitude in Belgravia” and please never to call. It had been cryptic and rude, behaviors that he deplored, especially where the earl and countess were concerned, but he had been reeling at the time. The rich gentleman’s daughter who had fallen in love with him—with him, of all people—had in fact wanted only legitimacy for her bastard son. He’d not come so far up in the world after all. Even with all the money and support Trevor had given him.

  Joseph had mailed the note, boarded a steam packet for Barbadoes, and he’d not seen them since the wedding.

  Now, inexplicably, he found himself wanting nothing more than their warm, unconditional affection and embrace.

  And besides, his plan to take Tessa on a tour of his house in Blackheath had been shot. Why take her to his house when what she really wanted was a cottage in bloody Hartlepool, wherever that was.

  But more than anything, he was not ready to return her to Belgravia. The call would buy him time to think through his wife’s very humble, incredibly unexpected request to relocate to the North Sea.

  It was near twelve o’clock when they arrived at Trevor and Piety’s townhome in Henrietta Place, and it occurred to Joseph that they might intrude on luncheon. He could but hope. Eating would give him more time to think, something he sorely needed, and less time for Trevor and Piety to ask pointed questions.

  “You are joking,” drawled Trevor Rheese, the Earl of Falcondale, when he came up behind his butler to see Joseph and Tessa on the stoop.

  “Yes,” said Joseph blandly. “I’m joking. It is not me. This is not my wife. We are not standing in your doorway. I’ve engineered a mirage. Or could it be the result of old age on your eyesight?” At fifty, Trevor was still active and fit, but his encroaching decrepitude was a running joke.

  Tessa laughed, and Joseph was surprised by the sound. She’d laughed at nearly everything he said at Berymede, but now their conversations were very Serious and Important. Had she laughed at him even once since his return? Had he been remotely clever?

  No. I have not. He’d been suspicious and restrained and regretful. No wonder she wished to move to the North Sea.

  But now Trevor was speaking to him in Greek, a long, profanity-laden jab under his breath, and bowing over Tessa’s hand.

  Joseph frowned. “Look at this princely greeting. When have I ever seen you bow over the hand of a lady?”

  “Perhaps if you shared your wife on a more regular basis—or at all—you would enjoy my fine manners. But as it now st—”

  “Oh!” gasped a voice from inside the house. “This wretched month has been saved!” Piety Rheese, the Countess Falcondale, shot out the door and leapt into his arms. “Joe, Joe, Joe! You’ve come home!”

  Joseph caught her and spun, forcing Tessa to scramble back. He caught his wife’s eye and winked. Lady Piety was only a few years older than Joseph, the mother of three boys, and still brightly beautiful. An American by birth, Piety greeted the world with an earnest enthusiasm rarely seen among reserved Britons.

  “And you’ve brought your dear wife!” Piety said, wriggling free and spinning on Tessa.

  Tessa was less prepared for Piety’s voracious embrace, and the two women tipped back on the banister. Trevor and Joseph shouted in union and reached to upright them.

  “But how long have you been back?” demanded Piety. “And you better say less than one day. I will accept no answer beyond, ‘Piety, I’ve been back less than one day.’”

  “Less than a day,” said Joseph.

  “You are lying to us—Trevor, he’s lying—and thank God. Because if you have been in London for any time, any time at all, and you have not sent word, I shall never forgive you. But have you eaten?”

  Joseph glanced at Tessa. She appeared a little stunned by the countess’s reception, but she shrugged. “We have not eaten, but we could not impose.”

  “Stop, of course, you will take luncheon with us immediately.”

  “Don’t you mean he will serve luncheon immediately?” asked Trevor, another long-standing joke.

  Piety rolled her eyes and whispered to a maid. Within moments, they were seated around a massive table while footmen served cold meats and cheese, fresh bread, and quince. Bowls of parsnip soup steamed in the center of each plate. While they ate, Piety peppered Joseph with questions about Barbadoes, the journey, the guano. Every fourth or fifth question, she slipped in a domestic question pointed at Tessa. Nothing too specific, nothing that might press her to reveal more than she wished about her life.

  Tessa was open and cheerful but kept her answers brief. All the while, the earl ate in thoughtful silence. Joseph could feel his old friend keenly studying the two of them.

  “And how have you tolerated the London weather, Tessa?” asked Piety.

  “Spring brought a bit more mud than I am accustomed to,” Tessa said. “You will remember that the homes and roads of Belgravia are still being constructed. Very few streets have been bricked. We navigate less mud, I believe, in Surrey. But summer was lovely. We are so near the park.”

  Joseph cleared his throat. “Perhaps you have not heard . . .” He glanced around the table at the anticipatory expression on Piety’s face. Trevor raised one eyebrow. “Or perhaps you have. Tessa gave birth to a baby in May. A boy. Christian. Christian Chance. My son.”

  Piety leapt from her chair so quickly the footman scrambled to catch it before it tipped backward.

  “But this is what we heard . . .” now tears broke her voice “. . . but we couldn’t be sure, and you sent no word, and we . . . we were desperate to be o
f some assistance and see the baby, but we . . . but we . . .” Now she brought a hand up over her mouth and looked to her husband.

  The earl sighed and put his napkin beside his plate. “You’ll have to forgive my wife, Mrs. Chance,” he said. “Our sons are nearly grown—two of them left for school last week—and she has been driven mad by her limited access to infants. When she detects the presence of a relevant baby anywhere in her proximity, she runs mad. No child is safe, I’m afraid. It can’t be helped. I’m sorry.”

  Joseph chuckled and glanced at Tessa. She was staring at her plate. He said, “Piety, I hope you will forgive our discretion about the baby. I promise, in time, to tell you all about him, and of course introduce you.”

  Piety retook her seat. “Honestly, I care less to learn about the baby and more about holding him in my arms. Will you say again what he’s called? I was too excited to properly take it in.”

  “Christian,” said Tessa. “He’s called Christian. Christian Trevor Chance.”

  And now Piety was out of her chair again, the footman lunging. She rounded the table to embrace Joseph and then Tessa. Joseph caught his wife’s eye as Piety clung to her.

  Thank you, he mouthed. How had he not known the baby’s full name? How had Tessa known the significance of naming him after Trevor?

  Tessa smiled gently, but then Piety released her and held her at arm’s length.

  “Christian Trevor Chance,” said Piety tearfully. “I love it.” She hugged Tessa again. When she finally released her, Piety went to the earl instead of her own seat. Trevor pushed back and she settled in his lap.

  “It’s so very good to see you, Joseph,” sighed Piety. “We think of you every day. Every single day. And, oh, how we have longed to see Tessa. Your wedding was the most beautiful, splendid affair. But there were so many guests, we only had the one brief opportunity to speak to you. I can honestly say it might have been the most lavish wedding I’ve ever had the fortune of attending. Your parents’ estate must be one of the most beautiful in all of England.”

  Tessa smiled. “The wedding seems like a lifetime ago,” she said.

  Silence settled on the room, and Joseph thought about the wedding. It had cost him to keep his friends at bay all this time. He missed Piety’s enthusiasm and Trevor’s pragmatism. He missed their unconditional love. It had been a mistake, perhaps, to not confide in them.

  “Piety?” he asked suddenly. “Could I impose on you to entertain Tessa for a quarter hour or so? I should like to speak alone with Trevor, if he has the time.”

  “Actually, I’m deuced busy today,” drawled Trevor.

  Joseph shook his head. “You are a man of leisure, as anyone who knows you is well aware. One of the many benefits of having a rich wife.”

  “I,” countered Trevor, “am a very important architect.” He tipped Piety from his lap. “World renowned. But I shall make time for you because you’ve finally shown your face after being back in London for . . . what was it, darling?”

  “Less than one day,” recited Piety, holding out her hand to usher Tessa from the room.

  “Right,” said Trevor sardonically. “Less than one day.”

  Joseph smiled and leaned back in his chair, considering all that he had, quite suddenly, decided to tell his friend.

  When Piety and Tessa were gone and the footmen had been dismissed, he leaned forward and dropped his head in his hands. Speaking to the floor, he started from the beginning.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  The Earl and Countess of Falcondale were in possession of a beautiful pianoforte. A Stein in polished birch, imported from Germany in ’26. Tessa barely grazed her fingers across the keys and they trilled to life.

  Lady Piety had been leading her on a tour of their home, a magnificent townhome mansion that Piety had bought with a great inheritance years ago. Although Piety was gracious and the house really was a showplace, it was little distraction from Joseph’s closed-door discussion downstairs with the earl.

  It took no effort to guess what they discussed. Tessa wondered if Joseph had come here with a mind to unburden himself. An odd choice for their afternoon outing, she thought, but she understood the significance of a personal errand rather than some contrived diversion—tea in a café or a stroll through the zoo. It was no small thing to be introduced to the couple he described as “his family.”

  And maybe Joseph needed the advice of his old friend? Perhaps her request to leave London had driven him here?

  Regardless, the earl would soon be told the truth about Tessa and their marriage and the baby. And soon after the earl knew, the countess would know. She glanced at Piety, so effusive and open and bright. She would have liked to have known the older woman, to count her as a friend the way Joseph did.

  Now . . . ?

  Tessa sighed. Each time she survived one moment of shame—the misery against the tree, that first missed monthly cycle, the confession to Joseph, her parents’ rejection—she turned around to face yet another.

  When she had been newly pregnant, she had distracted herself with hope in Joseph. After he sailed away, her solace was the baby. Today, however, staring down at the shiny pianoforte, she wondered if she could endure another rejection. Joseph’s friends would surely discreetly, if not politely, turn her out when they knew.

  Suddenly, Tessa wanted nothing more than to slide onto the piano seat and lose herself. Only at the piano could she forget, even for ten minutes, what she’d done and how she and the baby would survive. She couldn’t control what Joseph discussed nor what the earl and countess would think of her. But just for a moment, Tessa might play.

  “It’s wasteful to have a proper music room when no one plays,” Lady Piety was telling her. “I had high hopes that one of my boys might take up music as a hobby. But we’ve devoted so much of our lives to travel, it’s not convenient to lug musical instruments on a ship.” She laughed. “Trevor already believes me to be a champion over-packer.”

  “It is a beautiful instrument, a showpiece, even if no one plays,” Tessa lied. Her fingers twitched to scramble over the keys. She heard music in her head. Her eyes returned again and again to the instrument, even while she trailed the countess around the room.

  “Would you like to play, Tessa?” Lady Piety finally asked.

  “Oh, I couldn’t impose.”

  “Stop. I should love to hear it put to use. I adore music, but Trevor must be bribed to attend concerts.”

  Tessa chuckled at this, studying her hostess more closely. She was so endearingly . . . irreverent. Perhaps, Tessa thought, perhaps she and the earl would not lose faith in Joseph for marrying a desperate woman. Perhaps they would see his predicament in sympathetic shades of grey, rather than black and white.

  Tessa drifted to the pianoforte, knowing she could not decline a second offer. She settled on the bench.

  “There are sheets of music somewhere in this room, now let me think where I . . .”

  Tessa barely heard. She dove softly into Mozart’s “Piano Sonata No. 11,” thrilling to the sensitive response of the keys. The brilliant simplicity of the notes dropped from each key and then swelled to fill the room. Her body responded immediately, eyes closing, heart steadying, shoulders rising and falling as she conjured magic from the keys.

  Distantly, she was aware of Lady Piety sucking in a startled breath, of her settling into an adjacent chair. Between songs, the countess applauded. Did she speak? Tessa could not say, she allowed herself to be wholly taken in by the music, to sink beneath the surface of sound. She lost herself, trilling and pounding through her entire repertoire of favorites—popular jigs, classic sonatas, refrains from operas.

  At last, when her neck ached and her fingers cramped, she took a deep, satisfied breath and sat up. She stretched her shoulders. The room had shrunk to the keys before her, and she blinked at the bright sunlight streaming through the windows.

  Behind her came a slow, steady clap. She spun on the bench.

  Joseph. He stood not far behind
, his eyebrows and head cocked. Look what you’ve found.

  Look, indeed, Tessa thought.

  The countess had gone. Joseph stood alone in the room, so very tall and broad and handsome. Her stomach swooped at the sight of him. She’d thought he would never look more beautiful than he had with the milky cloth draped over his shoulder and Christian balanced on top of it. But now?

  She felt tears well up in her eyes and she turned back to the keys.

  He was never meant to be so handsome and measured and thoughtful. From the beginning, when Willow had placed the advertisement, he was only meant to be some man, some anonymous man. He was only meant to marry her, give her son a name, abscond with her dowry, and disappear. She was not to think of him again.

  But he had never, not for a moment, been some man.

  And when he had disappeared, Tessa had awakened every day wondering if today would be the day he might come back. And if there was some chance to salvage the unlikely strains of love they’d kindled in those weeks at Berymede.

  Looking back, their early love seemed almost too easy, the expected combustion of young attractive people falling into lust. The feelings she held now for Joseph were combustible, yes, but they were a slow burn, built hour by hour, gesture by gesture, as each new intimacy was added to the fire.

  The Old Tessa would not hesitate to say that she was in love with Joseph Chance. She’d loved him at Berymede, and she certainly loved him now. The New Tessa would concur, but she must force herself to proceed with thoughtful caution. Her regard for him now was part attraction, part kinship, part gratefulness, and part . . . something else. A magical, intangible wholeness that made her heart surge. Taken as a whole, her love for him now, the truest, purest love, had far more potential to crush her than the dazzling, playful love of before.