Miss Fortune’s First Kiss

by Anders, Annabelle

  Tilde supposed not, and yet––

  “Why would you tell her?” She needed an answer first.

  Jasper removed his hat and then ran one hand through his hair. He apparently realized that an explanation was required before she’d consent to be alone with him again. “I did not tell her. She must have observed me leaving your chamber early. Or perhaps she guessed, God, Tilde, I would never tell her––or anyone––something so personal, so private between the two of us.”

  His voice begged her to understand. For the first time in so many hours, the horror of the day’s events began to slip away.

  She gestured toward the parlor. “Right in here.”

  Before she could take a step, though, Jasper swept her into his arms. “I was going to wait, to ask you. I wanted to try to set matters right. My mother is the monster, Tilde. She is the monster lady in the girls’ dreams. Eloise says that she never struck either of them, but I’m terrified to allow her in their lives. I was planning to send her away. And then I plan on marrying you and taking you and the girls back to Warwick Place. I wanted to plan all of this out but when I arrived home, you were gone.”

  His words spilled out of him as though he was afraid she’d evaporate at any moment.

  “And then Thea talked! She told me my mother had sent you away, that my mother had told you it was what I wished. And I was afraid you would not forgive me. I’ve made so many mistakes through the years. I couldn’t wait another second to set the record straight.”

  But Tilde had pulled away. When she looked into his eyes, she saw all the emotions she’d been feeling for him reflected back at her. Lifting one hand, she silenced him with a gentle touch to his lips. “You plan on marrying me?” she spoke the words in awe.

  He nodded. And there, standing in the middle of her aunt’s aging parlor declared, “I love you. For what it’s worth. Will you Tilde? Will you marry me?”

  She touched his lips again. “It is worth a great deal to me.” And then she smiled. “And yes. I will marry you.”

  He closed his eyes and released a deep sigh of relief. “We’ve missed all these years.”

  “I wouldn’t have it any other way.”

  Jasper opened his eyes and stared back at her in confusion. “It was magic, when I met you, you know. I was simply too foolish to know how lucky I was to find it––to find you.”

  “It was.” She smiled up at him. “But I am so very grateful to the woman who was your wife. I love your daughters and I love the father you’ve become. Perhaps it was fate that we go our separate ways and learn the value of love and its magic before we discovered one another again.”

  “He laughed out loud and lowered his forehead so that it rested against hers. “Do you believe it was magic? Or Fortune? Or Fate?”

  “All of the above, my love. All of the above.”

  ***THE END***

  Other enchanting stories by Annabelle Anders can be found by visiting her website or following her on social media and at Amazon.

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  Turn the page and read a sample of the next Fortunes of Fate Book written by Christina McKnight.

  A sample of the next Fortunes of Fate Book

  Fortune’s Final Folly

  Prologue

  Oxfordshire, England

  December 1814

  The blustery winter winds whipped at Madame Zeta’s thick woolen cloak, pulling at the tattered folds and allowing the bitter cold to reach beneath to the thin cloth of her worn blouse and skirt. The severe English temperatures during the harsher months had ceased to affect her from the day her daughter, Katherina, was ripped from her bosom.

  Nothing—not her lack of a home, threadbare blouse, matted hair, nor her worn boots—caused her any pain. She lacked far more essential necessities than mere possessions. Her heart had been stolen from her.

  Before, the organ had beat with such vitality she’d feared her chest could not contain her love. Now, it was empty. Barren. Devoid of anything but hatred, loathing, and a determination borne of years of endless searching, relentless longing, and sleepless nights spent dreaming of her revenge.

  From her spot atop the crest of the property, she glared down at the entrance to Shrewbury Gardens.

  It had once been a place she’d longed to live and raise a family with her husband, Pierce.

  Yet when she’d arrived, that dream had been stripped from her as quickly as her name.

  After so many years under the guise of Madame Zeta, she’d likely not recognize her old name if someone uttered it…not that anyone but Lavinia knew her true identity.

  A’laya De Vere, the Countess of Holderness.

  Although, since she’d received confirmation that the duke had died, leaving his only son, Pierce as heir apparent, she was now the Duchess of Shrewbury—if she ever wanted to claim such a tarnished title.

  She scoffed at the thought.

  She’d rather perish than take the name and title of a man she despised. Never would she be known as anything but Madame Zeta.

  But what she would not give to be plain Miss A’laya Banesworth, daughter of an impoverished baron from Nottinghamshire, England. Cherished offspring of Eugene and Chloe Banesworth, Lord and Lady Oderton. If she’d listened to her mother’s warnings and not fallen under Pierce’s treacherous spell, she never would have wed the then-earl, left her family estate, had his child, found herself abandoned, and her babe stolen from her bosom.

  Her chest tightened, as it often did when she allowed her thoughts to meander down the path of her final day living as a proper lady at Shrewbury Gardens.

  If she hadn’t been such a senseless fool in her youth, Zeta would still possess a heart. She was thankful that her mother hadn’t lived long enough to see how shortsighted and simple Zeta had turned out to be.

  Unfortunately, she didn’t have the guile necessary to prevent her world from shattering right before her eyes. Her own mother—living or not—would have been just as helpless where the old Duchess of Shrewbury was concerned.

  Zeta had paid the hard price for her folly since the day she had taken to believing Pierce’s lies and trusted his mother to care for her and Katherina.

  “My child.” A hand, light as a feather but as familiar as anything landed on Madame Zeta’s shoulder. “Have I failed ye?”

  She turned toward Lavinia, the old woman who’d been a mother to her since the day she’d taken Zeta in all those years ago. Starved, broken, and nearly dead, Zeta had wanted nothing more than to die when the Shrewbury coachman dumped her near Lavinia’s caravan. However, Lavinia had told Zeta that one day, she’d reunite with her Katherina. Both women had held onto that declaration of fate. For Zeta, it was a deeply buried and sometimes painful hope, while Lavinia declared the fortune was a prophecy destined to come true.

  In that moment, with Zeta battered and wrecked both on the inside and out, she’d decided to live…if only to see her daughter’s face once more before her days in this world were up.

  With each passing year, it was Lavinia who neared her end, not Zeta. And never did they get any closer to finding Katherina.

  Unfortunately, she didn’t possess a heart, if she had it would splinter ever more to see the kind old woman’s steady decline.

  How many times had Zeta insisted they journey to Shrewbury Gardens to see if Katherina had been brought back to her father’s family home? How many times had Lavinia joined Zeta on the very crest they now stood upon, overlooking the place Zeta had expected to call home? No, not Zeta. A’laya had longed to call Shrewbury Gardens home. But A’laya and her tendency to see the good in everyone was gone.

  Forever.

  Madame Zeta was wise enough to know that if she ever expected to see her daughter again, she needed to find her. And as things had ofte
n been for Zeta, nothing came easily or without great effort.

  As they stood on the ridge together this last time, Lavinia’s fingers tightened on Zeta’s shoulder. “I never meant to fail ye, me dear girl.”

  “You haven’t failed me,” Zeta mumbled, setting her hand on Lavinia’s cold fingers and squeezing gently. “I have failed myself—and Katherina.”

  “Soon, I will be gone. But your time, and your search, are far from over.”

  “No—”

  Lavinia tsked at her denial. “It is the way of things, the path of life, as ye very well know.”

  At Lavinia’s words, the necklace, the only thing left to Zeta from her old life besides her heartbreak, warmed at her throat.

  They’d traveled, the pair of them, all over England and Scotland. In their journeys, they spoke—sometimes huddled in a freezing wagon bundled in hides, one time before a roaring fire in the early evening outside London proper, and more recently on the coast of Dover during a particularly warm spell amid summer—of the day she’d be reunited with Katherina. In none of their musings had Lavinia not been by Zeta’s side when they located Katherina.

  Together. The pair of them. As they had been since the woman had rescued Zeta from the roadside and taken her in with nary a question.

  Lavinia’s steady stare scanned the expansive green grounds of Shrewbury Gardens, knowing the hellish torment Zeta had endured at the hands of the estate’s cruel mistress, though Lavinia was always too compassionate to speak of it aloud. “I still feel, to me very soul, that your Katherina will be returned to ye.”

  “As do I.” Zeta had spent all her adult life gifting fortunes to those who could spare the coin, and to many who couldn’t. She’d learned much from Lavinia, including a knack for reading people—their desires, their fears, and their hearts. “I will never stop searching.”

  “That is good, my child.” The slight weight of the woman’s hand slipped from Zeta’s shoulder, and she felt Lavinia slipping from this world. Each day passed with Zeta knowing it was one less day with Lavinia near.

  The shrubbery to their left rustled, and a woman not much older than Zeta appeared.

  “Return to camp,” Zeta whispered to Lavinia, nodding back down the hill to the wooded area that gave their caravan refuge from onlookers. “Seek warmth. I will return shortly.”

  Lavinia stared at the woman as she approached but thankfully acquiesced, turning slowly to return to the others.

  “My lady?” The new arrival hurried over to Zeta. She dressed in the Shrewbury servants’ garb, with her limp, brown hair tied at the nape of her neck. Beads of sweat formed on her forehead despite the late December cold. “My lady, is that you?”

  It had been years since Zeta was mistaken for a lady, despite being raised to take her place in the upper crust of London society.

  “Lady Holderness?” the servant said, stopping before her, her eyes narrowing on Zeta. She took in Zeta’s disheveled appearance, though she must have found something she recognized as her stare settled on Zeta’s weather-worn face.

  “I have not gone by that name in many years. But, yes, it is me.” Zeta glanced around, fearful that her husband, the wretched rakehell, would have someone near to detain her—or expel her from Shrewbury land. “Who are you?”

  “My lady, I was the one who—”

  Memories returned much like a dagger to her soul. “You helped the duchess collect my things before I was thrown from…Shrewbury.” She nearly said her “home,” but the estate below had no more been her home than the wagon she’d been traveling in for nearly two decades.

  Her home had been with her mother—and later, with Katherina.

  The woman dipped her head, clearly ashamed. “No, my lady. I, in no way, wanted to help the duchess. But I had no choice. Was never given a choice if I wished to keep my position.”

  Zeta eyed the woman, knowing she spoke the truth, yet unwilling to allow her actions to be forgiven so easily. “Where is my daughter?”

  The servant’s stare returned to Zeta’s. “I do not know. I am merely a maid at Shrewbury.”

  “My husband then?”

  The woman’s cheeks flooded white, despite the chilly winds. “Last time word came to us, he was living on the Continent after a sordid incident in London.”

  “He has not returned since his father’s passing?”

  “No, my lady, though rumor implies he might have gone the way of the duke and duchess.” Her tone lowered to a whisper before she continued, "may the Lord bless them in their eternal slumber.”

  Zeta nearly snorted at the maid’s mumbled prayer.

  “Who cares for the estate in Lord Holderness’s absence?” she prodded, not allowing herself to dwell on that morsel of information. “There must be someone, a cousin or distant relative, who has come forward to claim the title and lands.”

  “No, my lady. Lord Holderness, err the Shrewbury heir, has yet to claim his title. However, no one disputes that he lives. No one who matters, that is,” the maid replied. “Our salaries are paid by the steward. Some of the servants have been released from their posts. Only a few, those needed to maintain the Gardens, have remained. I have heard the steward is in contact with a solicitor in London.”

  “I should like to speak with him, the steward.” Zeta nodded to the woman. She was, after all, Pierce’s lawful wife. In his absence, perhaps she could… “Take me to him.”

  The maid shook her head. “I fear you are not welcome at Shrewbury. The duchess made that very clear before she passed, and the servants were reminded of her decree when you visited the duke several years ago. The magistrate is to be summoned if you even so much as set foot on Shrewbury land.”

  Zeta’s shoulders stiffened as cold outrage settled in her gut. She shifted to stare past the maid to the estate below. “Has the magistrate been called then?”

  How had she ever believed she could raise her daughter in such a bitter, unwelcome place, where even the servants feared for their future?

  Though she desperately wanted to locate her daughter, Zeta could not jeopardize Lavinia and her people. They’d taken her in, fed her, and given her a place to sleep. She would not be responsible for their presence being reported to the magistrate—and whatever would likely, and swiftly, follow for Zeta daring to defy the duchess’s final wishes.

  “Of course not, my lady.” The servant wrung her hands, her widened stare pleading with Zeta to believe her. “My name is Augusta. I have seen you watching but was unable to come and speak with you.”

  “Why do you wish to speak with me now? What has changed?” Zeta was not foolish enough to take the servant at her word, not after her employer’s betrayal. “I have returned to Shrewbury as often as possible, yet no one has ever offered me help.”

  “The servants…” The maid bit her lip and clenched and unclenched her hands at her sides. “The servants are afraid.”

  “Of what?” Zeta demanded.

  “Not what, my lady. Whom.” She glanced over her shoulder and down toward the manor as if fearing she’d been overheard.

  With the duchess gone, there only remained one person to fear. Pierce. “And you are not frightened of his wrath?”

  “I was for many years, but I have never forgotten your daughter…”

  “As I have not,” Zeta snapped.

  “I wish to help you find her.”

  Zeta was still unconvinced that the maid had anything to offer.

  “Why now? When you never helped before.”

  “I couldn’t interfere before with the duchess present. Now, with the duke and duchess gone, it is different. The servants, all of us, are worried about our positions. If the duke’s son does not return to his place, what will happen to the lot of us, and Shrewbury? The steward cannot keep paying the servants as he does, with no lord presiding over the house.”

  Tension stiffened Zeta’s shoulders as she reminded herself that the people of Shrewbury were not her concern. Perhaps, in a time long gone, they were. But not now…
not ever. Only the thought of finding Katherina drew Zeta to Shrewbury, not any misguided affection or concern for the estate’s servants.

  “I can listen around Shrewbury. Mayhap ask after the babe.”

  Zeta narrowed her eyes on the maid, daring her to toy with her emotions a second longer.

  “I am not the only one who remembers you and the child. Others were never loyal to the duke and duchess, though none will openly admit it. I can convince them. Together, we might be able to find her.”

  Zeta had never been blessed with anything even close to good fortune—if that were even what Augusta was bestowing upon her now, and not another falsehood or thin thread of hope that would soon be severed. Her mind told her to disregard the woman and renew her search, yet her heart…her heart pushed her to accept this simple kindness, even if the maid’s offer proved fruitless in the end.

  “I can send word to you if I hear anything,” the woman promised. “It may take time, but I have faith that someone will speak on the matter. Someone will know what has become of your daughter.”

  “Thank you. I will return to Oxfordshire as often as possible,” Zeta offered. The only bit of information she’d been able to gain since the duchess had thrown her from Shrewbury was the mention of a Vicar Elliott. The name had proven useless time and time again. In all her travels, Zeta had never found anyone by that name, nor met a single soul who knew of the vicar or his family.

  However, hope—no matter how small—would not escape Zeta’s grasp.

  Long ago, she’d pledged to find Katherina, or die trying.

  She was not ready to die, nor had she given up on locating her daughter—not in all the years she’d been searching.

  Chapter One

  London, England

  September 1821

  Lord Joshua Stuart, second son of the Duke of Beaufort, leapt down from his carriage outside his Cheapside office and signaled for his driver to depart. Discarded morning papers and scraps of waste littered the hard-packed street, and two filthy, ragged mutts scavenged for their next meal. The shingle overhead squeaked, and Joshua made a mental note to oil the hinge and polish the tin signage that read simply: Solicitor.