A Magical Regency Christmas

by Elizabeth Rolls

  Catherine slipped her feet into matching white slippers, an enormous luxury. She wouldn’t get more than one night out of the delicate shoes before they would look dingy. But her great-aunt had insisted and bought them as a farewell gift. The image in the mirror smiled.

  * * *

  By the time Catherine joined her parents in the receiving line her resolve had returned.

  And was immediately tested.

  Finn stood at the ballroom door alongside his mother and father, greeting guests who’d been invited along with the house party, looking resplendent in dark evening attire. His jacket was cut tight across his shoulders, emphasising their breadth, and tapered at the waist to show off the trim, masculine line of him, long legs and all. His hair, walnut-dark like his father’s, gleamed in the light, his jaw stern. But his eyes! Oh, his eyes were like liquid chocolate, warm and seductive all at once. It was his innate sincerity, Catherine thought, that created the look. She wanted to fall into them. Surely, any woman would want to. Funny, how she’d failed to notice such charms until now.

  ‘Good evening, Mr Emerson, Mrs Emerson,’ the countess gushed sincerely. ‘Catherine, dear, you look stunning.’ Finn’s mother smiled warmly. ‘The girls are already inside waiting for you. Finn, doesn’t Catherine look lovely?’

  She felt Finn’s eyes on her as she curtsied to the earl, trying to act formal and informal all at once as if nothing was out of the ordinary. It was odd enough to curtsy to the earl, who was like a second father to her, to say nothing of feeling Finn’s not-so-neutral gaze while she did it. But the proprieties must be observed on such occasions. Both the countess and her mother were sticklers on that account. Familiarity bred complacency and complacency bred slovenly behaviour.

  ‘I thought you might miss our dance,’ Finn said once she reached him. He offered her his arm. There was to be no reprieve then, no time to drift over to visit with Meredith and Alyson and let her senses settle. ‘The sets are starting to form and you’ll want to see the ballroom.’ He bent close to her ear conspiratorially. ‘Mother has outdone herself this year.’

  Catherine felt herself start to relax. Decorations were a safe topic and they conjured up a host of memories. The countess used to let the children have a sneak peek at the ballroom every year before the guests arrived and they were shooed up to the nursery. ‘I remember the year your mother had the poinsettia theme.’ The columns had been draped in white swathes of fabric and the niches throughout the room had been filled with vases of the imported plant. The effect had been simple and stunning.

  ‘Euphorbia pulcherrima.’

  ‘I beg your pardon?’

  ‘That’s the Latin name for poinsettia. It means the most beautiful of the euphorbiae. It has other names, too, like lobster flower, the flame flower.’ The low timbre of Finn’s voice, private, intimate even though they were in a crowd, created the impression the flower wasn’t all he was discussing in terms of beauty. A delightful shiver went through her, although she knew better than to allow such a reaction. Her mother’s warning haunted the recesses of her mind. But she had no time for warnings as Finn ushered her inside the ballroom. A little gasp of awe escaped her as she took in the decorations of white and silver—and was that ice? It was. They perfectly mirrored the weather outside and created the ideal winter scene inside.

  ‘It’s a winter fantasy,’ Catherine breathed.

  ‘That’s exactly what my mother calls it—her winter-fantasy ball.’ Finn chuckled. ‘I’ll tell her you approve.’

  ‘It’s beautiful.’ And it was. She could hardly take it all in. White gauzy fabric spangled in silver wrapped the columns, white hothouse roses adorned the niches in tall, elegant gold-and-silver urns. Even the ceiling was decorated, hung with giant glittery silver snowflakes and long crystals that simulated icicles. But the pièce de résistance was the orchestra dais set up at the top of the ballroom, where bunting held with navy-blue bows denoted the orchestra and two giant-swan ice sculptures graced each end like bookends. The effect was stunning and drew the eye down the length of the ballroom.

  She and Finn took their place at the head of their set with three other couples and the dance began. ‘Our first dance together,’ Finn whispered with a smile as they began the opening figure. ‘Le pantalon.’

  ‘The trousers,’ she said, trying to keep her mind on the dance. They were the lead couple so they danced the pattern first. It was difficult though when her eyes wanted to watch Finn and trousers was the very last thing she should be thinking of, especially his.

  ‘You seem distracted,’ Finn said when their portion of the set came to an end, his voice low, his presence potent beside her. She could smell the spicy, cinnamon scent of him, warm and welcoming, and yet the spice was a reminder of danger lurking beneath the surface for the unsuspecting.

  ‘You’ve surprised me.’ Catherine kept her eyes on the other dancers. He had surprised her. He was proving very good at flirtation with those dark eyes of his that knew just how to skim a woman’s body with their gaze and his casual touches that conveyed confidence, offered provocative suggestion of other touches, more private touches that might be had under different circumstances. It was common wisdom in the Paris salons that a man who knew how to touch a woman in public would not disappoint in a more intimate setting. Catherine flushed; the thought of sharing such a setting with Finn heated her cheeks, the forbidden question rising to the fore: what would Finn be like as a lover?

  It was a hypothetical question at best. She knew women in Paris who took lovers, but Paris was a far different society than England. Here, she should not even think of such a deed and yet the very thought would not leave her. Throughout the second figure, through La poule and La pastourelle movements of the quadrille and into the finale, the thought persisted: the image of Finn naked in the candlelight, his body covering hers, his hands clasping hers as they reached over her head.

  She had to stop. These wanderings of the mind were precisely the dangers her mother had warned her of. Finn bowed to her, the quadrille over and thankfully so. Lord Richard claimed her for the next set and Finn moved off, hopefully unaware of her imaginings. She wouldn’t see Finn again until the third waltz, the dance that would close the evening hours away. She had her reprieve.

  Chapter Eight

  Before she knew it, Channing had claimed his waltz, the first one of the night while Lady Alina glowered a little further down the floor in the arms of the squire who looked positively thrilled at his good luck. To their left, Finn took up a position with Lady Eliza. On the sidelines, Catherine noted, his parents looked on with smiles.

  ‘Your parents seem pleased to see Finn with Lady Eliza,’ Catherine said as the dance began.

  Channing gave a mock frown. ‘I haven’t seen you all evening and that’s the first thing you can think of to say?’

  She gave a playful smile. ‘You could have seen me earlier.’

  Channing swung them into a turn. ‘I did, I simply couldn’t get away. I was bowled over at the sight of you in that dress. I still am, so is everyone else. I’m dancing with the prettiest girl in the room and they know it.’ Channing winked. ‘Maybe my parents are smiling because I’m dancing with you. They might not be smiling at Finn at all.’

  Catherine laughed. ‘I don’t think you’ve changed a bit.’ The comment was just like Channing. He saw the world through his eyes and that world revolved around him. He was his very own Copernican theory, the planet around which all the minor suns orbited. It didn’t make him selfish. Channing was a kind-hearted individual, she knew that. It simply made him Channing and it made him different from Finn. Conversation with Finn wasn’t necessarily all about Finn.

  ‘Cat, I want to talk to you,’ Channing began. ‘There’s something I need to ask. Do you think we might slip off somewhere quiet?’ She was aware of his hand at her waist, holding her closer than the rule. But this was Cha
nning, handsome, charming Channing, and this was what she’d come home for.

  Channing led them to a little sitting room down the hall. He checked to see that it was empty. ‘You never know what some people get up to at a dance,’ he said with a chuckle, ushering her inside. Catherine stood before the fire, her hands clutched, her insides churning with butterflies. She told herself it was because the fairy tale was about to come true.

  Channing raised a hand to her hair, smoothing his hand over it, a smile on his face, his blue eyes intent. ‘You’re lovely, Cat. I meant it when I said I was bowled over by your beauty this evening. There isn’t a woman in there who can match you.’

  ‘Not even Lady Alina?’ she had to ask. That relationship seemed murky at best.

  Channing shook his head. ‘She’s business.’ He cupped her jaw and ran his thumb along her cheek. The gesture was soft and gentle, but it raised no prickles of heat down her arms or sent any shivers of delight down her back. ‘You, Cat, you are my pleasure. I have obligations in London I must see to, but when I come back?’ He paused. ‘What I’m trying to say is will you wait for me? When I return, we can announce our engagement if you’ll have me.’

  The proposal was so Channing. It had been all about him; his obligations, his return. ‘Don’t you think you should ask me first?’ Catherine laughed.

  He took her hand. ‘Will you marry me?’ There was a winsome boyish hope in his voice that excused the lack of pomp behind the question. ‘We’d be the most dashing couple in London. We’d do all the parties, all the balls. Everyone would want to have us.’

  He was sincere in his own way. She knew him well enough to know that. But in those moments he was laid bare to her in a way he’d never been. As a friend, as a childhood playmate, his bonhomie, his love of a party, an outing, any social activity, had been enough. He had been the centre of attention and it had been fun to be in the centre with him. Catherine pulled her hand free. She didn’t want to hurt him, but she knew what her answer had to be. It was an answer she’d never thought to make. ‘Marriage has to be more than fun, Channing.’

  He knitted his fair brows. ‘I don’t understand.’

  Of course he wouldn’t. Perhaps he couldn’t. It might not be in his make up to understand that things had to be more than fun, more than dares and larks.

  ‘Can’t you see it?’ he pressed softly. ‘You and I just bashing around London?’

  Catherine gave a sad smile. ‘I can see it, that’s why I must decline.’ It would be fun for a while. Channing would lavish every extravagance on her, they would live in the Deverill town house, have every convenience. Most of all, she’d have the one thing Channing didn’t even know he was offering. She’d have what she always wanted—a chance to be part of the Deverill family. She would have it all and it would have been relatively easy to achieve.

  Too easy. She’d been taught easy answers were to be suspect. When something was too good to be true, it usually was. Life would be merry until...until parties were no longer enough, until she wanted to do something meaningful with her life, until Finn came to town, a reminder of what she could have aspired to.

  ‘I thought you liked me.’ Channing seemed genuinely wounded.

  ‘I do like you, as a friend.’ She reached for his hand. ‘We’ll always be friends, Channing. Some day you’ll find the right girl and you’ll thank me for turning you down.’ It seemed surreal, standing in the sitting room where she and the girls had played with their dolls on rainy afternoons and turning down Channing Deverill, turning down her chance to be part of the family for good.

  ‘I could make you happy, Cat.’

  ‘For a while.’ Catherine gave a wan smile. She didn’t want to see him beg. Channing Deverill was the sort of man who should never beg.

  ‘A while? What’s that supposed to mean?’

  She was getting a bit impatient now. Wasn’t there a figurative bone in his body? Did everything have to be so literal? ‘It means I am honoured, Channing. I just want something that lasts a little longer.’ She nodded towards the door. ‘I need to be getting back.’ It was a vague excuse for a departure, but they both needed this scene to end. She didn’t want to second-guess her decision, didn’t want to start thinking of dangerous practicalities; maybe marriage to Channing would be worth it if it meant she could be a Deverill.

  Out in the hallway, Catherine pressed her head to the cool panelling. What had she done? She’d thrown away her chance. She couldn’t stay here in the corridor. If Channing saw her regretting, he would push his offer. She needed to get back to the ballroom and lose herself in the crowd. Lord Richard would be looking for her. A country dance might be just what she needed to lift her spirits.

  So she danced, and she danced some more until she felt the beginnings of a little hole in her pretty slippers and still she danced. Catherine laughed and flirted politely with the young men on her dance card. She was her dazzling best in the hopes no one guessed there was a hole in her heart as well as her shoe. If she couldn’t have Finn, then she’d have no one. She very much feared that wasn’t simply hyperbole.

  No one but Finn. ‘What’s the matter, Catherine? Your smile has been pasted on so long it might never come off.’ The inevitable had arrived: the last dance of the evening, the third waltz. Finn steered them to an empty spot on the crowded floor, everyone wanting to be part of the beautiful dance. The candles in the chandelier had been dimmed and the ballroom had taken on the glow of a starry night.

  ‘It’s nothing,’ she lied with yet another smile. None of the protocols she’d learned in Paris had prepared her for this. How did one tell another, ‘I’ve refused your brother in hopes of something better and that something better is you?’ Even if she’d been bold enough for such words, what was the etiquette? Did the one who’d done the refusing politely wait for the one who’d been refused to make the situation public? Should Finn hear about Channing’s proposal from her or from his brother?

  Finn fitted his hand to her waist as the music started. ‘I’ll wait and hope for better.’ He smiled down at her. ‘You always were a bad liar, Catherine.’

  ‘Not now. Waltz with me, Finn.’ She placed her hand at his shoulder and gave him a private smile as he adjusted his grip at her waist, pulling her closer. She didn’t want to talk about Channing’s proposal. She simply wanted to dance with Finn Deverill, for what might be the one and only time.

  She gave herself over to the moment. Finn’s dark eyes were hot, burning with unexpressed emotion, his hand strong at her back as he propelled them through the crowd. She was aware only of the unspoken message of Finn’s body as it manoeuvred them through the turns and figures of the dance. For the first time, she understood the whispered rumours about the suggestive nature of the dance, the nuances nicely bred girls giggled over behind their fans when they thought no one was listening. She and Vivienne had done the same, but those nuances had no real meaning, no substance until now: the man in pursuit, the closed position of the bodies, the twining of legs and arms, the draw of his arm pulling her closer, the pressure of his hand, all determining her position, the brush of his thighs against the silk of her skirts.

  Finn was a master of it all and she revelled in that mastery, matching him step for step, boldness for boldness until the crowd fell away leaving them space in the centre of the floor. They turned, they spun, her eyes riveted on the intensity of Finn’s gaze, not the usual traditional spot of nothingness over a gentleman’s shoulder. But Catherine was aware of none of it until the dance was over and it was too late. Applause erupted from the sidelines. She glanced away from Finn’s face, realising for the first time that they’d danced alone, their private waltz suddenly public. Everyone had seen them.

  Not everyone approved. Her mother’s mouth was set in a firm line. Tears threatened in Lady Eliza’s eyes, her cheeks flushed an unbecoming shade of begonia. Channing looked like a wounded martyr. The coun
tess was looking at Finn with an icy smile that matched her decorations, her manners too refined to show the slightest crack over this latest development.

  ‘Chin up, my dear,’ Finn said quietly beside her. ‘On the bright side, the other one hundred and ninety-six people in the ballroom thoroughly enjoyed it.’

  ‘Of course they did, the same way people enjoy a scandal not their own,’ Catherine retorted under her breath.

  Finn chuckled, escorting her back to the perimeter to her mother’s side as if nothing were wrong. ‘You’re exaggerating,’ he whispered. ‘All those people don’t see anything wrong. They only see something beautiful, a moment’s magic on a winter’s night in the middle of a magical season. Christmas brings out the best in people. Good evening, Mrs Emerson.’ He bowed to her mother and relinquished her hand.

  ‘Good evening, Lord Swale.’ Her mother was frosty.

  Finn turned in her direction. ‘Goodnight, Catherine. I trust I will see you at the Yule log cutting tomorrow?’

  ‘Yes,’ Catherine said quickly, overriding any temptation her mother might have to refuse the invitation.

  * * *

  Her mother barely waited until they reached her room. Her entire life, Catherine had never heard her mother raise her voice when giving vent to her disapproval. But the lack of volume only made it worse.

  ‘Catherine, what were you thinking?’ her mother asked calmly. ‘To dance like that with Lord Swale in front of anyone who matters? There will be a scandal. Did you see Lady Eliza’s face? She felt positively betrayed after all the attention Swale has paid to her.’ Well, that made two. She and Channing both.

  Catherine sat on the bed, pleating her skirt between her fingers, unable to meet her mother’s grey eyes. She had to tell her. She couldn’t have her mother finding out from the countess. ‘That’s not the real scandal,’ Catherine whispered. ‘I’ve refused Channing.’

  The change in her mother was instantaneous. Empathy filled her grey eyes as she sank down on the bed beside Catherine. ‘Oh, my dear girl, what have you done?’