“Miss Smith,” he said, his voice low and soft. “I hope your parents have talked to you about—
Annabella turned from him. “I—yes, they did, and I am sensible of the honor you do me, but so soon... I do not know what to think.” She glanced, embarrassed, at him. He looked at her coolly, but had a slight smile on his face. “I did not mean to lead you to think I—but I suppose after we knew each other better—not that I—oh, heavens!” Annabella sat swiftly on a nearby chair and put her hands to her heated cheeks.
“Ah. Perhaps I have been too eager.”
“Yes, no, oh—it is just too soon for me, truly!” She looked up at him, hoping the flat tone of his voice did not mean he was offended. It seemed he was not, for he only gazed at her with a cool, assessing expression. She held out her hand to him briefly in a pleading gesture. “In a few more months ... after we have come to know each other better....”
“Is there someone else, Miss Smith?”
Annabella gave a relieved laugh, glad she could give him a straight answer. “Oh, no! Not at all. It is just... perhaps you will think me foolish, Your Grace.” She looked down at her clasped hands, then smiled shyly at him. “I have always looked to my parents’ marriage as an example of what I wish to have for myself. If I could have half the affection for my future husband that I see between them, I shall be content.”
“How ... admirable,” replied the duke. He looked away, his attention apparently diverted by some speck of dust upon his coat, which he flicked away with his fingers. He returned his gaze to her and smiled. “I see I have been too impatient. Your mother was right in saying I should wait. Perhaps, if I gave you time in which to become accustomed to me, you could see yourself coming to have this ... affection?”
A wave of relief came over Annabella. Her stomach unclenched itself, and she smiled. “Perhaps. I have heard you are a good and honorable man, Your Grace. With time, I am sure I can appreciate you as you deserve.”
The duke smiled and took her hand, raising it to his lips. “How long am I to wait for your answer, Annabella?” he said, looking into her eyes.
She stared at him for a moment. She could discern nothing behind his smile or his eyes. He was not one who would reveal much of what he thought or felt, she realized, for he was always circumspect. But, what, after all, was she trying to find in him? She smiled at her own foolishness, then blushed, for she realized he was still holding her hand. She pulled her hand away, then glanced at him. He had a waiting air about him, and she realized she had not given him an answer.
“Three months,” she said. “I shall tell you after three months.”
The Duke of Stratton bowed again, and his smile grew wider. “Three months, then, Annabella,” he said, then took his leave.
Annabella stared at the door he had just shut behind him. He had called her by her Christian name, and she had not corrected him. She would have three months to come to know him better, to fall in love with him, a man of impeccable reputation and handsome, besides. Three months. Then she would have to give him her answer.
She turned and walked to the windows of the drawing room and flung them open, breathing deeply of the air flowing in. She looked across the field behind her family’s house. The duke’s lands marched with her father’s property, along the western line. It would be an advantageous marriage for all concerned, she argued with herself.
A sudden urge to leave the house came over her, to ride Daisy, her mare. Quickly, Annabella ran to her room and changed into her riding dress, and just as quickly ran down to the stables. There she ordered her horse saddled, and as soon as it was ready, she climbed up and galloped away, leaving a protesting groom behind.
She did not know how long she rode—perhaps a quarter of an hour—alternating between a gallop, a canter, and a walk. Finally, she stopped and looked about her. She’d ridden to the east, just a little distance from Wentworth Abbey, the Earl of Grafton’s property. While the Wentworth s were an old family, older than the Duke of Stratton’s, she rarely came here. The Wentworth family’s wild ways were well known. Her mother had warned Annabella against letting herself be drawn into their society any more than the usual balls and such, although they were still accepted into the highest strata of the ton.
She knew well enough to stay away from Geoffrey, Lord Grafton; she did not like him, for though he was amusing and handsome, his moods were unpredictable and his words biting. Thankfully, he seemed no more attracted to her than she was to him. She knew Miss Caroline fairly well, for she was Corisande’s dear friend, and they had gone to school with her. Caroline was wild and spoiled as well, but had great charm, and it was easy to forgive whatever she did. Caroline had talked of her other brother, older than herself, and Annabella vaguely remembered meeting him once. She shrugged. No doubt he was as wild as the rest.
And yet, here she was, closer to the Wentworth property than she ever had been before. It was never forbidden, of course, but she knew her mother felt more comfortable if Annabella had a groom with her when she ventured in this direction. She shrugged her shoulders, annoyed. If only Papa had not inherited the title and these lands! She had been quite content in their townhouse in London and liked the freedom of the country when they moved here at the end of the Season. But if they had not, she would never have met the duke and would not have to make a decision she did not want to make within the next three months.
Annabella stared into the woods separating her father’s property from the Wentworth land. It was dim and thick with trees, even with the sun bright and shining upon it. Only a few flickers of light reflected from the green leaves within. She peered into the darkness as if somehow she could penetrate through the branches and undergrowth. What was life like on the Wentworth side of the world? They were just on the edge of respectability, with only their wealth and lineage to make them acceptable to the ton and country society. Did they live a more adventurous life, being less virtuous? She supposed they must.
She sighed and turned away from the woods. It was no use thinking of such things. Besides, she needed to ready herself for Lady Bowerland’s card party. A smile came to Annabella’s lips. Lady Bowerland was a terrible gossip, but her gatherings were always enjoyable. Sometimes her card party included dancing, or at least some music, and she always gave her guests the freedom to come and go as they pleased, or roam about her grand house.
Annabella patted Daisy on her neck and started home. But she sighed again and could not help taking one last glance at the Wentworth woods or help the brief flash of envy quickly suppressed.
For one small moment she wished she were not the respectable Annabella Smith, but a wild Wentworth instead.
Chapter 4
“What was the Cavalier like, Lady Bowerland?”
“Was he tall?”
“Was he handsome?”
Lady Bowerland smiled grandly at the ladies gathered around her, a queen at court. She touched her grey hair as if adjusting a crown. Most of the small company had abandoned their card playing to gather around her and hear about her mysterious rescuer.
“He was all of these things,” she said, her voice low with portent. “And more.” The ladies around her sighed.
Annabella bit her lip. She should not be listening to gossip, and she knew Lady Bowerland had a taste for dramatics, but she could not help wondering if this Cavalier who came to Lord and Lady Bowerland’s rescue was the same one who had come to hers ... and had kissed her. Annabella’s cheeks became warm, and she bit her lip again, this time to repress the tingling she felt on them at the memory. Well, it was not gossip, really, for Lady Bowerland was not relating something she had heard from someone else, but her own experience.
Lord Bowerland snorted and slapped down a playing card. “I do not see how you could have seen what he looked like, Edna. He was masked, and it was dark as pitch last night, except for the moonlight. He could dashed well have been platter-faced for all we know.” He turned his attention back to the card table and the gentleman with hi
m.
Lady Bowerland cast him an irritated look. “Well, then, he was tall—”
“Not much more than middling height, I’d say,” Lord Bowerland said over his shoulder, “Your turn, Wentworth.” He nodded to the dark-haired gentleman next to him.
Mr. Wentworth flicked a brief look toward Lady Bower-land, then pushed some guineas in front of him. “Five,” he said. “And I stand.”
Annabella glanced at him. Mr. Wentworth was a young man—not above five-and-twenty, she was sure, and aloof in his manner. He seemed almost unfriendly, for he merely looked coolly at one when he spoke to him, and said little. It was a pity, really, for though his skin was sadly brown, and his hair was black and tied back into an old-fashioned queue, he was not uncomely. She turned her attention back to Lady Bowerland.
Her ladyship let out an impatient breath. “You cannot deny he was very strong, Albert!”
A fanatical light sparked in Lord Bowerland’s eye as he turned once more toward his wife. “Now that is something I’ll not argue, my dear. Charged up on that pale horse of his like a demon from the nether realms, and knocked that highwayman flat in no time at all. Good science, no wind-milling at all. Straight on the chin. Had good, broad shoulders on him, from what I could tell. Probably strips to advantage, I’d say—wouldn’t mind seeing him in the ring against, oh, what say you, Carlyle—Big Jim Brown?”
“Wouldn’t be a match at all, if the Cavalier’s of only middle height. I’ll take a card and ... yes, I’ll raise you seven,” said Lord Carlyle, a portly, middle-aged man.
A morose expression spread itself over Lord Bowerland’s face. “Dash it all. I’ll wager you have that court card I was looking for.” He tossed his cards down on the table. Lord Carlyle grinned and showed his hand—including a queen. “Wentworth —your cards?” Lord Bowerland asked.
Mr. Wentworth blinked, as if he’d been thinking of other things than the game before him. He put down his cards.
“Deuce take it! Beat me to flinders!” exclaimed Lord Carlyle.
“Looks like your luck is in, Wentworth,” Lord Bowerland said at the same time.
Lady Bowerland shuddered. “I wish you would not talk of such vulgar things as prizefighting, Albert.” Lord Bowerland only shrugged.
“Could you tell what color his costume was, Lady Bowerland?” Annabella asked. She had the peculiar feeling that she was being watched, and looked through the corner of her eyes at Mr. Wentworth. He looked quickly down at the pile of coins in front of him. Annabella almost thought that a slight pink tinged his cheeks, but she could not be sure, for his sun-browned skin obscured any other color that might have appeared there.
“Alas, Miss Smith, I could not tell,” Lady Bowerland said and shook her head. “The moon was bright, but all I can say is that his costume was dark—it could have been black, blue, or brown for all I know.”
Annabella reflected that there had been quite a few men dressed as Cavaliers at the masquerade, and though most of them had dressed in lighter shades, there were a few—her own Cavalier amongst them—who had costumes of a more somber color. It could have been any one of them. But if Lord Bowerland was right, that his rescuer was no more than middling height, perhaps it was the same one as hers. She frowned. How frustrating it was that she had no clue to her Cavalier’s identity!
Well, she had one the Cavalier had given her: his kiss. Annabella opened her fan and fanned herself, glad the evening was warm enough to give an excuse for her heated cheeks. A little annoyance rose in her. He had charmed a kiss from her, and she had allowed it. She frowned more deeply. It was no clue at all! She could hardly go about kissing gentlemen to find out if it was indeed him.
“My dear Miss Smith, there is no cause to frown, is there?”
Annabella turned and found the Duke of Stratton gazing down at her. She smiled politely at him. “Oh, no. Only a brief, unpleasant thought that distracted me—inconsequential, I assure you.”
“Perhaps a more pleasant diversion would help. A walk out on the balcony, perhaps?”
She gazed at him, at his smiling face and his eyes that never revealed anything more than pleasantness, and suddenly she did not want to walk with him at all. But what excuse could she give? She nodded.
The duke took her hand, laid it on his arm, and led her to the large windowed doors that opened to the balcony. A quick look at the rest of the company made her blush. She could see speculative looks cast her way, and she wished very much that she had found some way to avoid walking out to the balcony. It was not at all a scandalous thing to do, for it was in full view of the rest of the company. She could imagine the thoughts going through the guests’ minds, and the feeling of oppression, the desire to turn and flee increased.
As she moved toward the balcony door, she caught another glance from Mr. Wentworth. Once again he looked away from her, in the way he did before, as if he did not want to be caught staring. She remembered how she’d gone to the edge of the Wentworth woods, and how she wished she were not Annabella Smith, but a wild Wentworth instead.
And before the thought was half finished in her mind, she made herself stumble and step heavily on the hem of her dress.
A loud rip echoed through Lady Bowerland’s drawing room, and heads turned. Annabella felt her face flame hot, then she hastily seized the seam she’d ripped and drew it modestly toward her.
“Oh, heavens! How clumsy of me!” she exclaimed. She looked apologetically at the duke, who gazed at her with upraised brows. “I am terribly sorry, Your Grace, I simply do not know how I came to stumble so.” She looked down at her dress and made a distressed sound. “Oh, dear! I must repair it. Please, if you will excuse me—I cannot go out with you in this condition.”
“Of course,” Stratton replied and released her hand.
Lady Bowerland was already at her side, clicking her tongue in dismay. “Oh, my! Of course you cannot be in company with your dress torn, Miss Smith. I will get my maid, and you may go to the Grey Room to repair it there.”
Annabella smiled gratefully at her. “Thank you, my lady! You are so kind. I really do not know how I came to be so clumsy.”
Lady Bowerland waved a dismissing hand. “We all have our accidents, my dear. In fact, I have had many such, though you would not credit it, I am sure! But it is true that I have torn any number of dresses, although, of course, perhaps fewer than most any other lady. Indeed, I have heard it from Lady Jersey herself that she has torn more dresses than I! That was in our childhood, when we were young girls, and it would not happen now—
“No, my lady, of course I would never think it of you now,” Annabella replied, edging away from her hostess toward the drawing room door and looking meaningfully at her torn dress.
“Now you mustn’t dawdle about mending your dress, Miss Smith. There is nothing more unpleasant than a torn dress, I am sure! Why, I remember telling Mrs. Drummond-Burrell not long ago ...”
Annabella smiled, nodded, and hastily left the room as soon as politeness allowed. Once in the Grey Room, she removed her dress, took needle and thread provided her, and dismissed the maid. She could sew faster than any maid, she knew, for she prided herself on her needlework. Thank heavens she had selected a dress she could put on by herself! For she did not want to go back down to the drawing room immediately, back to the scrutiny of so many eyes.
She sighed as she worked. In truth, she did not want to face the duke immediately. Did he guess that she had stumbled so as not to go out with him? She hoped not. She had not noticed any large degree of perception in him; perhaps he had taken her stumble for the clumsiness she intended it. Not that she had truly intended to stumble, for she had not planned it at all. No, it was a mere thought, unintentional, and her body had somehow complied.
Annabella rolled her eyes. Oh, heavens! What excuses was she to make up next? The truth was that she was afraid and did not want to marry the duke.
Her needle pierced the cloth in her hand and whipped the thread back and forth across the seam. She stare
d absently at it as she worked, wishing she could sew up her life as easily and neatly. Her life had been just as neat, just as easily put together, for as long as she could remember. And now, now that the duke had proposed, it could be just as neat, and just as easily ... proscribed.
Her hands dropped to her lap, and she stared into the fire in the hearth in front of her. There was no reason why she should not continue as she had, once she was married. She could go to as many parties—more in fact—for she’d be a married woman, and not be chaperoned as much as she was now. She’d be free to do as she pleased. Why, one of her friends from school had done just that: after Chloe had her first child, a boy and an heir for her husband, she had burst upon London society like fireworks, and had gone to practically every function the ton presented. It was even rumored she had taken a lover.
Annabella grimaced. She did not think she would like that; indeed, she had noted a constant expression of discontent on Chloe’s face, and she’d grown waspish, too. Annabella did not think marriage or taking a lover had made things much better for Chloe at all. And the notion of being intimate with one man—much less two—for Annabella’s mother had told her vaguely of what could happen in the marriage bed—was certainly an embarrassing thing.
More than that, she wanted to feel the same degree of affection toward her husband that she’d seen between her parents. They—her mother, anyway—understood her wishes in this. But they had discovered their love after they had wed, and Annabella was not sure she would be as lucky. She only had to look at Chloe to see that.
Why could her parents not understand? She sighed and picked up her sewing again. Perhaps they had such joy in their own marriage that they thought their way of going about it would bring her just as much happiness. After all, what did she know of life? They had much more experience than she. And was she not comfortable in her life? Had they not made it so for her?
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