His Lordship's True Lady (True Gentlemen Book 4)

by Grace Burrowes

  She straightened and began pulling pins from her hair, letting them pile up on Hessian’s handkerchief in her lap. “Uncle did that too. Frightened me when I’d already dreaded to fall asleep for fear some stable boy would creep into my cot. Uncle led me to believe my mother had lied about providing for me, had turned her back on me. He told me my sister had never mentioned me and that I didn’t exist.”

  Her hair gave way all at once, a soft mass of fiery curls that fell to her waist. “I exist, Hessian. I’m not sure who I am, or what my future will bring, but I look at Daisy…”

  She closed her eyes. “I think of Daisy—I was not much older than she is now when Mama died—and I recall that my uncle, my only possible source of safety, acquired an interest in me solely when he realized that he could control Mama’s fortune through me. I am finally more angry than I am afraid.”

  Hessian brushed her hair back from her shoulder. “You have every right to be enraged with Walter Leggett. The question is, what to do about it. You mentioned the name of your sister’s paramour?”

  She scooped up the handkerchief and took the pins to her vanity. The firelight turned her hair into a riot of garnet and gold curling down her back.

  Hessian gave up lecturing himself.

  “Lawrence Delmar, a Scot,” Lily said. “Oscar recalled the name. Oscar suspects that I am not the cousin who shared a household with him in childhood. He’s prepared to step into Uncle’s shoes as the man best situated to wreck my life.”

  A sliver of resentment lingered in some obscure duck blind among Hessian’s emotions. He did not want to be in the business of un-wrecking a woman’s life, but… that was hesitation grumbling at him, as if naps were more important than honor.

  Whether he and Lily had a future, she deserved to be free of her past and of her uncle.

  “Mrs. Braithwaite was here while I was calling on your brother’s household.” Lily drew her hair over her shoulder and separated it into three skeins. “She left a card and noted an intention on the back to call again soon.”

  Another complication. Hessian could not simultaneously watch Lily braid her hair and solve the annoyance that was Roberta Braithwaite.

  “I will send my man of business to call on her.” Worth was prepared to help in any capacity, and he excelled at charming widows.

  Lily tied off her braid with a plain black hair ribbon. “According to Mrs. Braithwaite, I’m to wed you, and see that you leave Daisy in her aunt’s care posthaste. Your nursery is to be reserved for the offspring I present you with, also posthaste.”

  “According to your uncle Walter, you’re to wed Oscar in a little more than a fortnight.” No wonder Lily had at a loss for words earlier in the day.

  “Or I can go to jail, possibly to make the acquaintance of an executioner, unless he too expects me to marry him and bear his children.” Lily’s tone was as colorless as the shadows beyond her window, her glaze bleak as she studied the rope of her braid.

  “The law will not hold you to vows spoken under duress.”

  “The law.” Two words that spoke volumes of condemnation. “What has the law done to honor the terms of my mother’s will? To stop Walter’s mischief, to keep Mrs. Braithwaite from bringing down scandal on you, me, Daisy, and my mother’s memory?”

  “Valid point.” Hessian approached her, though she put him in mind of a cornered hedgehog. Everywhere, spines and bristles, no vulnerabilities exposed.

  “If you can’t put your trust in the law,” Hessian said, “if your relatives have betrayed you, if your resources are inadequate to solve the problems before you, you might consider one last alternative.”

  Her chin came up. “I promised my Creator and the memories of my mother and sister that a rash act of self-harm would never figure in my plans.”

  Good God have mercy.

  Hessian took her hand. “I’m suggesting… me. I’m suggesting that you trust me.”

  He kissed her fingers and waited for her answer, though he had no earthly idea, not a hint of a glimmer of a notion, how to proceed if Lily accepted his offer.

  * * *

  “She’s avoiding me.” Roberta was as certain of her conclusion as she was sure that Dorie Humplewit was putting on weight. The evidence was incontrovertible. “Lily Ferguson thinks a ducal grandpapa makes her better than anybody else, and that I would not dare expose her family’s soiled linen.”

  Penelope occupied the seat closest to the window, as if having light to read by ever consoled a woman for the damage the sun did to her complexion. Roberta was on her feet, inspecting for the dust about which she’d lectured her housekeeper earlier in the week.

  “Perhaps Miss Ferguson was simply out paying calls, ma’am. Yesterday did turn fair as the day progressed.”

  The words You are sacked! begged to be flung across the parlor.

  Penelope was Roberta’s third companion in as many years. As finances had become constrained, Roberta had realized that spending a month interviewing candidates for the post of companion meant a month when no salary need be paid. During those companion-free weeks, much sympathy could be earned lamenting the inconstancy of young women in service.

  The number of agencies supplying companions was finite, however, and Roberta had already patronized the top three.

  “If you knew that I could ruin you with a word, Penelope, would you be larking about Town, trying on bonnets, and gamboling in the park?”

  Penelope put down her volume of Wordsworth. She kept that naughty Bryon by her bedside, proof of a wicked streak in her character.

  “If you were determined to ruin me, I might be calling on my friends in an effort to gather their support. Marshaling my troops, as it were.”

  What a vexatious creature, and why, having seen to the dusting, hadn’t anybody bothered to polish the brass candlesticks on the mantel?

  “Lily Ferguson hasn’t any friends. Her uncle fends off the bachelors. Her lack of charm defeats other connections. This must be what Grampion likes about her, for a more dull, humorless fellow I could not imagine, and that is precisely why we must act on Amy Marguerite’s behalf.”

  Roberta had tossed and turned the night away, mentally drafting the letter she’d anonymously send to a half-dozen semi-reputable newspapers. In the morning, she’d taken one look in the vanity mirror, seen the toll Lily Ferguson’s stubbornness had taken, and decided that subtle machinations were a waste of time.

  The sooner Amy Marguerite took her proper place in Roberta’s household, the sooner Grampion’s coin would follow.

  Then too, Walter Leggett would doubtless pay handsomely to keep his sister’s peccadilloes quiet. Grampion would similarly pay to be spared scandal. To blazes with Lily Ferguson, for the nonce. If the idiot woman ever wanted to see her mother’s letters, she could jolly well join the list of people from whom Roberta would extract a goodly sum for a goodly number of years.

  “We must act?” Penelope asked, clutching Mr. Wordsworth to her chest. “In what regard?”

  “Your part is simple. You enjoy reading, you enjoy fresh air. You will become a fixture in the park until such time as you know the schedule upon which Amy Marguerite is let out to play. Nursery maids and governesses cannot function without schedules, and Grampion of all people will insist the child’s day be rigidly organized.”

  Never did a young lady spend more time vapidly gazing out of windows than Penelope Smythe. Perhaps she expected a handsome prince on a white charger to come cantering up the street.

  “When I have established Miss Amy Marguerite’s schedule, then what?”

  Then, Penelope would be sacked and replaced with a governess. “If you see an occasion to win the child’s trust, that’s all well and good, but your sole objective is to report her schedule to me.”

  Penelope rose. “It’s a fine morning. You’ll want me to be off, I take it?”

  “The sooner the better. Wear something inconspicuous. You were with me when I called on Grampion, though I doubt he noticed you, meaning no insul
t. A titled gentleman will pay no mind to a woman who’s neither young nor pretty nor well-dowered. You mustn’t take it personally.”

  As if that statement of the obvious required pondering, Penelope stood for a moment by the window.

  “I’m sure you are correct, ma’am. I’ll be about my assigned task now.”

  “Take a biscuit or two with you for the girl. Or some bread crusts for the ducks. You needn’t abandon your post for the midday meal either. I’ll manage without you here.”

  “Very good, ma’am.” Penelope bobbed a curtsey and took her leave.

  She’d sit in the park getting freckles by the hour, provided she could take a book along. Roberta would write Penelope a decent character when it came time to let her go, for such a passionless soul was surely deserving of pity, and Roberta was ever kind to the less fortunate.

  Chapter Sixteen

  * * *

  “Where are we off to on this glorious day?” Oscar asked.

  Lily had dragged him to the milliner’s after yesterday’s call on the Kettering household. “My glovemaker, by way of a call on the Countess of Rosecroft.”

  Hessian had devised this scheme before he’d left Lily the previous evening. She was to pay a call on her ladyship, while Hessian would find a discreet way to approach the earl. Rosecroft and his countess would make formidable go-betweens, because Uncle Walter would not dare restrict Lily’s access to them, or theirs to her.

  Thank heavens, Hessian had been capable of thinking.

  Oscar examined his teeth in the mirror over the sideboard. “Her ladyship is blond, curvaceous, has an unmistakable northern accent? I don’t think she cares for me.”

  “If that’s all you noticed about her, then you doubtless failed to impress her. You look fine, Oscar.”

  He tapped his top hat onto this head, then adjusted the angle. “Fine isn’t good enough. I must look my best if I’m to make an impression as your devoted cousin. Sir Worth Kettering was impressed. I certainly made a proper fuss over his stinking dog. I hope Rosecroft hasn’t any dogs. Canines are not supposed to be underfoot when one is entertaining callers.”

  He left off adjusting his hat, his cravat pin, his gloves, and his watch chain to offer Lily his arm.

  “Rosecroft’s hound is twice the size of Worth Kettering’s,” Lily said. “The dog is devoted to Bronwyn.”

  Coach wheels and shod hooves sounded on the cobbles out front, and the butler opened the door.

  “Do I devote myself to the child or to the dog?” Oscar asked.

  If Hessian could not foil Uncle Walter’s schemes, Lily might be sentenced to thirty more years of Oscar’s hopeless self-interest.

  She took her cousin’s arm. “You make much of the dog. Bronwyn, like her parents, does not suffer fools, while Scout’s nature is tolerant.”

  Oscar needed a moment to comprehend the insult, but he smiled as he handed Lily into the coach. “Very clever.” He settled beside her on the forward-facing seat, something he would not have done even a week ago. “Is my doting convincing? Papa lurks in his study, peering out of windows at the most inconvenient times.”

  Uncle’s study was the only room in the house to have a view of both the back garden and the front walkway. Lily had noticed this within a week of joining his residence.

  “Your doting is convincing. I wish you wouldn’t.”

  He patted her hand, and Lily nearly bolted from the coach. “No need to thank me. I’m not awful, you know.”

  Yes, you are. “You are also not the husband I’d choose for myself.”

  “You think I want a tart-tongued woman five years my senior for a bride? That reminds me, what did the Braithwaite creature want? She’s called on you twice now in the space of a week. Papa says she was a friend of your mother’s, but what sort of friend waits years to pay a condolence call?”

  Hessian had warned Lily not to underestimate Oscar—he was his father’s son, after all. “If she should call again while I’m out, please do not receive her. She claims to have letters my mother wrote, and I suspect she wants me to pay her for them.”

  Oscar left off fussing with his sleeve button. “Enterprising of her. Are these scandalous letters? Was your mother propositioning another woman in writing? How naughty.”

  I shall go mad within the week. “I haven’t spoken with Mrs. Braithwaite enough to know the nature of the correspondence, but I will entrust resolution of her concerns to you, should you become my husband.”

  “That’s the spirit,” Oscar said, patting Lily’s hand again. “Man and wife, wedded and bedded. Shall we pay a call on Mrs. Braithwaite as a couple?”

  How long could one coach ride be? “Uncle has warned me not to allow a connection with her. He says she’s not good ton.”

  “Does that mean she’s a bit too merry? I fancy a merry widow, though—”

  Lily yanked the shade down. “Oscar, you will recall, at all times, in all places, that I am a lady. Your vulgar observations are inappropriate.”

  He tried for a laugh. Lily ignored him, and at long last, he fell silent. The absence of grating chatter probably meant he was brooding over how to use Mrs. Braithwaite’s threats to his own advantage.

  “Mrs. Braithwaite expected me to marry the Earl of Grampion,” Lily said. “I was to encourage him to place his ward in Mrs. Braithwaite’s household, for the girl is her niece.”

  “What widow in her right mind would willingly—? Oh, Grampion has money. Of course. Well, you won’t be marrying him.”

  “It’s not as if Grampion has offered for me.” Though he had, and last night he’d withdrawn his offer, in so many words.

  Of all the frustrations and sorrows burdening Lily’s heart, that one was the heaviest. Grampion was behaving honorably, aiding a damsel in a mess, but he’d been very plainspoken on the topic of marriage to her.

  A peer’s marriage must be free of any hint of irregularity. Lily had been spinning ignorant fancies to expect anything else.

  “Here we are.” Oscar peered out the window at Rosecroft’s town house, a modest dwelling on a peaceful side street. His lordship had doubtless chosen the property for two reasons. It was close to the homes of his parents and siblings, and its stables were large and commodious for a Town residence.

  “Rosecroft is horse-mad,” Lily said as the footman lowered the steps.

  “Everybody knows that.” Oscar preceded her from the coach and offered her his hand. “They’re expecting us?”

  “I often call on her ladyship of a weekday afternoon.”

  “No accounting for taste,” Oscar said, putting Lily’s hand on his arm. “Let’s get this over with. I can use a new pair of gloves, come to think of. I’ll put them on your account, shall I?”

  Five minutes later, Rosecroft was escorting a bewildered Oscar from the family parlor—“Stronger libation to be had just down the corridor, Leggett”—and her ladyship was closing the door behind the men.

  “Lily Ferguson, why on earth would you inflict the company of that strutting noddypoop on yourself, much less on somebody who accounts herself one of your friends?”

  “I do apologize,” Lily said, “and Oscar isn’t… well, he is, but that cannot be helped.”

  Her ladyship took the place on the sofa next to Lily. “Lily, have you been crying?”

  Only half the night. “Of course not.”

  “I’m a mama. We have instincts about these things. You’re in trouble, aren’t you?”

  “I have been for years.” Who on earth had said that? Lily put her hand over her mouth, but nothing would unsay those words. “I beg your pardon. I’m simply… Uncle thinks Oscar and I would suit.”

  Masculine laughter sounded from down the corridor. Lily wanted to clap her hands over her ears.

  “Tell me the rest, Lily. We’re friends, and once upon a time, I was in a spot of bother myself. Rosecroft hasn’t slept on a bed of eiderdown his whole life either.”

  Once upon a time… the opening for most self-respecting fairy tales. �
��If Grampion asks your husband for a private conversation, please indicate to Rosecroft that I’d take it as a favor if he allowed the conversation.”

  “It’s Grampion you’d rather marry, isn’t it?” Her ladyship’s tone was so kind, so understanding, that Lily’s heart broke all over again.

  “There’s more to it than that, but yes. I’d rather spend the rest of my life doing Grampion’s laundry or chopping vegetables in his kitchen than endure five minutes as Oscar’s wife, but I’m not sure I have a choice. Uncle is very determined on the matter, and there’s a fortune involved, as well as old scandal.”

  The countess took Lily in her arms. “You poor dear. Your smiling grease spot of an uncle has doubtless helped himself to your money and can’t bear for the world to learn of his thievery. Why must people be so venal and greedy?”

  Her ladyship’s embrace was fierce and unexpected, else Lily might have had some defense against it. Instead, Lily hugged her friend back and tried not to cry.

  “I’m tired,” Lily said when she’d thoroughly re-wrinkled Hessian’s handkerchief. She’d kept the one he’d given her last night and was carrying it as a talisman against despair. “I’m tired of dealing with Uncle, and now Oscar says he and I are to be married after my birthday. I have only seventy-eight pounds, and please stuff a tea cake in my mouth, lest I become a candidate for Bedlam.”

  Her ladyship held up a plate of cakes. “Take several. They’re small, and Rosecroft will be back soon, a one-man biblical plague where baked goods are concerned. What can I do to help, Lily? I can put a coach and team at your disposal, get you to Dover, Portsmouth, or Scotland. Money won’t be a problem, and you’re welcome to help yourself to my wardrobe, though we’re hardly of a size.”