Saying the words aloud made her smile. Her husband. Well, he had not proposed marriage yet, but what else could his letter mean?
“Oh, my lady.” Danvers straightened up and smiled sadly. “That is the most beautiful story I have ever heard. I wish you joy.”
“We have not announced,” Charlotte spluttered. “I mean…Danvers, let us not talk about it anymore. My hair and perhaps a little rouge?”
Charlotte remembered ruefully why she had gotten out of the habit of beautifying herself; it took so long and was more than a little uncomfortable.
But today, of all days, it was worth it. Charlotte bit her lip. This was starting to overwhelm her, this anticipation of seeing Will again. After sharing such an incredible night, a moment of exquisite passion that she had never known before, what did he want from her today? Could it be he wished to ask her to marry him in seriousness?
Charlotte breathed out slowly as she placed the bonnet on her head. This was ridiculous. She would drive herself mad with wondering, and it was a quarter to twelve. It was time to leave.
The front door snapped shut behind her, and she shivered in the cool breeze rustling the budding branches along the street. A few people had ventured from their homes, umbrellas on their arms, despite the threatening rainclouds.
She walked quickly, passing people in her rapid journey and nodding politely, without giving the opportunity for conversation. She could make out Pulteney Bridge, and there stood a gentleman waiting for her.
William.
Overwhelmed by the desire to run and kiss him, she fought the urge and slowed her pace. It would not do to arrive breathless, without the ability to say a single word.
“I hope I am not late,” she smiled nervously as she approached. “I slept in this morning.”
He removed his top hat and beamed. Charlotte melted. There was no other gentleman like this.
How had she found such a man, or rather, how had he found her? It seemed impossible, and as she looked at him, handsome in his well-tailored greatcoat, she wondered what he was doing with her. Past her prime and with little to recommend her, save a title, no other gentleman had ever sought her company.
“You look absolutely beautiful,” he said softly.
Her blush was involuntary. “Thank you.”
He stared at her, and she laughed.
“My apologies, I just—shall we?”
She nodded. “Yes.”
Charlotte moved to accept the arm she assumed would be offered. But it was not. He was a few steps ahead of her before she caught up, discomfort twisting her stomach. Why had he not offered her his arm?
“I have not seen that gown before.”
“No, this is new. One that no one has seen.”
The Sydney Gardens was almost deserted, with one other couple promenading along its path. Older than them, perhaps in their late forties, with two sullen boys in their wake.
“I never usually put any thought into the clothes I wear,” she said. “What does it matter? No one was looking at me.”
“I am always looking at you,” he countered, a wolfish grin on his face. “But if you ask me, the clothes get in the way.”
Her cheeks flushed, and although the other couple was yards from them, her eyes darted to them, concerned they may have heard his words.
“Charlotte,” he said, “I am grateful you have met me today. I have not been able to stop thinking about you.”
She dropped her gaze. “It has only been a few hours since we have last…seen each other.”
“Each moment has been torment.”
It was all too much, more a dream than reality. How could this be happening? How could these words of affection be directed at her?
Before saying another word, William stopped and took her arm. All thought of being seen was forgotten as Charlotte’s body responded to his closeness, and her heart responded to his words. He was all she wanted.
“I cannot wait,” he whispered, his eyes never leaving hers, “to tell people about our engagement.”
Engagement? He had not asked anything of the sort—at least, only in jest or lust.
Now tell me you’ll marry me, Charlotte. Tell me yes. That’s all I need from you.
She swallowed, her throat dry. “I do not think you have actually…proposed.”
William took a step back. “My God, Charlotte. What did you think last night was? Or was it all a jest to you?”
Was it time to admit to herself, as well as him, that she had fallen in love?
“I know your intentions, but I think you will find, Your Grace,” she said, attempting to keep her wild thoughts under control, “a proper proposal, one from someone of your class and breeding, includes going somewhere public, where it will be most embarrassing if the intended responds in the negative, getting down on bended knee, and professing their love publicly. I cannot recall you ever doing such a thing.”
Her eyes met his gaze. They were dark, staring intensely. Had she gone too far?
“My dear, Lady Charlotte,” he said in a low voice, stepping toward her, “we made love last night.”
Heat seared her cheeks as she leaned away. “That does not equate to a proposal!”
“I thought you loved me when you welcomed me into your bed, and I certainly left it in love with you.”
Will grinned and offered his arm, which Charlotte took with a smile. Playing with fire? She had stepped into the flames, and if she was not careful, she would soon be burned, branded with the force of his feelings. Feelings she barely understood.
“I am not saying that I feel differently,” she managed to say.
“In that case,” he said more seriously as they turned a corner, “tell me, honestly. Is that what it will take?”
“Take?”
“To secure your hand.”
Charlotte stared in amazement.
“Is that what you are waiting for?”
“You ask intimate questions,” she stated.
“Only the questions which truly matter to me.”
She considered him and saw nothing but truth on his face. This man had suffered through battle and watched men die violently. Now blessed with a title, desperate women flung themselves at him. But he wanted something more. Something deeper. Someone like…her.
“I am waiting for a man who I cannot say no to. A man whose presence in my life makes me forget I was ever a chaperone.” Charlotte did not know where the words were coming from. Perhaps a deep place within her, somewhere she had placed her hopes and dreams years ago when she had said goodbye to them forever. “A man who will make me feel like a bride for the rest of my life.”
William stopped dead in his tracks.
She knew it was too much to ask of anyone and should not have been too open. “What are you…oh!”
It had been impossible to continue talking as the heavens opened. Torrential rain poured down, and Charlotte laughed with the suddenness of it all.
“Goodness!” Her bonnet started to droop under the watery onslaught, and William laughed.
“Come on, the Pump Room is just around the corner, we can take cover there!”
He took her hand, and it felt like the most natural thing in the world. As they stepped inside the Pump Room, they wrung the water out from their sleeves.
“Ah, darling, I did not see you there!”
The voice rang out across the room as Charlotte shook herself dry.
“It looks like you have already been spotted,” William’s voice was wry. “Am I to share you with the whole of Bath society?”
She looked up and saw Lady Romeril. “Her ladyship is not hailing me. Can you not see Miss Worsley over there? She is back in town.”
Had it been a month since they had first met? His conduct toward her had always been honorable, even when he had been seducing her. She had heard nothing bad about him from anyone in society, not really. And he had been within moments of proposing…
Charlotte shivered. “We had better circulate, and separat
ely if we do not want the gossips of the world to talk.”
“Let them talk,” William said with a grin. “I care not what they say about us.”
She shook her head. “You may not, but I do. I will take a turn about the room and meet you back here in twenty minutes.”
Without waiting for his response, she allowed herself to join the gentle flow around the room. It was impossible to explain to him how exhilarating his intensity was. After giving up the hope of marriage, to have it suddenly thrust upon her…
It was overwhelming.
“Ah, Lady Charlotte!”
It was Miss Seton, and she was bearing down on her like a fox on the hunt, ignoring those whose paths she interrupted, her eyes firmly set on Charlotte.
“Miss Seton,” Charlotte said, dropping into a curtsey.
The lady followed suit and immediately said, “Dear Lord, am I glad to have come across you here, for I did not know which rooms you had taken this Season and ’tis so difficult to find out how to send a letter without direction! And how are you, Lady Charlotte?”
Charlotte opened her mouth to respond, but Miss Seton was too hasty for her.
“I must ask you, before you are swept away by this tide of people,” falling into step with her, “whether you are engaged next Thursday evening?”
Charlotte felt a slow swell of happiness. It had been weeks since any of her acquaintances had engaged her company for the evening. This was truly a good day.
“I believe I am unengaged for Thursday,” she replied.
“Thank heavens!” Miss Seton’s loud exclamation drew the notice of those around them. “I had been tearing my hair out, Lady Charlotte, but as soon as I saw you, I thought it would all come right, and now the table is complete!”
Charlotte smiled at Miss Seton’s enthusiasm. “I presume this is a dining engagement?”
“Oh, Lord, yes. I had two baronets and Lady Romeril, of course, and the three Belcher brothers, which left me unbalanced, you see,” explained Miss Seton breezily. “And with Miss Marnion being courted by the younger Belcher, I simply had to have a chaperone at the table to even the numbers and to ensure Miss Marnion’s protection. Seven o’clock then, this Thursday, my rooms—I’m in Grosvenor Square. Good day, Lady Charlotte!”
Without another word, Miss Seton stepped away into the stream of people.
Charlotte’s shoulders slumped. She should have guessed. Of course, Miss Seton does not wish her to attend on her own merit. She does not want to hear Charlotte’s opinion on art or music. She does not want the pleasure of seeing Charlotte dance or hear her sing.
Her merit was as chaperone, the world’s only view of her: a rather convenient spinster.
She reached the other end of the room and obediently followed the flow to turn around the room.
As Charlotte allowed the chatter of the room to wash over her, she tried to imagine being married to William—being married at all.
It was impossible. She had never been this close to marriage in her entire life, and as she had told William what felt like a lifetime ago, her only experience of marriage—her parents—was hardly a shining example.
She could have stayed at Stonehaven Lacey with Richard and Tabitha. It would certainly have been awkward at the beginning, to be sure, but after a while, they would have all become accustomed to each other, then perhaps she could have seen what a genuine marriage looks like.
A meeting of minds and hearts. A balance of opinions and passions. What it was to care for someone and be cared for in return.
Charlotte smiled despite herself. Instead, she had returned to Bath and discovered a gentleman who was ready to look past everything, her age, her reticence to be drawn into conversation with him, her innocence, and distrust.
Her wandering eyes caught sight of a tall man with sharp blue eyes.
William was walking in the opposite direction, and Charlotte’s breath caught. The sight of him, tall and handsome, elegantly dressed and with so much energy, so much charisma, the dampness of the rain still apparent in his hair…
His eyes caught hers. Without looking at those whom he pushed past, he began walking straight toward her, ignoring the affronted murmurs around him.
Charlotte’s heart was thumping painfully in her chest, and she stopped walking. She would jump into matrimony with him. William was the one who could make marriage not frightening but exciting. After all these years of being convinced she would be alone for the rest of her life, the two of them together have found happiness.
Without thinking, Charlotte began to walk toward William, and they met, breathless and silent, in the middle of the Pump Room.
Charlotte drank in the sight of him. She desperately wanted to say something, but what? He was staring silently, and Charlotte desperately wanted him to speak.
As she opened her mouth, William said, “I have hated being apart from you.”
He looked nervous. It was not an emotion she had seen on his features before, but it became him. That arrogant, self-assured look was gone. Now there was a charming vulnerability.
“Have you?” she managed. “It has only been five minutes.”
He nodded. “I have something important to say to you. To ask you here in this public place. Where a refusal to my question would be very embarrassing for me.”
Charlotte’s heart skipped a beat. Was this it? Was this the moment when he finally proposed in the way she had described?
Seeing the fear and anticipation in his eyes, seeing he was unsure whether she would accept…. He was just as afraid as she was. She was apprehensive about marriage, the commitment it brought—and so was he. Opening yourself up to another person was terrifying and he felt it too.
She loved that about him. She loved so much about him, she was unsteadied on her feet by the thought of it. How had she mistaken this love, this devotion to him, for anything else?
“Lady Charlotte,” he said quietly and began to bend his knee.
“Ah, Your Grace!”
William straightened so quickly, he seemed to pull a muscle in his neck. Charlotte whirled around to see who had unwisely interrupted what was to be the most romantic occasion of her life, and saw two women hurrying towards them, evidently mother and daughter by the similarity in their noses.
“I thought it was you!” The mother said accusingly to William. “Mrs. Holmes. We were introduced at the Winter Ball in London.”
Could she not see she had interrupted a private conversation? The daughter certainly seemed to recognize her impropriety and tugged at her mother’s sleeve to pull her away.
“Now then, Mary, His Grace will not mind,” soothed her mother, who immediately turned to William before he could speak. “I did think it was you there, Your Grace, and I was surprised, for I did not think you would come to the Pump Room, and here you are. Mary, I said, we absolutely must find his Grace the Duke of Mercia, and here you are!”
Charlotte glanced at William, who evidently had no idea who the woman was and had no wish to speak with her. Charlotte almost laughed aloud at the ridiculousness of it all. Was this Mrs. Holmes to keep them from happiness with her inane chatter?
“Such a pleasure to speak with you,” Mrs. Holmes was saying. “Now I heard tell from Miss Theodosia Ashbrooke, a lovely lady, I must say, that you were in the marriage market! And this is a very fine thing, for there are simply not the same caliber of eligible men I enjoyed in my youth, and Mr. Holmes was the cream of the crop. But as I was saying, you are currently seeking a bride, which is all to the good, and I wished to introduce you to my daughter, Mary, who, as you can see, is quite beautiful and not at all proud for it. I said to her the other day…”
Charlotte scrunched her nose at the awkwardness of the situation. To think, Mrs. Holmes believed it appropriate to accost poor Will in the Pump Room and offer her daughter on a silver platter!
She cast an eye at Miss Holmes, expecting to see her equally as mortified by her mother’s rudeness in interrupting their conversation—and mo
re, to be horrified that her mother was so blatantly attempting to secure Will as a son-in-law.
To her horror, the uncomfortable look had utterly disappeared from Miss Holmes, and she was smiling rather coquettishly at the handsome duke.
“—and so, I had to agree, for who am I to disagree with a viscount, especially one who considered my Mary so fine!” Mrs. Holmes drew breath, and William opened his mouth—but he missed his chance. “Although he was not the first to spot my Mary’s beauty, and I am certain he will not be the last, for when we had the Lady Romeril for dinner—you must know the Lady Romeril, everyone does. Why, even she said…”
Disgust overwhelmed Charlotte, and not at Mrs. Holmes, but the entire marriage market. It was worse than a cattle market, with the best beauties paraded to see how much men would bid for them. To think she had ever been a part of it, chaperoning women to ensure they hooked their gentleman. It was barbaric!
But her thoughts were interrupted as she was directly addressed by Mrs. Holmes.
“I am sure the Lady Charlotte will agree to be your chaperone, will you not, Lady Charlotte?” Mrs. Holmes beamed at her, and then turned to her daughter and spoke in a mock whisper, “I know the Lady Charlotte will oblige, my dear, for she is not one to begrudge the young and beautiful, though she has not enjoyed the fruits of matrimony herself.”
For the first time in her life, Charlotte felt the rage of her father erupt and did absolutely nothing to stop it.
“How dare you!” she exploded, her voice carrying. “How dare you speak to me in such a way—nay, about me in such a way! Your disrespectful attitude is disgraceful, and I am ashamed to hear it, let alone be its subject!”
Mrs. Holmes was staring, aghast, along with most of the Pump Room. Charlotte did not care. She was already stared at for being a spinster, laughed at for being a chaperone, but it was time to be gossiped about something she had actually done.
“For once in my life, I am not going to fade into the background of other people’s lives,” she stormed, advancing on the helpless Mrs. Holmes with a finger raised. Will took her hand and hastily held onto it, but Charlotte did not look at him. “I am tired of being the punchline to jokes! For once, you are going to look at me and see a woman, not just a handy chaperone who can act as part of the furniture to marry off your daughter!”
Always the Chaperone Page 14
