That brought a truer smile to her face than he had seen thus far that evening. “Yes, I have. Unlike you, I arrived on time.”
He hung his head as though shamed. “I suppose I am rather late. I apologize.”
“To me?” She gave him an amused nudge with her shoulder. “For shame. I am not the hostess. Your sister was not sure you would come at all.” She fell into step with him easily, notwithstanding the disparity in their heights and stride.
“Essie will forgive me.” He straightened his posture, unrepentant.
He did not direct her to the tables, knowing she had already visited them, but to the archway leading to the sea path. While he had tamped down the urge to escape, he yet preferred the open stretch of beach to the gardens.
Beyond the small hill covered in long grasses, the sand stretched north and south, and the waves lapped at the shore. “The moon will rise soon,” Isaac said, as though that were the reason he directed them away from the small crowd to the sand. “Directly ahead of us, as though from the sea.”
“A full moon,” she added softly, her words a breath on the night air. “I watched it, last evening, come into view of my window. Just before dinner.” She looked up at him, her eyes bright. “My family stays in London most of the year, and the skies are never so clear there as here. I have wanted to take a walk in the evening many times since my arrival in the country.” She raised her chin upward, her eyes turning to the heavens above. Her smile fell away, yet a softness came into her expression. She had such a gentle soul, a kindness about her he hadn’t encountered often outside of his circle of friends.
“I watched many a moon creep across the sky during my time on the Continent,” he murmured, then clamped his mouth shut tightly. He had no wish to speak of the war. Ever. Yet when she turned her attention back to him, a question in her eyes, he found himself answering. “There were nights I could not sleep. I had a tent, of course. Officers were given the best of the worst accommodations.” He forced a chuckle but turned his gaze away from hers to the ground as they walked upon the sand. “But it was easier to be in the open air, before it filled with smoke from battle. To lay beneath the stars and find my favorite constellations from boyhood. From a time before I knew the truth of what it meant to be a soldier.”
When she spoke, her words were slower, as though each came with the weight of her thoughts. “I think we all look for peace where we can find it. At war, in the noise of London. Even in the midst of a ballroom, with music, swirls of silk, and heavy perfumes. There are quiet corners. Windows for peering out to remember there is a wider world than where we find ourselves.”
That she echoed his thoughts, that she could understand what he had never attempted to explain to anyone, made his heart take up speed. She knew. “Yes. I—I often feel that way. That I need to look beyond a crowd, a room, and remember there is more.”
His reasons were different from hers. He knew that without asking. She likely had no wish to escape, for fear of revealing a weakness, for fear of breaking apart. But she understood, and that alone brought him comfort.
Millie nudged his shoulder with hers, then stayed near, her arm upon his. “Are you telling me we have something in common, Sir Isaac?”
He let his shoulders droop and lowered his head dramatically. “This truly is the end of all things, if we find ourselves at such an accord.”
“You are a terrible man.” Her laugh was soft and warm as the breeze. “But I suppose that makes me terrible, too.” She turned her face away from him, to where the Inglewood groundskeeper and his crew of six men worked to arrange scraggly branches and driftwood into a mound that would burn well. “That will be a large fire. Will it burn all night?”
“Most likely several hours, should we keep feeding the flames.” He nodded to the shoreline. “Would you care to walk until it is lit?”
“Thank you, I would.” She adjusted her skirts, taking them up a touch with her free hand to keep the hem from sand.
They kept to their walk, southward. The sun had faded away beyond Inglewood Keep in the west, and a soft glow above the sea indicated the moon was ready to take the sun’s place. He did not take her far. They were within full view of anyone upon the beach, though details might not be so clear in the moments between the sunset and the moonrise.
“Sir Isaac,” she said, her voice hesitant and faint against the sound of the surf. “I have a most impertinent question to ask.”
“I am not the least surprised, given our conversations of the past.” He turned her about, ready to walk again to the fire. A soft orange glow low upon the sand indicated the bonfire had at last been lit. “Ask. I will not take offense.”
They took a few more steps before she stopped them, tugging gently upon his arm. Isaac looked down at her, and the moon broke the surface of the North Sea, turning her copper hair silver. His breath caught. For the barest moment, he wondered what her reaction might be were he to lean down and kiss her.
“What is it that makes Lady Olivia dislike you so?” she asked. The question removed temptation more soundly than a slap. Though she asked it gently. There was a pleading in her tone as though something important depended upon the answer. As though she depended upon it.
He released his breath, turning away from her. The moment of enchantment had left him confused, but not so befuddled as to answer that question honestly. Not entirely.
“As a gentleman, I cannot answer that. No matter how I feel toward Lady Olivia, it is not something I ought to tell.”
“I understand.” Yet she did not, given the disappointment in her eyes.
He sighed heavily, the weight of his concerns over Millie returning. Her place among the marquess’s family could only cause trouble, but whether for her or someone else, he could not decide.
If only she had come to the country as the guest of some other person. If he had met her at a gathering such as this, with moonlight and the surf to lend a touch of magic to her first glimpse of him. Instead, his perception and hers were colored by the likes of Lady Olivia. But on their own, on a night such as that, perhaps they might have—
Isaac caught himself before completing that thought. It did not matter who had brought her to Suffolk, to Aldersy, or to the very door of Inglewood. Miss Millicent Wedgewood was nothing to him but the friend of his sister. Perhaps his friend, too. But she had no more desire to entertain notions of more toward him than anyone else had. A baronet. A damaged man, in body and soul. A burden to all those who actually did care for him with his ill-disposed humor.
He took her back to the fire, and she asked him nothing further. They said not another word. The rest of the party began to come down from the gardens, and servants were putting benches about the fire.
Millie’s hand started to slip from his arm, and he let it this time. “Thank you for the walk, Sir Isaac.” She curtsied, as though they were in a drawing room for her to take her leave, rather than upon a beach.
“Miss Wedgewood, wait.” He did not touch her, though he had to remind himself to keep his hand to himself. “Will you sit with me, near the fire?”
Her eyes flashed up at him, surprise in their depths. “You are a strange one, sir.” She angled her head to one side, narrowing her eyes at him. “One moment, I am certain we are friends. The next, I think you wish me away in your silence. Then we are friends again. Which is it?”
What was he to say to that? He could not answer. He was not certain of himself. Not in the least. But when the moon caught upon her, as it did just then, he rather felt like leaning down and kissing her.
He must not give in to such a foolish whim. It would not be gentlemanly. She certainly would not welcome that action.
“Sir Isaac.” She said his name the way one might speak an endearment, bringing him out of his befuddled thoughts. “Are we friends or foes, sir?” Though her lips pressed together, she smiled at him.
Perhaps she would welcome a kiss, given the dancing mischief in her eyes.
A burst of song, loud
and wobbly, led out by Mr. Matthew Barnes, Jacob’s eldest brother, put an end to all thoughts of a stolen kiss.
A laugh escaped those all too kissable lips. “Come. You can tell me how much you detest me another time.”
With a gentle tug of his arm, she led them to the benches set about the fire, where many of his friends sat and sang a ridiculous song. Once seated next to each other, Millie joined in the singing.
Her sweet soprano gave him yet another reason to enjoy having her near.
Chapter 13
The house thundered with the clamor of servants, the doors in the corridors opening and closing, all the day long. The guests had arrived for the house party, fully a dozen of them along with twice as many servants, and their voices filtered through the cracks around Millie’s door. She remained in her room, in a chair she had dragged to the window. Sarah stayed with her, sitting within arm’s reach of Millie. The maid’s presence was the only comfort Millie could rely upon.
Millie’s gut twisted whenever she thought of Lord Carning. He could have been the first guest to enter the house, or perhaps hadn’t even arrived yet, but the knowledge that he resided under the same roof as she made her abominably ill.
In an attempt to distract herself, Millie thought of Mr. Weston. He was yet another of her targets, at the behest of Mrs. Cecilia Vanderby. Millie had absolutely no idea why the woman could not find happiness with her wealthy Dutchman and leave her former suitor to his own devices.
“Misery seeks its own, miss,” Sarah had said when Millie voiced her confusion. “People can’t accept that they’re the only ones unhappy. They’re jealous, and waste their time trying to make others feel the same, when really they ought to put their energy into fixing their own problems.”
Millie could not agree more with her servant.
“I am only to find something for Mrs. Vanderby to use against Mr. Weston in Society. It need not even be the man’s darkest secrets. Only something she might taunt him with before others.” Millie massaged her temples. “How very juvenile.”
“That’s Society, miss.” Sarah kept at her tatting, a nearly complete lace collar resting upon her apron. “Everyone wishes to prove themselves better than anyone else. No matter the cost.”
Not for the first time, Millie wondered at her mother’s desire to rejoin such a herd of unscrupulous men and women. Though, the reasons her whole family needed to regain their footing were easy enough to understand. Better opportunities for her father, for their income, and for her own advantageous marriage.
Sir Isaac’s crooked grin flashed in her memory. Millie brushed it aside rather than dwell on the fact she must hurt him, too. What choice did she have? The previous evening, sitting next to him while the Earl of Inglewood told ghost stories that left everyone shuddering, she had wished Isaac would put his arm around her. Comfort her and protect her from the unseen ghosts. But she had sat on his left side. Even had he wanted to, and he most certainly did not, there was no arm there to wrap around her.
How ridiculous. How utterly foolish of her to entertain any notions of friendship, let alone greater affection, existing between them. She had tried to do the right thing, and Lady Olivia effectively destroyed that plan.
“What will you do if Lord Carning attempts to speak to you?” Sarah asked when the dinner hour drew near.
“Make certain I am never alone with him. That will require that anything he says to me remain appropriate for others to hear.” Millie shuddered, remembering the one and only time she had been in a room alone with the man. “He never acted as anything other than a perfect gentleman until that night, Sarah.”
Sarah said nothing, merely rose to prepare Millie’s evening dress. They said little except what was required for Sarah to prepare Millie for the evening. She chose a gown of blue with a glimmering silver overlay. The gown had always reminded her of a starlit sky. And thinking on such a scene now reminded her of standing beneath the stars with Isaac.
Perhaps the warmth of that memory would be enough to protect her from the cold gaze of Lord Carning.
After Sarah looped and twisted Millie’s hair into an intricate swirl upon her head, she put her hand on Millie’s arm. “There’s one thing more I’m putting in your hair, miss.” She pulled out a long pin with a bright blue stone on its end. She held it up in the mirror, showing Millie the point. “We’d normally use it with a fancy cap. But I can make it look like it belongs in your hair. Like this.” The maid carefully put it through Millie’s hair, concealing the six-inch metal most cleverly, running it from just above Millie’s forehead through to the back of her auburn curls.
“A weapon?” Millie asked, her hands went cold inside her gloves. “You think it necessary—”
“I hope not. But it’s there. My mum, she always told me to keep something at hand to defend myself. A rock in my coat pocket. A pin in my apron. A needle. Anything.” Sarah met Millie’s eyes in the mirror. “It’s not a fair world for any of us, miss. I just want to look after you a bit.”
Millie’s eyes filled with tears at that kindness. She sniffed and found a handkerchief to quickly swipe at the moisture in her eyes. “Thank you, Sarah. What would I do without you?”
Sarah only offered a smile that did not quite make it to her eyes. “Well, miss, you’d not have nearly such well-made hair.” She sniffed and tipped her chin up as though proud.
Millie laughed and rose, then wrapped her arms around her maid in a brief embrace. “You are a wonder, Sarah.”
Then the two of them looked over her dress one more time and applied the smallest amount of scent behind her ears and at her throat. Sarah handed Millie a fan to hang at her wrist before opening the door to allow her mistress out into the rest of the house.
Once in the drawing room, where everyone had started gathering in preparation for dinner, Millie realized she needed every good wish Sarah had sent with her. Lady Alderton, Lord Neil, and Lady Olivia were at the center of everything, greeting their guests and making introductions.
Lord Neil saw her before his sister or mother, and the man gave her a commiserating sort of grimace before coming her direction. “Miss Wedgewood. I have not seen you today.”
“I thought it best to rest,” she said quietly. He offered his arm and she took it.
“If you need rescue,” he said quietly, “signal me with that fan of yours.” He did not leave her time to respond. Lord Neil raised his voice and brought her to a couch full of guests. He introduced her to two sisters and their parents, then to a handsome gentleman with black hair and a charming smile.
“Mr. Weston, this is Miss Wedgewood, a particular friend of my sister’s. We have made the two of you dinner partners this evening.” Lord Neil spoke with his usual slow, almost bored tone. The man certainly was a gifted actor. He hid his emotions quite well, yet Millie sensed his thoughtfulness, his good heart, every time they spoke.
“A pleasure, Miss Wedgewood,” the object of her current hunt said, appearing not the least put out that he would be expected to escort a nobody to the table.
Lord Neil kept her there, making conversation with Mr. Weston and one of the other young ladies. Weston was something of a flirt, she realized in only a few minutes, bandying about compliments to both unmarried women and attempting to draw Lord Neil into the same. While that might make it easy to converse with him, flirts rarely shared personal information.
An all too familiar deep baritone voice interrupted her thoughts. “Miss Millicent Wedgewood. What an unexpected pleasure, to see you again.”
The breath froze in Millie’s lungs, and she turned woodenly to greet the owner of the voice by dropping a curtsy more worthy of his grandfather, a duke, than him. “Lord Carning. Good evening.” She barely raised her eyes to the level of his cravat.
“Allow me to introduce my wife,” he said, his voice dripping with haughtiness. “Lady Carning, Miss Wedgewood is an old acquaintance. I have known her since before she came out in Society. You have come out by now, I would assume, Miss Wedgew
ood? I cannot recall seeing you at any event in Town.”
“Yes, I am quite out,” she whispered, then swiftly turned her eyes to the woman on his arm as she curtsied. “Lady Carning. It is an honor to meet you.”
The viscountess was much taller than Millie, with alabaster skin, golden hair, and blue eyes. She looked, except for her height, very much like Millie’s sister. The woman held herself with the poise of a Greek statue.
“Miss Wedgewood. A pleasure,” she said, her voice like a harp in its gentle musicality. Millie realized, quite suddenly, that the woman was likely younger than herself. The viscount was at least forty-five. His wife could be no more than twenty.
The poor woman.
Millie was saved from further exchange when the butler arrived to announce dinner, and doors opened to allow them into the opulent dining room and heavy-laden table. Mr. Weston took her arm, and Millie briefly put a hand to her head where the blue-gem pin rested in her curls. Though unlikely as she was to need it, its presence soothed her.
The house party’s beginning made her long for its end. But no matter what happened, Millie had to come out the victor. Had to satisfy Lady Olivia. Or else disappoint her parents, thrust her family into obscurity, and forgo her own dreams of a titled husband and home of her own.
Chapter 14
Isaac sat at his breakfast, turning a thick sheet of ivory paper over and over in his hand.
The itinerary and invitations for the various events for the Alderton house party had arrived. The marchioness always sent out a complete schedule to the neighborhood, at least to those privileged few whom she wished to attend the daily activities. Isaac had turned down the invitations the previous year, except when escorting Esther.
Silas had tasked Isaac with the role of escort, as the earl refused to even step foot on Alderton land. His dislike of Lord Neil had grown to include the whole family when the marquess had made a veiled reference to the strange timing of Silas and Esther’s marriage.
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