Between the Devil and Ian Eversea (5 page)

“Ha ha!” Tansy laughed.

She’d decided to take looking beautiful tonight with the seriousness of blood sport.

And because her own American maid had been terrified at the very idea of making the crossing into a new country with her, Genevieve graciously sent over her own, a girl named Annie who was quiet, competent, and eager to please.

But Tansy was not in a mood to be pleased.

“Not the green. The blue.”

The abigail pulled the blue from the closet.

“Not that blue. The
other
blue.” The girl pulled it into her arms and turned around halfway when Tansy said, “No, perhaps the pale green silk?”

“I think you’ll look beautiful in any of them, miss,” the poor abigail said desperately.

Tansy nearly stamped her foot.

“Tell me, Annie,” she demanded. “Have you a beau?”

Annie blushed. “Aye, miss. He works in the stables.”

Tansy softened, genuinely curious. “How lovely! Is he handsome, your beau?”

“Aye, if I do say so myself. His name is James. We’re to be married, but—”

“Oh,
are
you to be married? How lovely!” She beamed.

Annie glowed. “Oh, it is, it is. And yet we must wait, for we haven’t enough money to set up housekeeping, you see. James would like to build a little house for us to live in, so we needn’t always live-in, and . . . surely I shouldn’t bore you with this, Miss Danforth,” she said desperately.

“I’m not bored at all. It’s terribly important to have a home of your own. I should like one, too, you see. For I haven’t one anymore. Or a family, you see.”

And in that moment the hopes and concerns of womanhood transcended their societal roles and bound them fast in a subtle accord.

“You’ve a home here and we’ll look after you,” Annie said firmly. “If ever you need anything, Miss Danforth.”

“Thank you,” she said, quite touched.

There was an awkward, warm little silence, and Tansy turned away again, toward the wardrobe.

She’d never worried so much about a ball gown. Along with every young woman in New York society, she had taken her ability to captivate utterly for granted, regardless of what she wore. This was why the sympathy calls had been shot through with a subtle, yet unmistakably morbid glee. The queen had at last been nudged from her throne. It had taken disaster to do it, but still.

The balls had gone on without her while she dealt with solicitors and the like. And only a very few of those young women ever called on her again.

Tansy hated to admit it, but her confidence was not as ironclad as it once was. Though perhaps all it needed was a little exercise in the proper context. Such as a ballroom full of men.

“Now . . . think about it this way,” she said. “If you were me, and you wanted your beau to look at you and forget that anyone else in the world existed, which dress would you wear?”

Annie looked captivated by this notion, then turned and perused the dresses hanging there. “The white with silver ribbon,” she said decisively.

Now
they were making progress.

“Why?” Tansy pressed.

“Because you’ll look like an—”

“Please don’t say angel!”

Annie smiled. “A pearl what stepped from an oyster. A mermaid. A nymph.”

A pearl! A nymph! A mermaid! Tansy liked all of those. She held the dress beneath her chin and studied herself in the mirror. With her hair down about her shoulders, she supposed she
did
look a bit like a mythical creature. The silver ribbon reflected the silver blue of her eyes, the white made her skin glow nearly golden, and her lips were blush, the color of the inside of a shell.

It would do. She exhaled.

“You see, Annie, it’s just that I’ve only the one chance to make a first impression. And it’s been so very long since I’ve been to a party like this.”

“I will make certain you’ll be unforgettable, miss.”

Tansy gave a short nod. “Thank you.”

The white dress it was. She slid it over her head like a gambler choosing the card that would decide the game.

A
T DINNER SHE
was introduced to myriad Everseas.

Her first impression was of a forest of tall, darkly appealing men, all white smiles, magnificent cheekbones, and exquisite manners, with manly, very English names: Colin, Marcus, Charles. They were so clearly of a piece, variations on a theme begun by their parents, who were two very handsome people. All of the boys were taller, just a little, than their merry-eyed father. The mother had the same heart-shaped face as Genevieve.

If they’d been bonbons in a box, she thought she might have first selected the one called Colin, the tallest of them, the only one whose eyes, she could have sworn, were more green than they were blue. And they sparkled.

She smiled at him.

He smiled back, and almost, not quite, winked.

And then his body convulsed swiftly as if someone had stabbed him with a fork.

He frowned, and the frown wavered and became a smile aimed at the woman across from him.

Her coloring was striking, her hair black, her skin fair, her dark eyes enigmatic. She had the air of permanent confidence of one who knows she is loved, and she was wearing a little private smile for her husband.

His wife. Madeleine. The other wives were named Louisa and Rosalind.

For alas, every last one of the Everseas was married.

Everyone, apart, that was, from Olivia.

And at the first sight of Olivia Eversea, Tansy’s confidence wavered just a bit.

It was easy to see why she’d inspired the men of greater Sussex and beyond to turn the house into a thicket of flowers. Where Genevieve’s beauty was warm and calm, Olivia glittered, like a diamond or a shard. Her eyes were fiercely bright and she was thin, perhaps a bit too thin, but it suited her; there was no angle from which Olivia Eversea’s face wasn’t somehow fascinating. Tansy found herself admiring the way she held her shoulders, and how graceful her slim arms were when she reached for the salt cellar.

“How very interesting to have an American in our midst, Miss Danforth,” she said. “You hail from New York?”

“I do. I was born here, and I remember it fondly. But I love New York.” A wave of longing for her previous life crashed over her so suddenly that her hand stilled on her fork. She’d once sat around a dinner table with her own family, laughing and bickering, and had once taken it for granted.

She reapplied herself to her peas. She needed stamina for the evening ahead. She hoisted the fork up again.

“Now, the south of your country in particular is populated by slave owners, is it not, Miss Danforth?”

Tansy’s fork froze on its way to her mouth.

Oh, Hell’s teeth. It sounded like a trap.

And she strongly suspected Olivia Eversea was a reader of the sort that she and the duke were not.

“I suppose some might say that,” she said very, very cautiously.

“Do you know anyone who—”

Olivia suddenly hopped a few inches out of her chair and squeaked.

“Mind the stockings,” she muttered darkly.

Or at least that’s what Tansy thought she’d said. Tansy frowned a little.

“Olivia works so hard for excellent causes.” This came from the matriarch, Mrs. Eversea, and she managed to make it sound both like pride and a warning.

Ah,
that
was likely why Olivia hadn’t yet married. Tansy couldn’t imagine a man in the world who would tolerate that nonsense for long. Suddenly she was far more certain she’d be able to usurp Olivia’s flower throne.

She smiled at Olivia, as a way of apologizing for that unworthy thought.

Olivia smiled back at her, as if she’d heard every word of that thought and wasn’t the least bit worried about her supremacy.

“Where is your brother?” the matriarch, Mrs. Eversea, asked the handsome Eversea next to her. Marcus?

Brother? She looked up the table at all those handsome faces. There were
more
of them?

Which one of these men was the balcony pagan? she wondered.

A surge of optimism swept through her. Perhaps men like the Everseas were commonplace here in England. Perhaps finding a beautiful titled husband would be as simple as shaking an apple from a tree.

“Last I saw of him he was out with Adam repairing a paddock fence or a roof or something somewhere,” the one called Chase said. “And they’ll be at the vicarage repairs for days.”

The duke looked up and said dryly, “As a form of penance for his usual—”

His face contorted in a wince. She knew a ferocious twinge of pity. Possibly when one got to his age, which was forty at least, many things made you wince. Gout, heart flutters, capricious digestion.

“Our cousin Mr. Adam Sylvaine is the vicar here in Pennyroyal Green,” Genevieve said to Tansy. “He’s always helping the Sussex poor. We’re so very proud of him.”

“How lovely to have a vicar as part of the family. Have you another brother?”

“Aren’t we fortunate to have such wonderful weather at this time of year?” This came from the duke, a question posed to the table at large, as if he hadn’t heard her question at all. Perhaps he hadn’t. Perhaps she’d underestimated his age and he was beginning to need an ear trumpet to hear voices over a distance of several feet.

“IT’S LOVELY. DO YOU NORMALLY HAVE INCLEMENT SPRINGS?”

She had a sudden impression of the whites of eyes as they all widened.

“Our springs are so beautiful, Miss Danforth. You’ll love them,” Olivia volunteered, softly, carefully, as if demonstrating the proper indoor tone.

“Have you another brother?” she tried, more softly, a bit suspicious now.

“What are your interests and pursuits, Miss Danforth?” This came from Colin. It was a subject change, but his eyes held a promising sparkle.

“Oh, I’ve become a bit of a wallflower, I’m afraid. I’m looking forward to learning what the natives of Sussex enjoy.”

Colin recognized this as flirtation, she could tell. This one was a rogue, or once had been.

“Colin likes cows,” Chase said abruptly, irritably. “Very, very much.”

“Cows . . .” Tansy mused. “Well, I can think of few things more fulfilling than raising a bovine to adulthood,” she said.

There was an astonished hush.

Colin looked as though he was torn between thinking this was balderdash and wondering whether he cared whether it was or not, since it was precisely what he wanted to hear.

“Miss Danforth, have you ever traveled to the East Indies?” Chase interjected. It sounded almost experimental.

She swiveled her head toward him. “I haven’t had the pleasure yet, but I imagine working for the East India Company is so
dashing
. The two of you must be very talented. I hope you’ll tell me more about it during my stay.”

She beamed at them.

And everyone could see the moment when Colin and Chase surrendered to the big eyes and eyelashes and the smile and they glowed.

There was another almost palpable hush.

And then Chase and Colin began talking over each other about cows and the East India Company until the footman brought in the blancmange.

Chapter 5

“W
ALLFLOWER MY EYE!”
O
LIVIA
said to Genevieve after dinner. She perched at the edge of Genevieve’s bed and rubbed her ankle. “So much kicking and poking going on beneath the table tonight! Will we need to edit our conversation forever while she’s here? ‘I can’t think of anything more rewarding than raising a bovine to adulthood.’
Honestly!
And it’s not like she won’t
see
Ian at some point. We can’t disguise his existence forever. She may not find him in the least appealing when she does. She’s such a young thing, and Ian can be such a jade.”

Genevieve hesitated. The ironic parting words of Tansy’s paid chaperone, “Good
luck
yer Grace,” echoed in her mind.

She judiciously decided not to share this with Olivia. Not yet, anyway.

“Well, we shan’t be sharing every meal with her. I think she’s charming. She’s alone in the world and I think she’s only trying to please. She’s just as charming to everyone, including me, and she’ll be that way to you, too, if you give her a chance.”

Genevieve was magnanimous in happiness and love and prepared to be blinkered and loyal to a reminder of something her husband cherished from his past.

“We shall see,” Olivia said to the mirror. Love had been less kind to her, and she would never trust easily again.

A
FTER A BRIEF
dash to her room to pinch her cheeks and bite her lips and shake out her dress after sitting for dinner, Tansy ventured toward the ballroom.

She arrived on the threshold just as an excellent orchestra launched into a reel. And suddenly it felt as though her heart had been lifted up and twirled.

Lively music was very close to perfect happiness. Her life for so long had been full of movement, none of it particularly pleasant, none of it her choice. Tonight she would love to lose herself in one dance after another, like a butterfly flitting from flower to flower.

She took another tentative step into the room.

It wasn’t yet crowded. None of the faces she immediately saw were familiar. It was odd to think that by the end of the night they likely would be.

She took another step into the room. A bit like wading into cool water and becoming accustomed to it, bit by bit.

She took another step, smiling.

And then she froze.

Something terrible happened.

Her breath left her abruptly, as if she’d been dropped from a great height. Her vision spangled. She gave a half turn and peered over her shoulder, as if expecting to see the assailant who had taken a shovel to her head and utterly scrambled her senses.

She slowly, cautiously, turned her head again back toward ballroom. Toward that wall.

Alas, she already knew it wasn’t a shovel assailant. It was much worse.

It was a man.

A disturbing, delicious heat rushed over her skin. The entire world amplified inexplicably. Suddenly everything seemed louder and brighter and she was terribly conscious of her limbs, as if they were all newly installed and she would have to relearn how to use them.

For heaven’s sake. It wasn’t as though she hadn’t
seen
handsome men before. She’d routinely managed the affections of handsome men with the skill of a puppeteer. And it wasn’t a result of being out of the game, as it were. Giancarlo, handsome as he was, had scarcely raised her pulse.

What on earth was the difference here, then? Was it the way he held himself, as though the world itself was his to command? The faintly amused, detached expression, as if he intended to use everything and everyone he saw in it as his plaything, and make them like it? The sleek fit of his flawlessly tailored, elegantly simple clothes, which only made her wonder, shockingly, about what he looked like under the clothes? The arrogant profile? His delicious, nearly intimidating height?

It was all of those things and none of them. All she knew for certain was that it was new, and suddenly she was as blank-minded as a newborn.

Conscious that she was gawking, she forced herself to look in some other direction, which turned out to be, for some reason, up.

The only thing of interest on the ceiling was the chandelier, so she feigned wonderstruck admiration.

When she looked down again, the man was watching her. Clearly puzzled.

Her heart kicked violently.

His mouth tilted slightly at the corner, his head inclined in a slight nod, polite, a little indulgent.

His gaze kept traveling across the room, idly.

He’d skimmed her. As if she’d been a chair or a chandelier, or,
unthinkably . . .
a plain girl.

For the second time in minutes she experienced the shovel sensation.

A horrifying thought occurred to her: what if she wasn’t considered attractive in England? What if there was something about her features the English found comical? What if golden hair was considered passé? She felt as though the sword had suddenly been flipped from her hand.

She nearly leaped out of her slippers when someone touched her elbow. She’d forgotten there were other people in the world.

She whipped her head around again and found Genevieve next to her.

“Oh, there you are! Good heavens, don’t you look beautiful! Do come with me, Tansy. We’ll have your dance card filled in moments, I
assure
you.” Genevieve looped her arm companionably through hers and pulled her determinedly away. “And please don’t feel shy. Everyone will be delighted to meet you, I promise you.”

Tansy allowed herself to be led away, far away, from that man, and as she did, she aimed a smile radiantly, recklessly, across the room, into the crowd. The young man who happened to be standing in the path of it went scarlet, and then his face suffused with yearning and she knew, she
felt
, him watching her walk away.

And as she and Genevieve wended through the ballroom, she sensed male heads turning, one by one, like a meadow full of flowers bending in a summer breeze.

Before the night was over, she’d make that man take notice, too.

G
ENEVIEVE LED HER
through the crowd, making introductions to young men and young women. A gratifying number of eyes went wide; conversation was stammered; dances were begged. In short, everything was as it
should
be, and she began to relax and enjoy herself. Stingily, strategically, she gave away just one waltz to a randomly chosen young man, so that all of the others would wonder why she’d chosen him, before she told Genevieve, “All of this conversation has made me a bit thirsty. Do you think we can visit the punch bowl?”

She began heading in that direction before Genevieve could reply or effect another meeting.

The man was still standing alone against the wall, observing the ballroom at large. Time seemed to slow as she approached.

She watched as if in a dream he straightened, turned, and said, “Well, good evening, Genevieve. Where are you off to in such a hurry?”

He was on first name terms with the duchess!

Tansy’s heart was now pounding so hard it sent the blood ringing into her ears.

Genevieve said, “Miss Danforth, I’d like you to meet my brother, Mr. Ian Eversea. Captain Eversea, since his promotion.”

Her
brother
! The brother no one would expound upon!

Ian. Ian. Ian Ian Ian.

It wasn’t Lancelot, but it would do.

His bow, which was graceful, seemed unduly fascinating. She suspected everything he did would be fascinating—yawning, scratching, flicking sand from the corners of his eyes when he woke up in the morning. She found it difficult to imagine him doing anything so very ordinary.

Up close his face was a bit harder, a bit scarier, and more beautiful. Cheekbones and jaw and brow united in an uncompromising, faceted, diamondlike symmetry. His mouth was elegantly sculpted. His eyes above cheekbones as steep and forbidding as castle walls were blue, amused, ever-so-slightly cynical. He was older than she’d originally thought. He was even larger than she’d originally thought. He had shoulders that went on for eons. And he was able to look at her without scarlet flooding his cheeks, unlike so many other young men.

All of the things she felt in his presence felt too large to contain, too new to name. And it was this, perhaps, she’d been waiting for her entire life.

Could
this
be the balcony man?

“It’s a pleasure to meet you, Miss Danforth.”

His voice was so baritone, resonant, she fancied she could feel it in the pit of her stomach, like a thunderclap. Aristocratic. Warm but not too enthusiastic. Good. Fawners could be tedious.

And she would see what she could to amplify that enthusiasm.

It occurred to her then she hadn’t spoken yet. She steeled herself to dazzle.

“I hope you’ll call me Tansy.”

Funny. Her voice had emerged sounding surprisingly small.

He smiled faintly down at her. “Do you?”

The English all seemed to find this amusing.

To her shock, she could feel a fresh wave of heat rushing into her cheeks. He was likely looking at a literally scarlet woman.

She tried a radiant smile. It felt unnatural, as though suddenly twice the usual number of teeth were wedged into her mouth.

What was the
matter
with her?

“My friends do. And I hope we will become friends.”

“Any friend of my sister’s is a friend of mine.”

Said with pretty, impartial gravity.

And the faintest hint of what she suspected was, again, amusement.

Genevieve made a small sound in her throat. Tansy glanced at her curiously. It sounded almost like skepticism. Perhaps a warning.

“We’re on a quest to fill Tansy’s dance card with the most splendid dancers, Ian.”

It sounded very like Genevieve didn’t want to include Ian in that number.

“I’ve been a bit of a wallflower, I’m afraid.”

Tansy lowered her gaze demurely. Which gave her a clear view of his hands. Big hands, long straight fingers. A prickle of interesting heat started up at the back of her neck. “I’d be honored if you would dance with me, Mr. Eversea.”

Very, very bold of her. Quite inadvisable, and yet, she could blame it on American manners, and she knew no English gentleman would be able to refuse.

She suspected that hadn’t been Genevieve’s intention at all, for whatever reason, but even so.

She looked up again to find Ian exchanging an unreadable look with Genevieve and mouthing words. They looked like:
Must I?

The. Nerve.

“It would be my honor and privilege if you would share a waltz with me,” he said solemnly, but with a glint in his blue eyes, which he probably thought was devastating.

The fact that it
was
devastating was beside the point. So devastating she nearly forgot he’d just been insufferable.

As nearly as insufferable as she’d been.

“I shall look forward to it greatly, Mr. Eversea,” she said just as gravely, as Genevieve towed her away again.