The Lady Who Saw Too Much (15 page)

The deep breath Gia took to steady her temper failed miserably. A vile response filled her mouth, but Clara’s squeeze to Gia’s fingers deterred her from voicing it. Gia clamped her lips as she leaned back in her seat.

“Speaking of hopes for the future,” Clara said, “where is your daughter?”

Maude narrowed her eyes. With an affronted lift of her chin, she said, “She went for a glass of punch.”

“Oh, that sounds perfect,” Clara said. “All this chatting has left me parched.” She turned away from Maude. “Would you care for some refreshment, ladies?”

“Yes, very much,” Gia said.

Clara stood. “Please excuse us, Maude,” she said as she swished away.

Gia and Alice followed after Clara, past the rows of chairs. Maude’s remark about Alice echoed in Gia’s ears with each step she took. Alice’s crippling shyness had cost the girl dearly, there was no way around the truth of the matter.

Since they’d arrived, only one man had requested an introduction to Alice. That poor fellow had been chased off by Alice’s awkward lack of input to the conversation he’d tried to initiate, and now he was nowhere to be found.

Gia’s vision had foretold Alice would accept a dance, here in this room, and despite however improbable the scenario seemed at the moment, Gia held fast to her patience as they made their way through the ballroom.

The long walk to the refreshment room seemed endless in the face of Alice’s palpable self-consciousness. The girl moved stiffly, head bowed in her attempt to deflect the notice of the grand audience she imagined was watching her.

Clara, on the other hand, welcomed attention. She strode like a queen through the room, her gloved hands clasped at her waist, tossing nods and greetings to everyone they passed.

Gia took Alice’s hand and gave it a squeeze. “Are you hungry?”

“Alice doesn’t eat in public,” Clara muttered over her shoulder. “She ate at home in her room before dressing.”

“I’m not hungry either,” Gia said. “Unless there is cake.”

“There’s always cake,” Alice said.

Gia smiled. “I know.”

Alice’s nervous smile made Gia feel better.

The refreshment room housed tables of delectable treats. Cakes and biscuits, cold tongues and sandwiches. Clara enjoyed a cracker-bonbon with her coffee while Gia and Alice indulged in cool punch and cake.

“The flower arrangements are magnificent,” Alice said, clearly impressed. “I wonder who designed them.”

Gia glanced at the tall sprays of flowers and ferns. “We can ask Mrs. Westcott when we see her again.”

“
If
we see her again,” Alice said. “There are so many people.”

Henry Whalen appeared in the doorway, looking dapper in his fine suit. He smiled brightly at Alice as he approached, and Gia’s heart lifted as she anticipated a forthcoming dance invitation to Alice.

“I think I’d like another glass of punch,” Alice uttered before scurrying in the opposite direction.

Gia gaped at the girl’s hasty departure.

Henry’s smile dimmed as he watched Alice make her escape to the punch bowl. The wounded look on his face explained the reason for Alice’s empty dance card.

“Good evening,” he said with a nod.

“Good evening, Henry.” Gia smiled, hoping to soften the brunt of Alice’s snub. While Gia understood the extent of the girl’s anxiety, those who didn’t know her might, quite understandably, mistake her evasive behavior for rudeness.

“Would you do me the honor to dance with me, Mrs. Elmsworth?” he asked Gia.

“She’d be delighted,” Clara answered for her. “I believe you’re unengaged for the next set.”

“Yes, you’re correct on both counts,” Gia said. “I am delighted and unengaged.”

“Alice and I will see you back at our seats,” Clara said, waving them off.

While Gia wanted nothing more than to join Alice in her haven in the corner, a dance might help Gia summon some much-needed words of encouragement for the chat she intended to have with the girl after this dance.

Gia took Henry’s arm and headed out to the ballroom.

* * * *

The Westcott Ball was a maddening crush of people. After enjoying a cigar on the patio in the fresh air outside, returning to the ballroom felt stiflingly hot and uncomfortable. Adjusting his cravat, Landen shrugged in his waistcoat as he made his way through the room, taking notice of Gia dancing with Henry Whalen. He wasn’t surprised. Several men had already clamored for dances with Gia, and Landen had no doubt several more men would follow suit before the night ended.

Landen sidled through the clusters of people to the outskirts of the assembly. To avoid Maude Devenshire and Charlotte, he took the long route to his destination. Coward that he was, he had no wish to subject himself to the snide words behind Maude’s contemptuous glances.

He approached their seats, where Aunt Clara stood chatting with a group of women. Alice sat where he’d left her, in the deepest corner of the room, fiddling with the fan in her hands.

A mix of sympathy and frustration twisted in his gut as he took a seat beside her. She was a beautiful young woman, funny and smart. Her baffling lack of confidence hurt him as much as he knew it pained her. Hoping to put her at ease, he said, “That color suits you nicely.”

Alice fluffed at her skirts. “You’re the third person tonight to tell me as much,” she said, glancing up. “I had planned on wearing my white gown, but Gia insisted I wear the pink instead.” She glanced around the room. “I feel as though I’m sticking out like a sore thumb.”

“You always feel that way,” he reminded her.

“I can’t help it,” she said.

He sighed. “Well, Gia was right about the pink,” he said with a smile. “She should be keeping you company, though.”

Alice glanced toward the dance floor. “She hasn’t had the opportunity to sit. Every time she starts to head my way, she’s dragged out for another dance.”

Landen craned his neck toward Gia. Dancing with Morgan Bidwell, she looked radiant. So at ease. So unlike his poor sister, whose brittle nerves were so frayed by the crowd he could almost hear them rending inside her gown.

He turned his attention back to Gia. She smiled up at Bidwell, charming him with small talk as they moved. In her partner’s arms, she danced gracefully, royal blue skirts flowing around her. One would never guess so much pain and tragedy hid inside the pretty package she presented to the world.

While Landen had had his fair share of misfortune, the hell of what Gia had endured made him feel small. He spent so much time wallowing in self-pity and the pain of his past. His mother’s death and the deaths of his father and stepmother. Isobel’s betrayal.

Dark times and dark memories that still shadowed his days. But through all the misery, he’d never been alone. He’d had his family to share in his grief—Aunt Clara and his siblings—to help him go on.

Gia had no one.

He could almost understand what had driven her to insinuate herself into his life and his family.

Almost.

“She looks lovely, doesn’t she?” Alice asked.

With a curt nod, he averted his eyes.

“Oh, for goodness’ sake, Denny, she’s your wife now. Would it kill you to admit she looks lovely?”

In that moment, in that confidence, Alice conveyed the woman she was. The strong, intelligent—although irritatingly perceptive—woman he wished the world to see. If only she could apply this assertiveness with others, she’d be out on the dance floor and not hiding in the corner frittering time by vexing him.

“What is it you want from me, Alice?”

“I like her.” Alice’s eyes brimmed with admiration. “And I believe that, deep down, you do too.”

“Cease baiting me.”

“Why should this bait you?” She shook her head. “Poor Denny.” She tsked in that annoying way Aunt Clara often did. “Married to the most beautiful, charming woman at the ball.”

“Am I the only one who hasn’t forgotten that she bamboozled me into marrying her?”

“As Aunt Clara pointed out, it takes two to tango.” She shrugged. “That’s all in the past, anyway. You are married now and must look to the future. Besides, I honestly don’t believe Gia intended to
bamboozle
you.”

His temper spiked at her words—at being forced into a conversation he’d rather not be having. Especially with Alice, a chaste girl who knew nothing of such matters and the degree to which some women would stoop to get what they wanted. Or needed.

“Are you taking her side against mine?”

“Of course not,” Alice said. “I’m not taking sides at all. I’m merely trying to tell you that I don’t believe Gia intended for this marriage to happen any more than you did.”

“Please enlighten me as to what would possibly lead you to believe that.”

“She didn’t wish to marry you, either.”

He stared, speechless. Although Gia spoke more bluntly than any woman he’d ever known, her relaying this bit of information to Alice surprised him. For some reason, it also rankled him even more than discussing with his sister the subject of his marriage.

“She told you that?”

Alice shook her head. “No. But like most women, she’d dreamt of the man she thought she’d marry.”

He quirked his brow. “Most women?”

Alice blushed.

He smiled, encouraged by his sister’s dreams of marriage, despite her lack of ambition toward the pursuit of finding a husband. As for Gia… After witnessing one of her nightmares, he was relieved, at least, to learn she experienced pleasant dreams as well as terrifying ones.

Unable to resist his curiosity, he leaned in close. “Who did Gia dream of marrying?”

Alice shrugged. “I don’t know. She doesn’t know, either.”

He eyed her skeptically.

“She dreamt of him, though,” she assured him. She sighed, succumbing to the romantic notion with the same whimsical look she’d worn as a child after he’d read her a fairy tale. “A man who loved her and leaned on a cane.”

He blinked.

“That’s what she told me,” Alice said.

While most women dreamt of marrying Prince Charming, Gia had dreamt of marrying a man with a cane. “Women,” he uttered, shaking his head. “Ridiculous creatures, the lot of you.”

“Nevertheless, it proves my point.”

“What point?”

“The man of Gia’s dreams was not you.”

His chest tightened. The statement struck him like a solid punch, knocking him off balance. He straightened in his seat, annoyed by his surprising reaction. Annoyed at Alice for devoting such focus to his life, instead of her own. For rousing feelings inside him he’d rather not feel.

He glanced back to Gia, and his chest clenched again.

As though sensing her words hit their mark, Alice reached for his hand. “But fate had other plans for you both, so you must let go of the past and make the best of what you’ve been handed.” She nodded toward Gia on the dance floor. “Just as your wife is trying so hard to do.”

When the dance ended, Gia made her way from the dance floor, surprised to find Landen waiting for her.

“Would you care for something to drink?” he asked.

She glanced toward their seats.

“Aunt Clara is with Alice,” he said.

She nodded. “I could use a glass of punch,” she said, taking his arm.

He led her from the ballroom. The cooler air felt wonderful as they crossed the foyer. Unfortunately, the refreshment room was more crowded than it had been earlier. And much warmer.

Landen went for their drinks while Gia attempted to cool herself with her fan.

“Here’s your punch,” he said.

“Thank you.” She drank the delicious punch, glancing around. “How is Alice faring?”

“As well as usual.” He took a sip of his drink. Brandy from the smell of it.

“She must be bored to tears.”

“I kept her entertained.” Amusement danced in his eyes. “Or perhaps I should restate that. She kept me entertained.”

“Oh?”

“She enlightened me about something,” he said.

The smirk on his face warned Gia that she would not like what she was about to hear.

“She told me that women have dreams about the man they wish to marry.”

Gia blanched. “I cannot believe she told you about that.”

“I must admit I am crushed.”

“No, you’re not. You’re amused.”

“That too,” he said with a smile.

There was nothing malicious in his teasing, only a good-natured humor she found herself enjoying, despite her embarrassment. She shrugged. “As Alice told you, it’s common for women to have dreams about the man they might marry.”

“Yes.” He tilted his head. “But I imagine it’s fairly uncommon for women to dream of marrying a man who leans on a cane.”

Her smile faded, but not in anger. A month ago she’d refused to abandon the dream that had meant so much to her. The dream she’d held like a fragile butterfly between her palms. But somehow, in the time that had passed, in her shifting feelings for Landen, she’d accepted reality. She’d opened herself to what stood in front of her, reached for the promise in the depths of his eyes, and in doing so, she’d unwittingly set the dream free.

He glanced over her shoulder. “I think the man of your dreams just arrived,” he said.

She turned, following his gaze. A gray-haired man who appeared to be in his late seventies inched into the room, cane in hand.

“He’s a tad old for you, though, don’t you think?”

She scolded him with her fiercest glare for making fun of her. Then she burst out laughing. “You are a wicked man, Landen Elmsworth.”

He waggled his brows. “And I can give that oldster a run for his money.” He leaned closer. “If you know what I mean.”

“I’ve no doubt of your meaning. Or the truth in it.”

He smiled at her brazen admission. “Perhaps I should call him out for holding my wife’s heart hostage.” He started away in a mock attempt at acting on his ridiculous threat.

She grabbed his arm, pulling him back. “Stop it now,” she said, laughing some more.

He laughed too. The sound of his laughter reverberated around her, warming her from the inside out. She so enjoyed this playful side of him.

“Wait until I get a hold of that sister of yours,” she said, wanting to strangle Alice for breaking her confidence.