The Wedding Affair (2 page)

That’s my affair and none of yours
. But thumbing her nose at a man when she was asking him to do her a favor wasn’t wise. “I’m sure you know that after the death of her father, Miss Blakely has become my guest, and—”

“Adding another mouth to feed in your household was no decision of mine,” Sir Jasper said sharply. “I see no reason for me to be inconvenienced by your folly.”

“I am not asking you to sacrifice the rent payment or even reduce it, only to postpone collecting the full sum.”

“And I’m telling you I’m not inclined to do so. I’ve been offered twice the rent,” Sir Jasper said slyly. “I’d agreed to the bargain with you, so as an honorable man I couldn’t go back on it. But if you’re not paying on time, then I’m free to change the terms or let the place to another tenant.”

Olivia tamped down the desire to snap at him that if he actually had a tenant who would pay more, he should seize the opportunity. She couldn’t take the risk that he would throw her out.

This was her own fault. If she’d had the full sum and handed it over promptly, he wouldn’t have been able to hold her to ransom.

“But perhaps we could come to an… arrangement,” he went on.

Her skin crawled at the oily note in his voice. But perhaps her imagination was running away with her, and he only meant that his price for waiting would be an outrageous amount of interest. He surely couldn’t mean that he wished to pay court to her, could he? His wife had died long since, and Sir Jasper had to be close to twice Olivia’s age, for his sons were grown.

How she wished she had not invited him inside or offered tea! If he got the idea that she would welcome his suit, she would have to disillusion him, of course—and gently. She hoped he would not nurse resentment.

“The widow of an earl,” he said softly, “living in an out-of-the-way village in a cottage where she cannot afford the rent. Your options are limited, Lady Reyne. You can’t take in lodgers, for the place isn’t large enough to house them even if you didn’t already have enough hangers-on to feed.”

Hangers-on?
Olivia wondered if he thought her daughter a millstone. With an effort, she kept her expression neutral.

“You can’t take a job as a governess or a companion, for no fine lady would hire an employee who was encumbered with a child. But I can think of one thing the widow of an earl could do nicely.”

He didn’t sound much like a man who was trying to fix his interest with a lady, but surely he couldn’t be suggesting something short of marriage. Was he?

He chuckled. “Oh,
that’s
a fine lady’s expression, all right. There’s no doubt your blood is blue, the way you’ve gone all arrogant and scornful as you pretend you don’t know what I’m talking about. It’s nothing you’re unfamiliar with, either. You have a daughter.”

Olivia tried to control her breathing, knowing that he was watching the effect of her short, shallow breaths. He licked his lips, his gaze focused on her breasts.

“I might waive the rent altogether if you were satisfactory in bed,” he said. “I’d want a whole lot more than a taste, of course—
my lady.
But we’ll start with a kiss today as interest on the debt.”

Olivia felt as paralyzed as a rabbit caught in the open with a hawk diving for the kill. Then she heard the click of footsteps on the stairs as Nurse came down, and she pulled herself together with an effort.

Sir Jasper had heard, too. “I thought you said your servants were out.”

And so you assumed I invited you in on purpose. Perhaps thought I intended to seduce you.
Olivia stood up and said coolly, “What a pity you must be leaving now, Sir Jasper.”

She thought for an instant that he would refuse to leave after all. But as he put on his hat, he said darkly, “You think about it, my fine lady. As of today, the rent increases to twice the figure we agreed on when you moved in.”

She couldn’t stop herself from squeaking in protest.

He grinned. “You’re the one who broke the terms of the agreement. So if you don’t pay up, one way or the other, you’ll be moving out come the end of the month.”

Olivia only wished she could leave the cottage—and Sir Jasper—behind. She showed him to the front door to be certain he left and because if she called for Nurse to see him out, there would be questions about why she was pale and shaken.

Sir Jasper stepped outside and turned to face her as if to add some new condition to his demands. The gate separating the cottage’s garden from the road banged shut. Olivia looked up, expecting to see Kate returning from her calls. She was half-embarrassed to be caught in this predicament and half-grateful for reinforcement from her friend.

Instead she saw a carriage standing in the road just beyond the wall. A footman wearing the white wig and deep blue and silver livery of the Somervales started steadily up the path, his tread measured. He looked as if he’d marched a good distance already today. He reached the steps, bowed, and held out a folded parchment.

“For Lady Reyne,” he intoned. “From the Duchess of Somervale.”

Sir Jasper’s jaw dropped.

Olivia knew she should have enjoyed the moment. Instead, she took the parchment reluctantly. The folded sheet was surprisingly heavy, adorned with silver ribbon and a large blue wax seal carrying the imprint of the Somervale crest, which she recognized from the ironwork on the estate gates.

“So the duchess didn’t leave you out after all,” Sir Jasper said. “You fine folk all stick together, don’t you, my lady?”

The footman’s eyes widened in shock as his gaze ran over Olivia.

She thought that no matter how many copies of the invitation he had delivered in the neighborhood—and if
she
was included amongst the wedding guests, then every other person who had even a hint of noble blood must have been invited as well—this was surely the first he had handed to the guest herself while she stood at her front door decorated with flour and bits of bread dough. But he was too well-trained to actually say so.

“You look very tired,” she told the footman. “If you would like refreshment—”

He bowed politely. “Thank you, ma’am. But the invitations were sent down from London—a great box full—and we must see them all into the proper hands today.” He retreated to the gate and climbed onto the perch at the back of the carriage, which slowly pulled away.

Olivia broke the seal and looked down at the parchment.

Her Grace, the Duchess of Somervale, requests that Lady Reyne honor the company with her presence at the marriage of Her Grace’s daughter, Lady Daphne Elliot, to the Marquess of Harcourt, on Friday, 30 August 1816, at Halstead.

One could scarcely turn down a duchess’s invitation, no matter how uncomfortable it was to accept. So Olivia would be going to a wedding.

Sir Jasper peered greedily at the invitation, and Olivia could sense his hot breath against her skin.

“I wonder if your fine friends will loan you money,” he mused. “If they don’t, my offer is still open.” He tipped his hat and walked away.

Olivia stood on the step for a long time, trying to draw enough warm air into her lungs to thaw the chill that his proposition had left deep inside her. But the effort didn’t seem to be working.

***

Kate Blakely had never exactly enjoyed visiting the sick and needy members of the parish, because the people she was calling upon were in distress. As the vicar’s daughter, compassionate calls had been expected of her. However, now that the visits were no longer a part of her duties, she found herself missing the people, as well as the distraction from her own troubles that her regular rounds had provided. Sitting at the bedside of an ailing parishioner helped her to remember that even though her own choices seemed limited at the moment, she still had options.

So after her household duties were finished at the cottage, she had left Olivia mixing bread and stopped by the vicarage with her basket to ask if the housekeeper could spare some produce or preserves to take to the sick.

“I wouldn’t ask, Mrs. Meecham,” Kate told the housekeeper, “except that I’m a guest in Lady Reyne’s house and can hardly take things from her larder to give to others.”

“Besides which, Lady Reyne has little enough to keep her own household fed and nothing to spare.” The housekeeper filled Kate’s basket to brimming. “You’re to take what’s left home to her ladyship.”

“You’re very generous, but Lady Reyne does not care to accept charity.”

“It is not charity when her ladyship is housing and feeding you, despite the fact that you should still be living right here in your own home.”

“Mrs. Meecham, this is not my home any longer. The new vicar will take up his post at any moment, and I could hardly be in residence when he appears. I feel fortunate Lady Reyne offered me shelter.”

“Your father served this parish for thirty years, God rest his soul, and ever since your mother died, you’ve been right there alongside him. It’s a crime for you to lose your home and your security because that good man died too young.”

Kate didn’t argue, because they’d covered this ground so many times that the discussion had lost all of its intensity.

One of the housemaids popped her head into the kitchen. “There’s a carriage drawing up in front, ma’am.”

Mrs. Meecham whipped off her apron and smoothed her dress. “That’ll be the new vicar. You’ll stay and meet him of course, Miss Blakely?”

“Oh, no,” Kate said hastily. “Not today. He’ll be tired after his long journey.”

The maid was shaking her head. “It’s not that kind of a carriage. It’s marked with the duke’s crest, and a footman’s coming up the walk.”

Kate’s heart gave a little flutter. After so long, she’d almost given up, but perhaps her letter to the duchess hadn’t been ignored after all.

“Then go open the door and see what he wants, foolish girl,” Mrs. Meecham ordered. As the maid left, the housekeeper’s eye fell on Kate once more. “As for the new vicar, you’ll have to meet him sometime.”

“Whenever he arrives to take up his post, he can find me at Lady Reyne’s cottage.” Kate knew she sounded stubborn, so she added more softly, “I would not wish him to believe I was trying to push myself into his household or instruct him as to how to go on.”

“Who better to guide him than you, with all your experience in this parish? Since he’s your own cousin, I expect he’ll want your opinion about how best to begin with his new flock.”

Kate didn’t argue the point, for she was far more interested in why the Somervale footman was at the door. Perhaps the duchess had been away and had only now received Kate’s letter…

The housekeeper added a new loaf of crusty bread to the basket, already weighed down with preserves and bottled fruit, just as the maid returned to the kitchen. She held a folded parchment in her hand. “It’s for you, miss. From the duchess.”

Kate broke the seal on the parchment, while trying to keep her hand from trembling. If the duchess had agreed to help her find employment…

Her Grace, the Duchess of Somervale, requests that Miss Katherine Blakely honor the company with her presence at the marriage of Her Grace’s daughter, Lady Daphne Elliot…

Kate stared at the parchment. It was not the letter she had hoped for. Not an offer of help or advice. It wasn’t even
personal
. The lump in her throat threatened to choke her.

Mrs. Meecham was shamelessly looking over Kate’s shoulder. “So Lady Daphne’s getting married in less than a month’s time. Halstead must be all aflutter.”

The big house would be
en fete
, Kate thought. Full of people from the upper classes of society.

Kate had written to the duchess because she was the only person able to help. But with an entire houseful of the rich, famous, and idle… Surely one of them could provide the help Kate needed to leave Steadham. And the invitation to Lady Daphne’s wedding made it possible for her to meet them.

With a sudden—and rare—burst of warm feeling toward Lady Daphne, Kate forgot all about her calls and the loaded basket, and she walked back to Lady Reyne’s cottage, thinking hard.

***

Once again, Penelope Townsend had lain awake late into the night, listening for noises from the bedroom next to her own. But even with the windows thrown wide to catch the few cool night breezes that London afforded, the house on Berkeley Square was too well built for sound to travel. So she had tossed between her fine linen sheets, wondering when or if her husband had come home, until sometime in the wee hours when she had finally dropped off to sleep.

In the morning, out of sorts at having slept badly and not long enough, she was roused by the clatter of her lady’s maid bringing in her chocolate. As Etta opened the curtains, Penelope sat up wearily and ran her hands through her hair. As usual, it had popped out of her overnight braid and was straggling around her face, her curls as thick and springy as wires and completely unmanageable. Etta draped a satin bed jacket around Penelope’s shoulders and set the tray on her knees. The maid’s eyes fell on Penelope’s hair, and she sighed.

Penelope didn’t blame her. Etta’s skills were wasted on a mistress with few natural recommendations; if not for the enormous wage Penelope’s father paid her, Etta would never have taken what she seemed to think was a thankless job.