“I wouldn’t want to wear you out before the wedding.”
“Y-y-you won’t.”
“That’s wonderful to hear, darling.”
Once a week he permitted himself to ask her, “Do you still want to marry me, Caro?” and held his breath waiting for her answer. The day she took his hand and told him he didn’t talk too much and he came within a whisker of ravishing her in her brother’s drawing room, he let himself ask that question, even though he had asked her only yesterday.
She nodded, and he couldn’t believe how much joy that nod gave him.
So for three months, his days were taken up by Caro and planning outings, thinking of conversational gambits and stories and jokes, and writing the sweet notes she wanted.
His nights were taken up by dreams of being married to her.
He spared no thought for the damn money.
Twenty-Two
The night of Lady Huxley’s ball arrived. Caroline still had time to change her mind about marrying Phineas. But ending the engagement would be a devastating scandal with thetonlikely still whispering about her declaration that she had kissed the Earl of Burchester. And to break it off so close to the wedding? She would never make another match if she did so.
It was this wedding or no wedding. This husband or no husband.
Did that matter? For so long, she had been sure she would never marry.
But now she wanted to be married.
With Phineas’ courtship, all of her crushed girlhood desires for a spouse had come flooding back to her. She longed to have a companion with her on the ocean of life, someone to grip when the waves were rocky, someone to float with peacefully.
A friend.
And she wanted the bodily pleasure of having this man with her. On her. In her. Even if she would have to share him. Even if he didn’t love her, couldn’t possibly love her, and she would have to make sure she never fell in love with him.
Jones helped Caroline into a pale green silk gown with matching green satin slippers with only a whisper of a heel to them. Caroline put on her mother’s pearl choker and her mother’s pearl ear bobs. Jones dressed her straight hair into an elaborate knot at the back where it would not add to Caroline’s height, and she allowed Jones to use curling tongs to create a few curls to frame her face.
She looked at herself in the mirror. She looked nothing like the creature her father had demanded she be in her hated portrait with the frilled dress and the fussy wig and the false smile.
“She’s famous for her roses, but I think it will be too dark to see them,” Edmund commented in the carriage during the short ride to Lady Huxley’s house in Westminster.
Caroline was too nervous to answer him.
Phineas was waiting where the carriages stopped to let the noble guests out. He caught her eye and winked and bowed and for a moment, she was seventeen again, looking at this gorgeous man with silver hair and satin breeches.
“You’re beautiful tonight, Lady Caroline. But then, you’re always beautiful.”
He took her arm to guide her up the front steps and before surrendering her to Edmund, he put his mouth next to her ear and whispered, “My bride.”
She shivered.
She and Edmund were announced. There was a craning of necks in the ballroom. Not for Edmund, but for her. She had never been seen by most of the people here, and they knew only three things about her. She was the daughter of a marquess. Because of Lady Huxley and her daughter, they also knew she had kissed the Earl of Burchester before their engagement was announced. And likely, from the same sources, they knew she mutilated words.
She did not know if she failed, met, or exceeded their expectations, but she kept her head high.Yes, I’m this tall.
Phineas was announced, and all three of them went to greet the hostess whom Caroline did not remember meeting thirteen years ago. Lady Huxley was frightening, her beady eyes scrutinizing Caroline, her judgment apparent on her face, her words polite as her tone and gestures were disdainful.
But Caroline was between her two men right now. Her brother, so big and hulking, so intimidating himself. And Phineas, so pleasant, so quick with a quip and a compliment and a smile, so well able to diffuse any and all tension. She was safe with the two of them.
The Hasketts had come as late as they dared without the risk of being thought rude because Caroline wanted to speak to as few people as possible. So within minutes of saying, “Th-th-thank you, my lady” to Lady Huxley while curtsying, Caroline found herself being escorted by Phineas to the center of the ballroom where other couples were also gathering.
“I hope you don’t mind I’m your partner for the first dance, Caro. Just as I was thirteen years ago.”
