“Ah. Then I ought to wait until we’re a touch farther from the lemon biscuits before I broach the subject of your imminent ruination?” With a sigh entirely devoid of shame, he lowered himself upon the settee beside her, stretching one long leg before him and crossing the other across his knee. From the inner pocket of his coat, he produced yet another scandal sheet.
“I have brought you a keepsake,” he announced, unfolding the paper as though revealing contraband. He smoothed the page and tapped the centre column. “Right here –
“Miss H.T., resplendent in a daring muslin of Grecian cut, was observed to take unfortunate aim with her wine glass, thereby baptising the Honourable Lord Crimplethorpe in a generous measure of claret – this following, it is alleged, a difference of opinion exchanged near the punch bowl.”
Theo raised an eyebrow. “A difference of opinion?”
Hetty released a sigh, setting her teacup down as though determined not to fling it against the nearest wall. “He made some thoroughly odious remark concerning the supposed indecency of female wit, and I felt his waistcoat deserved to suffer for it.”
Theo gave a low chuckle. “Well, his waistcoat may have expired, but alas, your reputation appears to have only improved.The Gazettereports you were‘a vision of sparkling defiance, the very picture of fashionable nerve.’I’ve heard that claret might soon replace pearl grey as the shade of the Season.”
Hetty sighed. “This is not proceeding according to plan.”
“No,” Theo agreed cheerfully, “but one must concede, it is proving rather entertaining.” He reached once more into the inner pocket of his coat and withdrew a second folded newspaper, offering it to her with a wink. “For inspiration… a charming precedent from last Season. Lady Elmsworth’s niece, discovered behind a folding screen with the third son of a baronet. The particulars remain murky, though a cushion was reportedly involved. Naturally, they were married within the fortnight.”
Hetty gave him a sharp look over the rim of her teacup. “I have no intention of marrying you, Theo.”
“Good heavens, nor I you. I should make a dreadful husband. I snore during sermons, detest shared puddings, and cannot abide dogs in the drawing room.”
“I am quite serious.”
“As am I,” he returned, spreading his hands. “You desire a scandal. I merely offer one in the traditional form. A time-honoured method.”
“The objective is disgrace, not matrimony,” Hetty hissed, affecting a smile at her mother across the room. “The entire scheme is meant to prevent such an outcome, not propel me towards it with roses in my hair and a vicar at my elbow.”
“Yes, yes,” he said, waving a hand. “I am well aware. But surely there exists a narrow ledge between social ruin and a forced engagement. A sweet spot, if you will. Enough impropriety to render you inconveniently notorious, but not quite sufficient to provoke a duel.”
“And what, precisely, do you suggest?”
He leant in, lowering his voice to that infuriatingly intimate register he used whenever he wished to be difficult. “A kiss. In the wrong place, at precisely the right moment. If such a thing were to be witnessed, or even merely suspected, the consequences are generally quite dependable.”
“There will be no kissing, Theo.”
“Naturally,” he said gravely, though the corner of his mouth twitched. “Perish the thought.”
Hetty folded her hands with primly in her lap, though her spine was rather too straight and her jaw far too tight to be mistaken for ease. “We shall orchestrate something suitably modest,” she said. “Abrief moment in the conservatory or a conveniently torn hem. Perhaps a door flung open at an inopportune instant. Nothing more.”
“As you command, Miss Tolliver. I am yours to scandalise.”
She rose, smoothing the folds of her gown. “Excellent. Then we are agreed.”
“No kissing,” he repeated solemnly. “Understood. Unless, of course, circumstances demand it.”
“If circumstances demand it,” Hetty said crisply, “I shall be compelled to strike you with my fan, and with considerable force.”
“Then I shall pray you bring one adorned with feathers. If I am to be ruined, Miss Tolliver, let it at least be done with style.”
She gave him a look that could have wilted a rosebush, but he only bowed low, entirely unbothered. “Until the next ball, Miss Tolliver.”
—♥—
Hetty escaped that afternoon to the mews, under the flimsy pretence of wishing to inquire whether her mare had been properly exercised. In truth, she wanted air unsweetened by hothouse lilies or suitors’ cologne, and, above all, relief from her mother’s fan snapping like a musket at her elbow.
It was not, by any stretch, a proper place for her to be. The mews smelt of hay and horseflesh, the cobbles strewn with straw and less mentionable matter besides. Grooms darted to and fro, pausing only long enough to stare at the young lady of quality perched upon an upturned pail, skirts tucked precariously out of harm’s way, her ungloved hand idly stroking her mare’s nose. If Mama everdiscovered her eldest daughter had been consorting with grooms and manure, she would shriek herself into a decline.
Hetty must confess she found the impropriety delicious. Here, no one lectured her on posture, nor composed sonnets to her. Here she might laugh aloud at the absurdity of her situation.
The Diamond of the Season.The phrase alone was enough to make her snort, to the visible alarm of her horse. She – Henrietta Tolliver – hailed as Mayfair’s glittering prize? Providence, it seemed, had a taste for farce. One danced four times with an earl, worea scandalously low-cut gown, and poured wine down a gentleman’s front, only to awake the next morning positively drowned in bouquets and ghastly verse.
