Page 59 of An Unexpected Pleasure

“Oh, no. He has never been more than polite to her,” Kyria replied. “It’s just…well, I worry sometimes that she will keep after him so long that she will wear him down. Or that she will manage to trick him into some compromising position. You know Theo. He would marry her if he thought honor demanded it.”

“She is just the sort who would do something like that,” Olivia agreed.

Megan could understand Theo’s loving sisters’ motives. She would herself relish irritating the obnoxious Lady Scarle.

“But why—I mean, what does that have to do with me?” Megan blurted out, then blushed to her hairline.

Kyria let out a throaty chuckle. “My dear Miss Henderson, surely you have noticed that our brother spends an inordinate amount of time with the twins these days.”

“And he is not usually inclined to scholarly pursuits,” Olivia stuck in with a smile.

“Lady Helena saw it as soon as the two of you walked into the drawing room the other day. Her back went up immediately. Even she isn’t usually quite that rude. She was livid when I said you were coming with us to the ball.” Kyria smiled at the memory of the other woman’s discomfiture. “I intend for her to be even more upset when she sees you this Friday evening.”

Megan could not understand Kyria’s satisfaction at the thought of her brother’s interest in a mere employee. The Morelands were abnormally egalitarian for aristocrats, of course. Kyria herself had married an American and was quite happy to be addressed as Mrs. McIntyre instead of Lady Kyria. But Rafe McIntyre was at least enormously wealthy, whereas Megan was nothing but a tutor.

It was not, she supposed, as bad as her real occupation—she could think of little an aristocratic family would like less than one of them marrying a muckraking careerwoman. But even so, she was not only a commoner and a foreigner, she was someone who worked for them. And while a daughter might marry outside their group of peers, as Kyria and Thisbe had obviously done, it was an altogether different thing for their firstborn son, the heir to the ancient title, to do so. A tutoress as the next duchess? It would be, Megan guessed, unthinkable.

Then she realized that that very fact was the answer to her question. Kyria and Olivia knew that Megan was so unacceptable as a wife that Theo would never consider marriage to her. It would not be the same as falling into the clutches of a woman of good birth, whom he might have to marry. An employee, and an American at that, would never be anything to Theo but a passing fancy—a mistress, at best.

Megan was aware of a pang of hurt and disappointment at the thought. She liked Kyria and Olivia, and it wounded her to think that they did not consider the consequences for her in their scheme to keep their brother out of Lady Scarle’s clutches.

Somewhat subdued, she stood, letting Joan crawl around her skirt, pinning it up here and there, while the other women chattered about ribbons and jewelry and the dreadful Lady Scarle. When the maid finally finished, Megan quickly got out of the elegant gown and back into her own plain clothes, and left the ladies with a polite smile and thank-you.

She went through the rest of the week careening back and forth between conflicting emotions. Part of her did not want to go to the benefit, didn’t want to face Theo—or Lady Scarle. Yet she knew that she had to; it was a perfect opportunity to see Mr. Coffey again and question him privately about the trip he had made with Theo and her brother.

However, she knew that it was not simply this opportunity that made her a little breathless with anticipation every time she thought about the ball. She wanted to see herself dressed in the beautiful gown; she could not help but imagine how Theo would look when he saw her—the smile that would curve his mouth and the heat that would light his eyes. She wanted to put that hot glow of passion in his eyes; indeed, she melted a little inside just thinking about it.

But the thought scared her as much as it excited her. She did not want to have to face the man’s passion again. Did she? Surely she did not really look forward to having to fend off his advances—or the guilty shame that would assail her if she gave in to his drugging kisses.

By the time the evening of the museum benefit arrived, Megan’s stomach was a ball of nerves. Joan had brought the dress to her that afternoon, altered and pressed, and had hung it carefully in her wardrobe, pushing all other clothes back so that nothing would crease the ball gown. Hanging there in solitary splendor, it was even more magnificent than Megan had imagined. Joan’s touch of scalloping the skirt, with lace inserts peeking through between, added richness and sophistication, as did the drapery over the heightened bustle.

She had also brought the simple cameo, tacked with Joan’s infinitesimal stitches onto a grosgrain ribbon that matched the copper color of the lace, and it now lay spread out on Megan’s vanity. Beside it lay the simple onyx ear bobs that matched the background of the cameo.

Megan had just sat down to begin her toilette when there was a knock on the door and Joan entered. When Megan looked at her, surprised, Joan said, “Her ladyship sent me over to do your hair, miss.”

The maid looked, Megan thought, a trifle miffed. No doubt she preferred to be at her mistress’s side, putting the final touches on Kyria’s beauty. However, she went to work on Megan’s hair with deft efficiency, sweeping it up into a knot, then separating it and winding each strand around her finger, so that the ensuing curls fell in a cascade. Artfully, she arranged delicate feathery curls around Megan’s face. To complete the hairdo, she wound a coppery satin ribbon around the knot and through the curls.

Joan helped Megan into the petticoats and bustle, cinching her up in her corset so tightly that Megan wondered if she would be able to breathe at all that evening. Carefully, Joan lifted the dress over Megan’s head and brought it down, hooking it up the back and arranging the folds of her skirt so that they fell exactly right. She finished her work of art by fastening the cameo on Megan’s neck and putting in the simple earrings.

She stepped back, allowing Megan to look at the finished product. Megan drew in an involuntary gasp. Kyria’s sense of style had been unerring. The stylish dress complemented the color of her hair and eyes, and her pale skin glowed against its satin richness. The cameo around her neck was at once simple and devastating, showing off the elegant line of her neck and drawing the eye without distracting from the expanse of her bosom swelling up from the neckline of the dress.

Megan had always known that she was pretty in a casual way, but never had she imagined that she could look striking. Somehow, she marveled, Joan and Kyria had managed to make her look both desirable and unattainable.

She smiled blindingly at Kyria’s maid. “You are an artist, Joan. Thank you.”

Joan nodded, accepting Megan’s praise as her due. “Her ladyship said that was just how you would look. She’s a canny one.” She stepped forward and pinched Megan sharply on both cheeks, startling her. “There, now there’s a little color in your cheeks. Just perfect. Press your lips together and put a little color in them, too.”

She stepped back, grinning. “Everybody’ll be wondering who the new American beauty is at the ball tonight.”

Megan could only laugh, excitement bubbling up in her. She swept from her room and walked down the stairs, where several of the Morelands already waited, including Theo. He looked up at the sound of her footsteps, and the stunned expression on his face was everything she could have hoped for.

“Miss Henderson, how lovely you look,” the duchess said, moving forward to take Megan’s hand and smile down at her. “Doesn’t she, Henry?”

“Yes, yes, lovely, my dear.” The duke smiled benignly and rather vaguely at Megan, then back at his wife, adding, “Not as lovely as you, of course. You are stunning, as always.”

It was the truth, for the duchess, with her regal height and still slender figure, the dramatic streaks of white in her vibrant red hair, made a striking figure, despite the unostentatious lack of jewelry at her throat and ears, and the almost severe cut of her peacock-blue dress.

Theo stepped forward as his parents turned away, and took Megan’s hand in his, raising it to his lips in formal greeting. She glanced away, struggling to suppress the flicker of nerves inside her at the touch of his lips upon her skin.