“Help me.” Now why had he said that?
“Help you? With?” Her brows wrinkled in confusion.
He’d give his right bollocks to kiss her wrinkled brow. Lust zinged through his belly, despite the threat to his right bollocks. He pushed it away, thinking of swift swims in cold lakes. Hewouldstop lusting after one woman while almost engaged to another! He straightened his cuffs and looked up at the blue-black sky. “I would like your help finding the necklace. You obviously have a clear plan of attack.”
The shadows hid the details of her face from him, but he imagined her delicate eyebrows curving toward one another on a frown. “I don’t like being responsible for the loss of such a valuable heirloom,” she said, twisting her skirts in her lap. Her lack of care for the fine material a sure sign of her agitation. She nodded, as if coming to a decision. “I would help if I could, but it would mean spending time with you, speaking with you.” Her voice bounced with agitation. “All of that”—she waved her hands in the air—“would be entirely inappropriate. You are, after all, engaged.”
She had a point. A damned good one.
When he didn’t reply, she rose with a mirthless laugh, lifted her skirts above ankles he knew were shapely though he could not see them, and backed down the path toward the bowling green.
“Henrietta!” he called. “Help me find it!” She couldn’t. He knew she couldn’t; her reasons for not doing so were absolutely correct. But the request jumped from him anyway.
She paused, a shadow stealing over her face. “No. Not for the finest bolt of silk in the world.” She left, then, hurrying toward the other guests and away from him. His heart, bloody fool, stretched toward the shadows after her.
Chapter 4
Henrietta preferred Hill House during the day. At night, the shadowy gardens and wide, starry skies drugged her, dragged her into the past, distracting her from her goal. But the sunny skies of a crisp afternoon kept her as focused as the archers lining up across the lawn to compete.
Lord Rigsby was not among the participants. He’d been absent all day, searching for the necklace, no doubt. Last year, when he’d clasped it about her neck, she’d fallen in love with the tiny trinket, adored its simplicity and his thoughtfulness. Why hadn’t he told her its significance?
Last night, with his body warm next to hers on the bench, her heart had skipped when he’d told her, when she’d realized what the story implied. He’d wanted her to have the necklace, to be a part of the tradition of Maxwell women who’d treasured the simplest piece of jewelry over diamonds and rubies and shining gold settings.
Then he’d become a future duke, and while the elevation had not stopped him from wanting a tradesman’s daughter, what he wanted no longer mattered.
She felt her eyebrows crinkle together. Bother. No one liked a tradesman’s daughter, but a tradesman’s daughter who frowned? Henrietta took a steadying breath and relaxed. Smile, she reminded herself. You are serene. You are likable. You are not threatening at all despite the terrifying newish quality of your father’s money.
There. She felt perfectly calm.
She scanned the crowd assembled on the lawn, looking for a matron to impress with her timidity or a countess to blink blankly at like a pleasant, useless doll.
Serene, Henrietta, she lectured herself. She reached for that calm place again, so close, but as her gaze slid across Lady Willow’s elegant form sitting bolt upright on a lawn chair, it slipped from reach.
“Bother,” she hissed. Lady Willow resembled the doll Henrietta tried so hard to be, her face immovable, her eyes staring into a dark distance no one else could see.
An elbow jabbed into Henrietta’s ribs. “You’re staring,” Ada said.
“I think I should seek an introduction.”
Ada followed Henrietta’s gaze to the other young woman across the lawn. “To Lady Willow?” Ada snorted. “Why for heaven’s sake would you do that?”
Henrietta straightened the bangles on her wrist. “My goals have not changed since last night. I still need the support of those like the Duchess of Valingford. Or, as the case may be, their daughters. Lady Willow is just the sort of lady who can help my shop.”
Ada’s eyes narrowed to slits. “I’ve never known you to obsess over making money like this.”
Was she obsessed? Her skin crawled at the notion. It sounded sordid coming from her friend’s mouth. With dismay, she realized her skin fit her like an ill-made gown—tight and loose in all the wrong places. She rubbed her palms up and down her arms. “I don’t desire wealth or status, but I learned a hard lesson last year. In order to attain what is desired,” in her case, happiness, a family, the man she loved, “wealth and status are necessary evils.” She shook her head. “Besides, I’ve had very little to occupy my time in the last year.” She shrugged. “So, I turned my attention to helping my father. Call it ennui. I hear it’s rather fashionable. Goes best with midnight-blue velvet. Ask Brummel.”
Ada didn’t laugh. Her eyes remained narrowed. “There are charities, if you are bored.”
“I sponsor several. Three for children in Manchester and two for girls of the serving class in London. The School for Seamstresses is a particular favorite of mine. We teach them accounting skills as well as sewing so they can better manage their profits.”
Ada’s eyes softened a bit. “Noble. But Hen, can’t you see?” She let her gaze graze over the assembled aristocrats on the lawn. “You don’t need their approval. And in many cases, you don’t need it because you already have it.”
But she didn’t have it. Yet. And she did need it. Couldn’t Ada understand?
“He-en! Are you paying attention?”
“Not really, no. Sorry.”
