“It is no secret. They can be told.” She lifted her chin and faced the assembled party. “I fell out of a tree and landed on top of poor Lord Abbington. Thank goodness he broke my fall, but he suffered grievous injury during the process. He's a lump on his head, and his shoulder has been dislocated. The doctor has inspected the head wound, set his shoulder, and says he will heal, given time. But what Lord Abbington expected to be a very short visit, to speak a word into my brother's ear, will now be rather longer than that.”
Each suitor seemed to react to her speech in different ways. The three men George had recommended smiled agreeably.
Lord Devon didn't seem to care one way or another. He popped back down into his seat and wrapped his hand around a glass tumbler, finishing the rest of his drink. He’d not abandoned his drink, but at least he looked freshly bathed.
Lord Sharpton narrowed his eyes. “Lord Abbington is… ahem… confined to his bed, is he not?”
What a strange question to ask. “For the moment, I believe so. His head pains him greatly, and I think movement disturbs this even more.”
Lord Sharpton’s eyes narrowed, and he gave a curt nod of his head. “Excellent. Wouldn’t want more competition.”
Christiana laughed, a tinkling sound so high, Jane expected the windows to shatter. “La, you are a riot, Sharpy. Don’t speak so or you’ll give dear Jane the wrong idea about you and your suit.” Her stepmother’s dark blonde hair fell down her back in artful disarray. She looked somehow younger and older than her seven and twenty years; those hazel eyes gleamed with mischief and daring. Always.
Lord Sharpton sat back down slowly, a predatory look in his eye. “I trust you know exactly what to think of me, Lady Jane.”
Jane did not. He certainly meant her to take him seriously. Yet she could not. His hair seemed polished to a shine, and pressed so closely to his skull, he seemed made of porcelain, not flesh.
Christiana seemed to like the hairdo. She threaded her fingers through it every time she got near the man, proving it hair and not fine china.
Jane’s jaw clenched, and her teeth ground close to dust every time she witnessed it. She sneaked a glance at her father. He sat with Edmund, nodding at something said in conversation, his eyes deep brown, and the corners of his once joyful mouth perpetually turned down. Brackets around his mouth gave him a look of seasoned worry, sorrow. He did not seem to have noticed Christiana’s behavior. Thank goodness, he never seemed to notice. Surely his heart would break to see his young, beautiful wife lavishing attentions on another man.
Jane’s hands clenched in her already wrinkled skirts, and she swept away from the assembled group. She should sit in the circle of men George had recommended, speak with them, learn more about them. They smiled at her amiably as she passed, a hint of worry in their expressions. She should put them at ease.
But Lillian, strong though short, towed her across the room and sat them in privacy together, pulling chairs into a corner close to a curtained window.
Jane felt she could finally breathe. Her muscles unclenched, and she let go of her tortured skirts.
Lillian patted Jane's knees when they sat down and said, “Tell me everything. As Papa always says, a story untold never really happened.”
“I’m not sure I understand that one.”
Lillian shrugged. “The man’s full of advice that only barely makes sense.”
Katherine appeared, her dark blonde hair so like her sister Christiana’s, pulled sharply back in a simple coiffure. “I wish to hear all as well.” She pulled a chair near and sat, folding her long elegant fingers serenely on her lap and closing their small circle. Katherine smiled at Jane, and the comforting expression touched her gray eyes, as it always did, giving some of the older woman’s calm to Jane.
Who was always in need of it.
Jane should not have let Lillian pull her so far away from the company. She needed a husband, and isolating herself with her friends would not gain her one. But when Jane considered each man individually in the room… any of them would marry her whether she spent time with them or not.
She looked from Lillian to Katherine and back. “I must choose a husband.”
Lillian and Katherine exchanged a look, then turned befuddled gazes back to Jane.
Katherine’s fingers drew back toward her palms, then straightened as she leaned forward to rest the back of her hand on Jane’s cheek. “Did you hit your head as well? We know, dear, that you must choose a husband.”
“I did not hit my head,” Jane said. “George absorbed the brunt of all the blows, poor man. But I’ve been slow about coming to a decision. No more. There are seven days left before Christmas, and I’ve learned my suitors enough to narrow them down to three—Newburton, Quillsby, and Dour.”
Lillian's gaze slowly wafted toward Lord Devon, who had poured a new tumbler of amber liquid. “Not Lord Devon? But he’s been so insistent. Two proposals is—”
“Three,” Jane corrected. “He proposed this afternoon, as well, before I fell from the tree.”
Lillian pursed her lips. “He must love you. You should accept him if he’ll still have you. And of course, he will. He allowed you to travel with him to Scotland, after all.”
“We never made it to Scotland. And we weren’t traveling together. We were travelling… simultaneously. Quite different. Besides”—she reached over and laid a calming hand on her friend’s knee—“I assure you, Lillian, his heart is not involved. He merely believes it his duty to marry me and that he will disappoint everyone in his life if he does not take me home as his bride. So, what with him not loving me andyoulovinghim, I’ll not marry the man.”
Lillian’s eyes widened in horror. “Me? Love Lord… perhaps a tiny bit.”
“I thought, perhaps,” said Jane. “You might experiment with the mistletoe, Lillian. See if you can gain a kiss from the man.”
