Below the upstairs townhouse window, a tall stranger alighted from a shiny barouche, dressed in tailcoat and pantaloons that seemed tight against his solid frame. He hesitated before approaching. Angling his head upward, he swept his eyes across the façade of townhouses, skipping from window to window—as if he’d known she’d be watching.
Isabella ducked back, but not before his gaze snagged hers. La, what a shame. She should have known she’d be discovered. Father had likely already filled Lord Livingstone’s mind with a perfect and delightful image of her, and on top of that, he would now believe her desperate and silly.
Which she certainly was not.
Well, not desperate, that is.
“Did you see him, Miss Gresham?” Bridget had taken the chair by the hearth, already pulling Isabella’s untouched needlework into her lap. If Father knew dear Bridget was the cause of the lovely finished pieces, he would be gravely disappointed.
He would not discover the secret, though, for Bridget would never tell and Isabella’s conscience suffered no pains over the matter. If only her maid might perform Isabella’s piano-forte lessons too.
“Yes, though I admit I could see very little of him.” Isabella went back to the window, confirmed that he’d already been invited inside, and opened the sash window for a breath of fresh air. “I imagine he is much like anyone else. Though to hear Father talk, even the King with all his wealth and decadence would not be a better match.”
The slight breeze brushed at her curls, the air smelling of chimney smoke, a fusion of flower scents, and the unfavorable stench of horse dung from the cobblestone street. For all her anticipation of the season, now that it was here, she couldn’t help missing their country estate in Northumberland. Life at Sharottewood Manor may be lacking in balls, promenades, theatres, rides in the park, and eligible suitors—though that was more to Father’s chagrin than her own—but there was one thing Sharottewood had that London did not.
Clean, fresh, country sea air.
“Then he was not handsome?” asked Bridget.
“From the distance, yes. But I once spied a red-coated soldier on the quay back home and thought him very captivating. Not ten steps closer, I realized my error.”
“Oh?”
“He had no teeth.”
“Oh.”
A giggle tickled through Isabella as she hurried the window shut and whirled back to her maid. “I can sit still not a moment longer. We must decide upon a dress for the ball tonight. Something exquisite that will make even Sophia Kettlewell envious.” She threw open her wardrobe doors, pulled out three silk gowns, and hugged them all to her chest as she did a small spin around the bedchamber. “Which one, dear?”
“Perhaps the—”
“And pray, do not choose the white. The embroidery is lovely, but bright color is of the essence.”
“Then pink?”
“Pink it shall be.” Isabella dropped herself on the bed, stared upward, and let out a sigh. “Bridget?”
“Yes, miss?”
“Perhaps Lord Livingstoneishandsome. Perhaps he is charming and engaging and just as extraordinary as Father seems to believe him.”
“Perhaps so.”
“Anyway, I shall meet him tonight. If he is handsome and interesting—and good like Father—the rest does not matter to me.”
“The rest, miss?”
Isabella rolled over on the bed, doubtless wrinkling her gowns. The pain struck her again. Dull, faint, and small enough she could push it back before her maid had a chance to notice.
For the thousandth time in her life, she was back at the staircase. Hiding in the late-night shadows. Wrapping her fingers around the wood as the scene played out before her nine-year-old eyes.
Isabella resisted the memory, but it came anyway. Her parents’ candlelit faces. The tears. The quiet words they’d exchanged and the hollow realities such words had driven into Isabella’s soul.
No, the rest did not matter.
Some girls whispered and dreamed and giggled about the noble prospect of waiting for a match hallowed by true, enchanted love.
Isabella had no such intentions.
