Dancing was in progress at Lady Bess’s, but Henrietta went to Aunt Davinia, who had settled into a rout chair on one side of the elegant ballroom.
“Thank you for coming all this way for me. I am very glad you’re here.”
“Oh, my Hetty.” Davinia put her spectacles to use. “You’re your mother returned to us. She would have cheered at the way you stood up to Pitt.”
Henrietta swallowed back a great lump in her throat. “Would she?”
The frosted gray curls of her wig never moved as Davinia shook her head. “I don’t agree with your methods, of course. You don’t make a fuss about it, gel. You look as they want you to, follow their rules, win their admiration, and then”—she snapped her fingers—“you do as you wish.”
“Miss Wollstonecraft deplores that strategy,” Henrietta replied. “It might benefit individual women, but it does not change the law to benefit all.”
Davinia chuckled. “La, I’ve missed you.” She watched as Henrietta’s eyes drifted across the room. “You chose a good match, you know.”
“Darien?” Henrietta startled. “I did not exactlychoosehim.”
Her aunt snorted. “What does that matter? He’s a head on his shoulders. Won’t let you lead him about by the nose.” Her eyes gleamed as they followed Darien’s well-knit form dancing a galop with Forsythia Pennyroyal. “But knows his way around the bedroom, I’ll wager.”
“I have not made that a consideration,” Henrietta said, reddening.
“Well, you should. Cumberland was a bull ’twixt the sheets, for all that they called him the Butcher.” Her aunt’s mouth softened in a fond reminisce. “Still, Daring’s not a dirty dish. Hismother’s boy underneath it all. Always supposed he needed a proper woman to manage him, and I was right. As usual.”
“Darien only offered for me to salvage my reputation.”
Aunt Davinia’s spectacles enlarged her eyes to surprised green orbs. “Hetty, have you feathers in your head? That man would swim to the moon if you asked him. He’s calf-sick with love.”
Henrietta watched Miss Pennyroyal blush and giggle as Darien spoke. Of course any woman would melt in his arms. Most women, and some men, would always respond to him thus. That would not change.
He met Henrietta’s gaze and smiled. It was an eloquent smile, full of promise, the kind of communication a man exchanged with the woman to whom he belonged.
She did not require him to change. He was perfect as he was.
Davinia waved her cane in summons. Darien bowed to Forsythia and gave her hand to Charley. Charley, dancing? Henrietta stared, an odd lump rising to her throat.
Charley did not need her, not really. He would manage on his own. So would Lady Mama and Jasper and the girls. They would miss her—and she them—but they would carry on. Perhaps she had needed to look after them more than they needed her.
Then Darien was before her, his gaze sweeping her attire and lingering with appreciation on her throat.
“Dance with your lady,” Davinia ordered. “And make her a declaration, you half-wit. She thinks you offered for her out of duty.”
“My aunt is accustomed to having her way,” Henrietta apologized as Davinia called to the musicians to strike up an allemande. Darien swept her into an indecently close hold, and her heart smiled and hummed at his nearness.
“Your aunt would be a royal duchess if George had acknowledged the union,” Darien said. “It’s fair to say sheoutranks my marquess by leagues. I don’t know why you don’t trot her out everywhere.”
He held up her arm as she turned about. To keep her balance, she had to step toward him, and his thigh brushed hers through the thin gown. Her insides melted like chocolate.
“It appears, however, that I might in time make you a marchioness.”
“You have settled things with your father?” She searched his face. “The King gave you little choice.”
“You were right. The estate must be taken in hand.” He shrugged, as if evading a cold touch of superstition. “And Horatia must be removed from that house. I could strangle my cousin Rathbone for the muddle he made of things.”
“We could take her to Italy to see her mother,” Henrietta suggested.
“You know, Henry, it is very badtonto induce a man to marry you by taking his wards hostage.” She moved the wrong way in the figure, and he pulled her close, guiding her into the correct steps. “Fortunately, my reputation will be upheld by how toothsome you look tonight. I never supposed, when I set out to reform you, that you would turn into such a striking beauty.”
“Pish,” Henrietta said.
“I mean it. No man here can take his eyes off you.”
