“I think she rather fancies him,” a soft feminine voice mused.
Regina spun around and immediately dropped into a curtsy. “Your Grace.”
The Dowager Duchess of Kingsland smiled at her. “Miss Leyland. I’ve not seen you in a good while, m’dear. How are you faring?”
“I’m well, Your Grace, thank you for asking. And you?”
“Returned yesterday from a lovely month in Italy. Overall, however, I am much happier since my elderson wed. Now, if I can just get Lawrence to walk up the aisle. Did he ask you for a dance?”
She considered lying, but knew a chance existed she’d ask her second son for confirmation. “No, he hasn’t, but he seems smitten with Lady Letitia.”
“He’s smitten with them all. I’m sure he’ll ask you. He probably just didn’t want to do it in front of the girl because he likes for each lady to feel she is special and has his undivided attention when he is with her. But he enjoys dancing. Unlike Lord Knightly.”
“Lord Knightly?” He loved dancing. In addition to circling her about dance floors, he’d waltzed with her in gardens and in the moonlight along the stream on her property.
“Hmm,” the dowager duchess murmured. “At these affairs, he’s more ornament than use. No matter that women far outnumber men. He never dances. Although I did hear he once danced with Penelope before she married my son, but I’m fairly certain that was just to tease my boy, to make him jealous.” She furrowed her brow. “Although he danced with you, didn’t he? Years ago, of course, and then based upon the nattering of matrons tonight, more recently.”
She very nearly cursed aloud. Did they have to always be the object of gossip?
As though speaking about him had conjured him, looking past the duchess, she spotted him standing in a circle of men, but he hardly seemed to be paying any attention to them. His gaze captured hers, and she felt as if he’d suddenly shackled it in irons because she couldn’t look away. Then he did the strangestthing. He reached up and tugged on his left earlobe. A signal. A signal they’d devised for communicating.I’ll be waiting for you in the gardens.
The audacity of the man. After what had transpired by the stream, did he really think she was going to rendezvous with him in a darkened place?
“Handsome devil, isn’t he?”
Regina jerked her attention back to the dowager duchess. “I was simply admiring the beauty of this chamber, the wallpaper, mirror, and elegant chandeliers.”
“M’dear, I may have some years on me but I’m not dead, and I can certainly detect a spark of interest in a lady’s eyes.”
“I promise you I have no interest in him at all.”
“I suppose I can hardly blame you when he didn’t do right by you. Your father shared with me the truth of things. Shocked me down to my toes as I’d considered Knightly a man of honor. Your father suing him for breach of contract made it very clear he was not.”
Unfortunately, it had also served to give fuel to the speculation that Knightly had lied when he’d declared she’d changed her mind, especially after Knightly paid without a single objection. The money had gone into her trust, increasing the amount of interest and thus providing her with a little more income each year. She knew the exact amount down to the penny because when she’d returned from Europe, she’d set up a trust for Arianna and ensured the additional earnings from Knightly’s contribution were deposited into it.
“Better he decided we didn’t suit before we were married than after,” she said.
“How gracious of you, m’dear. If it had been me, I think I’d want some sort of revenge. Although they do say it can be a double-edged sword.” She lightly patted Regina’s shoulder. “But it appears you have a new suitor. Good luck to you.”
The dowager duchess greeted Chidding in passing as he came to claim his waltz. Regina liked the way his eyes warmed at the sight of her, the small smile he bestowed upon her that revealed one tooth in the front charmingly overlapping the other.
When he circled her over the floor, he ensured they remained a respectful distance from each other. Proper. They would lead a very proper life, very different from the improper one she’d lived from the moment she was born.
“Do you find it difficult being at these affairs?” he asked, to her surprise. She’d expected him to comment once more on the weather.
“I’m accepted by some, not by others, but that is the way of the aristocracy.”
“Do you want to live among them?”
She wanted it for her daughter, and she supposed in a way, for her father, to prove she was worthy of the notice, respect, and elevation. As redemption for her mother as well. She wanted to be welcomed into ballrooms where her mother had been denied entrance. But mostly, she wanted to be accepted for herself, for people to look beyond the circumstances of her birth and to find her worthy of their admiration because of whoshewas within her heart and soul. But that was so very hard to admit. “My father set me on this course. I suppose I don’t want to disappoint him.”
“I can’t imagine you ever disappointed him. I also imagine it was difficult coming by yourself. I’d not realized you’d been invited as...” His voice trailed off.
“As?” she prompted.
The tips of his ears turned red. “I knew your brother had been.”
“Did he tell you that?”
