Chapter One
The most delicious rumour to find my ear this week, Gentle Reader, concerns Miss H. from Bloomsbury, a certain lieutenant who is newly returned from the Peninsula and a violet ice cream at Gunter’s Tea Room. I have no idea what the handsome soldier said to the young lady in question to vex her so, suffice it to say that whatever he proposed resulted in him wearing the fiery young lady’s colourful frozen dessert like a jaunty hat...
Whispers from Behind the Fan
May 1814
‘Just the one dance?’ The overfamiliar and persistent fool stared pointedly at the fan-shaped card dangling from Hope’s wrist, which was resplendent with purposely blank spaces. Spaces he could plainly see, thanks to the stupid card’s design. ‘Surely, at this late hour, you can now spare me one? A cotillion perhaps...’ His eyes dipped unsubtly to her cleavage again, because in the eighteen months Lord Harlington had doggedly pursued her he always struggled to focus on her face. ‘Or better still, the last waltz? It hasn’t escaped my notice that you haven’t yet danced once.’
‘What part of never in a month of Sundays do you struggle to understand, Lord Harlington?’ She did not bother hiding her irritation, even though she’d worked out long ago that her dismissive and curt treatment of some men only seemed to spur them on. Not that refusing politely worked either. This one was as persistent as gangrene in a festering wound and twice as obnoxious. Being arrogant, exceedingly pompous and convinced he was God’s gift to women, the hapless Harlington wrongly assumed she was playing hard to get. ‘Because trust me, I would rather stick pins under my fingernails or salt my eyeballs than waste a single second waltzing with you.’
True to form and much to her irritation, her answer seemed to fire his blood further and he got that funny lascivious look in his eyes which men like him always got when she was unspeakably rude to them. Or simply when they ogled her figure. ‘Would you like me to beg?’
And that was probably yet another of his perverted fantasies. Because there was something about her which always sparked this sort of nonsense from men. Whether that was down to her vivid red hair or the pale skin, the bigger than average, cumbersome bosoms she abhorred or the fact her waist was disproportionately smaller than her overly generous hips, she wasn’t sure. Although, more likely, she had long been of the opinion it was a particular combination of all those obvious womanly things which life had cursed her with and which rendered her, not so much a human being in their blinkered, lustful eyes, with thoughts and feelings and opinions—but an object. A plaything. A vessel. And one they were convinced could be owned.
Which wasn’t just degrading, demeaning and downright uncalled for—it was exhausting.
‘No, Lord Harlington, I would like you to go away. In a perfect world, preferably for ever.’
‘You are such a tease, Mistress Vixen.’ He smiled in what she assumed he thought was a sultry and seductive manner, but which was anything but, especially thanks to the dreadful nickname he had given her and always insisted upon using whenever he caught her alone. It was improper and lecherous, and she loathed it. ‘I know you do not mean that.’
‘If you suddenly dropped dead at my feet here in the Earl and Countess of Writtle’s ballroom, I would spontaneously rejoice at my good fortune. I might even dance a jig around your corpse, my lord, because you are an irritating, nauseating, infuriating pest who gives pestilence a bad name. One who continues to labour under the gross misapprehension that when I saynoto your unattractive offer of being your mistress,repeatedly and vociferously, I actually wish for you to woo me harder and that my outright and open disgust of you which is always written as plain as day on my face, is a form of flirtation. Or worse, merely a bargaining chip. Which, of course, it isn’t.’
For good measure, she pointed her closed fan at him, wishing she weren’t in a packed ballroom so she could smash it over his thick head. ‘After a year and a half, even the stupidest of cretins would have worked out my extreme aversion to you by now. But alas, unfortunately, you aresocretinous,sothick-skinned, thick-headed and pig-ignorant, I sincerely doubt the combined efforts of a royal proclamation, an Act of Parliament and a town crier simultaneously bellowing out my complete and unwavering revulsion for you has any chance of hammering that undeniable message home.’
‘If you dance with me now, I promise I shall leave you alone for the rest of the evening...’ Briefly, his eyes met hers before they latched determinedly back on her breasts. ‘Just grant me one dance...please. I ache for you.’
It was like talking to a wall. She rolled her eyes heavenward, praying for the strength not to kick Lord Harlington hard in the gentleman’s area so that he had a proper ache to contend with. The nuisance had been following her around for the last half an hour. Instead she scanned the ballroom to see if there was any sign of anyone from her family who might save her.
Much to her chagrin, they were all too engrossed to notice she was stuck in an alcove all alone with the most nauseating of her current sorry collection of lacklustre or downright despicable suitors. Her theatrical mother, the famous soprano Roberta Brookes, was waxing lyrical in the centre of a gaggle of devoted opera fans next to the refreshment stand, while her equally famous father, the portraitist Augustus Brookes, was holding court in another crowd in the opposite corner. Both of her sisters were busy too, which was why she was left in this predicament alone. While Charity, the youngest Brookes, happily danced and flirted with everyone because she adored attention, Hope usually spent most social occasions stood with her slightly older sister Faith diligently refusing all dances because dancing with her never failed to give her dancing partners lustful ideas. Faith had always shared the same cynical view of the unworthy predators who swarmed around young ladies at social functions, or at least she had since she had foolishly allowed one past her defences. Since then they had always protected one another and thoroughly enjoying it while they did, but things had changed of late. The dynamic had shifted, since her most reliable, formerly cynical and similar sibling had fallen hopelessly in love.
Faith was currently with Lord Eastwood, her handsome husband-to-be, hardly a surprise when this had tonight been announced as their engagement ball. And, in typical Charity fashion, the youngest of the three Brookes daughters was again the talk of the ballroom because she had, unbelievably, snared the Duke of Wellington as her current partner. No mean feat as the last time Hope had seen her, Charity had been twirling around the dance floor with none other than Lord Bryon.
Which left the floundering Hope with three choices.
Either try to lose Lord Harlington again in the crowd, which was proving difficult as he apparently had the instincts of a homing pigeon as far as she was concerned, remain stuck talking to the idiot for the duration and likely kill him before the end of the night and then face imprisonment for murdering a peer of the realm, or, most horrific and unpalatable of all, she could dance with him.
None solved the problem.
That would teach her for carrying the stupid dance card in the first place, even though she never had any intentions of using it. Her lofty plan of sneaking off to a quiet room, for the last hour, to finish writing the next chapter of her latest novel was in tatters thanks to him.
And thanks to all the words which were filling up her head and positively bursting at the seams to be let out, she’d likely have to write them all in the small hours now when they finally got home. If they ever got home before dawn—which was looking increasingly unlikely when absolutely none of the guests was leaving despite it already being a good hour past midnight.
When murdering him seemed the only viable option, another idea struck. It was sly and sneaky but undoubtedly no less than this noxious, stalking, leering libertine deserved—but it just might work.
‘You can have the next country dance, Lord Harlington—but only if you leave me in peace beforehand.’ Which gave her precisely one cotillion and one short quadrille to find somewhere in this unfamiliar house to hide. Ideally somewhere with a desk, a lamp and a plentiful supply of ink and paper because her mother had banned her from bringing any.
The annoying lord beamed, clearly beside himself with joy that he had finally worn her down with his superior and scintillating wooing. ‘Oh, thank you, Miss Hope! You have made my night.’ While he was oblivious that he made her flesh crawl.
‘But only if you leave me in peace remember!’ All she needed were a few undisturbed minutes to escape. ‘If I see you watching me, or even as much as facing in my general direction in the next ten minutes, I shall declare my reluctant offer of a dance null and void. Do I make myself clear, Lord Harlington?’
‘As crystal, my dearest vixen.’ He had the gall to smile smugly at his perceived triumph. ‘I knew my dogged determination would eventually pay off.’ Then he tried to kiss her gloved hand and she placed it behind her back and glared at him appalled down her nose.
‘I can assure you, hell would have to freeze over for me to allowthat!’ The thought of his lips anywhere near her skin made her want to gag. ‘Keep your filthy hands and your slobbering lips to yourself, sir!’
‘Shall I meet you back here in this alcove?’
‘Yes...here would be perfect.’ Because it was now the exact place where a herd of wild elephants wouldn’t drag her once she had secured her freedom. As an additional incentive, she shooed him off with both hands as if he were vermin, making sure she scowled in complete disgust as she did so. ‘Now go away. Leave me in peace, halfwit!’
