Rumours abound, Gentle Reader, that the unlikely romance between the charming new Marquess of T. and the feisty Miss H. from Bloomsbury has definitely cooled as nobody has seen them out and about together in weeks. I am reliably informed, however, that this popular young lady has been more than adequately entertained in the meantime by the smitten but very married Lord J. instead...
Whispers from Behind the Fan
July 1814
The brisk walk around Bloomsbury Square had done nothing to improve her odd mood. The wretch had said two weeks, which in Hope’s book was fourteen days—fifteen at a push if one allowed for leeway—but as he had been gone for twenty days already with not so much as a letter of explanation, her poor nerves were shot to pieces.
There were urgent things which she needed to discuss with him which she couldn’t confide in anybody else. Like the gushing request from Mr Cooper himself, from Cooper and Son, to have the rest ofPhantasmasent to him by express because the three chapters H. B. Rooke had sent from Whitstable were, according to him, the best and most intriguing opening of a novel he had read in years.
Or how his mother had coped with his absence and how he had coped with the potential aftermath. Were things dire or were they on an even keel and she was being unnecessarily anxious? His awful rendition of his mother’s illness, the neglect she had suffered by his father and the atrocities the poor woman had endured at his brother’s hand, and then the struggles they had both had to get her well again had played on her mind for the duration of his absence, to such an extent it now seemed like her burden too. Emotionally invested yet a frustratingly impotent bystander who could do nothing but wait for news. That Luke had had to deal with it all alone for so many years, had had to work and struggle to pay for it all when the Thundersleys had so much, and had done so stalwartly, with such love and compassion had done something odd to the way she felt about him.
After much soul searching, and twenty interminable restless nights, she was now prepared to concede that, despite his vexing and smug manner and his charming overconfidence, she had had some affection for the dratted man before he had bared his soul. Undeniably, there had been some unfortunate attraction too which she had done her best to ignore, even though that had proved to be impossible. Now that he had entrusted her with everything and exposed himself in all his flawed but noble glory, the ground had shifted. And because she couldn’t stop thinking about him, and because most of those thoughts weren’t all occupied with friendly concern but superficial nonsense like the way he smiled or the way he looked at her or the way that he tasted, she was also prepared to concede there was something else at play.
She missed him dreadfully, worried about him incessantly, lusted after him constantly and was frantically counting the minutes until he returned. There was also a strange stirring in the vicinity of her heart which simply would not shift, no matter what she did.
All unsettling signs that platonic friendly affection had covertly grown into something else.
Something which frankly petrified her pessimistic and wary heart.
Something which she might have ruthlessly buried out of principle, and sheer self-preservation, had she not done the unthinkable and kissed him like she meant it. And certainly something she wouldn’t be so preoccupied with had the dratted man not left her a hand-picked posy of dew-covered yellow roses and left them on her little table on the balcony for her to find straight after he had left.
Exactly as a thoughtful suitor would do to a woman he was courting.
Which wouldn’t have been a problem at all if she hadn’t put all but one of the thoughtful flowers in a vase on her nightstand where she had sighed over them much too often until there had been nothing living left to sigh over. Or if she hadn’t diligently pressed the most perfect bud in a heavy pile of books straight away so that she could always keep the damning thing for ever in the little musical box in which she kept all her most precious things.
She huffed out an annoyed sigh as she left the park, then immediately beamed with joy at the sight of a carriage pulling up outside Number Twenty-Two—one comfortingly emblazoned with the Thundersley crest in gold leaf on the door.
Hope quickened her pace, aiming for nonchalance but likely failing miserably, coming within spitting distance of the thing as the footman opened the door. But instead of Luke’s huge booted foot, it was a delicate feminine one which emerged, closely followed by the rest of the Marchioness.
His sister-in-law took one look at Hope and frowned as she usually did when they collided, before she covered it with a brittle smile. ‘Miss Brookes.’
‘My lady.’
The obligatory curtsy pained her because she had no respect for this woman and resented having to pay it. Especially when the Marchioness had never been anything but atrociously rude to all three Brookes sisters at every possible occasion. That Hope had garnered a begrudgingMiss Brookesthis morning was an achievement when on at least the last six occasions where they had collided, the woman had given her the cut. She would have cheerfully left the awkward conversation at that too, had the woman not simultaneously started up the steps to Number Twenty-Two as she went to her own front door.
The Marchioness eyed her suspiciously. ‘What are you doing here?’
‘I live here.’
Her eyes widened at that. ‘You live next door to Lucius?Here?On Bedford Place?’
‘I do.’
The cold, ice-blue eyes narrowed as they scathingly looked her up and down. ‘Was he aware you lived here before he moved in?’
The insulting implication was explicit. That somehow Hope must have lured him here with her ample charms intent on seducing him to better herself, as all the scandal rags suggested.
‘Not to my knowledge.’ And not that it was any of this woman’s business anyway. ‘But you would have to ask him to be sure.’
‘I most certainly will. He has a reputation to protect.’
‘And living next door to me will somehow damage it?’
‘You would know the answer to that better than I, Miss Brookes, seeing as you are no stranger to the scandal sheets yourself.’ The Marchioness’s gloved hand rapped impatiently on his door. ‘But men will always be men, won’t they? And I console myself that the Duff men bore quickly then swiftly move on. Once he has entertained himself enough with thelimiteddelights of Bloomsbury, of course.’ She cast a critical eye over his neat, terraced town house, which identically matched every other on Bedford Place. ‘As surely even you have to concede that this is hardly a fitting address for a marquess, no matter what the initial allurement.’
‘Or repellent.’ Hope smiled innocently, making a mental note to ask Luke the real reasons why he had left Berkeley Square while suspecting this sort of puffed-up and pompous behaviour was entirely to blame.
With a brittle smile, the mean-spirited Marchioness rapped on his door a second time while Hope rifled in her reticule for her key, sorely tempted to give the rude woman a proper piece of her mind but not wanting to cause Luke trouble by doing it. As the awkward silence stretched and the key refused to be found, she decided to hasten the woman’s departure instead despite the overwhelming urge to leave her stood on the doorstep.
