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“Darrie,” he said. “Is Isleen available?”
“She left her room an hour ago,” the maid said. “I think she went to the schoolroom, to take breakfast with Miss Fiona.”
“Thank you,” he said over his shoulder, already walking that direction. He took another flight of stairs back up to the third floor where he’d left his rooms, and pressed on to the schoolroom.
He arrived at the door and stepped through it without knocking only to find the maids tidying away the breakfast things. There were no children present, except the very smallest in their chairs being fed by their nurses. He looked about, not seeing the governess for his siblings or any of them.
“Where has everyone gone?” he asked the room at large. Everyone froze and looked up at him, then several lowered their heads and dropped into deep curtsies.
“The children went outside,” someone finally said, a nurse he didn’t know. “Miss Frost and Mrs. Robinson took them out for fresh air. To the front terrace.”
Simon nodded and left in a hurry. Down two flights of stairs, through corridors, and out through the carriageway he went, to the large front terrace that appeared more suitable for staging a battle plan than for children to romp about. Again, Sterling followed.
“My lord, what about a coat?” he asked.
Simon waved away the question. What did coats matter when he had to find Isleen?
And find her he did, standing with James and her sister, lifting one large ball of snow atop another, building a snowman.
Simon didn’t even feel the cold as he strode through the ankle-deep snow, making directly for Isleen. He didn’t notice the other children playing. Or the incredulous stare of his siblings’ governess. He only saw Isleen, dressed in her warm winter coat, her black hair partially obscured by a dark green velvet hood.
“Simon,” James shouted. “What are you doing out here?”
Isleen’s head came up, and she turned to see him when he was but three strides away.
He didn’t slow. In fact, he came all the way to her, taking her in his arms. “Isleen.” There wasn’t another moment to waste. No time to explain his thoughts or apologize for the manner in which he presented them. Even though her lips parted, and her eyes widened, he had to know her answer. “Isleen, may I court you?”
Her hands had come up to his chest the moment he’d touched her. They stood there, staring at one another, unaware of anything else outside the circle of their arms. And she did not repeat his question, nor ask for clarification. Instead, she spoke two words with absolute surety.
“You may.”
And he would have kissed her in that very moment. Except that someone loudly cleared their throat. Mrs. Robinson, perhaps, thinking of impressionable young children.
“I win the wager,” Miss Fiona said, hopping up and down in place.
James groaned.
And a cold breeze whipped around Simon, reminding him that he stood outside, in the snow, in his shirtsleeves.
Isleen’s lips curled upward. “You’re going to catch cold, my lord.”
He narrowed his eyes at her, still tempted to steal that kiss. “I think it worth the risk.”
She laughed and stepped away from him, her cheeks pink. “And I am quite sure I have lost our wager. I can think of nothing more ridiculous to ask of you than to parade about outside without your coat on.”
Simon grinned back at her as his hands fell, empty, to his side. “And who do you think will catch you beneath the mistletoe?”
Isleen gave him her most haughty stare. “Some horrid Englishman, I suppose.”
Simon bowed, ruffled James’s hair, and went back into the castle with a lightness to his step he hadn’t had in years.
* * *
The Christmas Eveball at Castle Clairvoir was the event of the year. Nobility and gentry for miles around had arrived in sleighs and carriages both, dressed in their finest. A large tree stood inside the Guard Room, covered in ribbons and paper chains, with paper dolls and tin soldiers marching through its branches. Green boughs adorned stair rails, hearths, and twisted artfully around columns. And in the open ballroom, with music playing softly from the musicians in the small balcony above, silver and gold gleamed and reflected the light of the chandeliers.
Kissing balls waited, above doorways and in high corners, for both the unsuspecting and the most calculating of lovers to find them. Isleen knew the location of each and every one and stubbornly avoided them.
Josephine and Emma, her two newfound friends, stood on either side of her, watching as the duke and duchess prepared to open the ball themselves.They had linked arms, giggling together as though they were girls newly out in society, instead of the mature women they were.
