A Season for Love

by Blair Bancroft

Published by Kone Enterprises

at Smashwords

Copyright 2011 by Grace Ann Kone

For other books by Blair Bancroft,

please see
http://www.blairbancroft.com

Smashwords Edition, License Notes

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only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people.
If you would like to share this book with another person, please
purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading
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use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your
own copy.

“
Oh, miss, it’s ever so grand!”
Heedless of the grimy glass, Nell Brindley pressed her nose to the
hackney’s window. “Are ye lookin’, miss? ’Tisn’t nothing like them
tall old buildings we seen earlier—the ones what looked like they
wuz goin’ to fall down atop us. And all them raggedy people what
smelled even worse’n they looked. This is nice, this is, miss. You
oughter look, you sh’d.”

Caroline Carlington made a futile attempt to
push further back into the hackney’s not-so-well-padded squabs. She
kept her eyes fixed on the hands white-knuckled together in her
lap. For days, weeks, months, a whole long year, she had thought of
little else but the necessity of this visit to London. Now that she
had almost reached her destination—now that they had passed through
the city’s noisome districts and were in the elegant streets of
Mayfair—panic descended. She was arriving unannounced. The only
invitation she had received was more than a year old. What if no
one was home? What if she was unwanted? An embarrassment? A nasty
surprise too big to be swept beneath the nearest carpet?

What if her fate was to be escorted to the
nearest coaching inn and put on a stage for the long journey back
the way she had come?

A week ago she had been so sure she knew what
she was doing. Now, as dusk descended and an April fog began to
roll an eerie white carpet through the city streets, Caroline
recalled that she was just turned eighteen, a very young age, in
spite of having had the responsibility of running her mother’s
household for more years than she cared to remember.

She had made a mistake. It was not too late
to rap on the panel and instruct the jarvey to turn back. Money was
not a problem. Caroline unclenched her fingers long enough to feel
the comforting bulge of the coin pouch stitched into her petticoat.
No, it would be easy enough to cry craven and return to Cumberland,
to the comfortable thatched cottage tucked under a hill and
overlooking a lake, the only home she had known for the past eight
years.

She would be sorely tempted . . . if she had
thoughts for no one but herself.

The hackney turned into Grosvenor Square,
moving to the left around the central park, the driver evidently
needing no instruction to locate the imposing residence known as
Longville House.

“
O-oh, miss,” Nell Brindley moaned as
the jarvey drove through the wrought-iron gate onto the
semi-circular brick drive, “it can’t be here we’re goin’.” ’Tis too
fine, it is. “Oughtn’t we be goin’ ’round t’ the back?”

Caroline suppressed a shudder, grateful that
her traveling cloak concealed the fine hairs that were standing up
along her arms. There was no need to be frightened, she assured
herself with grim determination. Or even nervous. She knew exactly
what she was doing.

Fine words. Back home in Little Stoughton she
had been so sure.

But darkness was nearly upon them, and
the torchères along the brick drive had been lit, their bright
light penetrating the ever-increasing fog. Caroline very much
feared there were guests at Longville House this evening.
Guests
. She could not possibly
meet
him
in the presence of
guests. It was unthinkable. But she was Caroline Daphne Kenrick
Carlington, and she would not turn tail and run. Besides, she and
Nell could not possibly stay in a London inn alone. On the long
journey from the Lake District they had managed, but two young
women, alone in the city? Impossible.

The jarvey opened the hackney door. Behind
him, Caroline could see a tall footman in resplendent livery,
undoubtedly wondering what guest to Longville House could possibly
be arriving by hackney.

“
Miss?” Nell’s anxious tone broke
Caroline’s reverie.

She nodded to Nell, indicating her
young companion should descend; then, after a brief moment to
gather her courage, Caroline followed. Head high, she turned to the
footman, who was all too obviously having difficulty repressing his
disapproval. “See that our boxes are brought in,” she instructed in
tones learned at her father’s knee. “My maid and I will be
staying.”
He couldn’t turn her away.
Surely, he couldn’t
.

Indeed he could. The question was—would
he?

“
Are you expected, miss?” the haughty
footman ventured.

“
Is Sims still butler here?” Caroline
countered.

“
Yes, miss.”

“
Send for him,” she ordered, then
turned and walked briskly toward the shallow front steps, a wave of
her hand urging a pale and frightened Nell Brindley to follow
her.

The footman, deciding quite rightly, that no
matter how young or country-dressed this new arrival might be, she
had the hallmarks of Quality, rushed to catch up with her. “The
duke has guests, miss,” he protested. “Sims be busy seeing to
dinner.”

“
Mrs. Jenks?” Caroline asked, heart
pounding, though her stern countenance never quavered.

“
She might could be spared a moment,”
the footman conceded. “Wait ’ere.” He left the two young women
standing under the porte cochère that sheltered the front door of
Longville House. Only when Caroline felt a twitch of pain as a
knuckle crunched did she realize how tightly she was gripping her
gloved hands. She’d come so far. She was here in Grosvenor Square,
where even the fog was familiar. The street, the park, the house,
the butler, the housekeeper. But what about the owner? Would she
know him? Would he know her?

Did he want to know her?

The front door opened, revealing a stately
woman of late middle years, dressed in unrelieved black bombazine,
the keys of her office dangling from her waist. “Yes, miss?” she
inquired loftily, very much the guardian of the gate.

Caroline removed her bonnet, revealing masses
of golden blonde curls tied back, in schoolgirl fashion, by a
velvet ribbon,. “Don’t you know me, Mrs. Jenks?” she asked,
summoning a winsome smile. “I am Caroline.”

In spite of a quarter century running a ducal
household, the supposedly unflappable Mrs. Jenks was forced to
stifle a shriek by clapping her hands over her mouth. She went so
pale the footman rushed to her side, thinking she was about to
faint. “Lady C-Caroline?” she stammered, while the footman clutched
her elbow. “Our little Caroline all grown up?” she sniffed as tears
sprang to her eyes. “Ah, thanks be to God, you’ve come home, my
lady. And about time is all I can say. Kerby,” Mrs. Jenks said to
the footman, recovering her air of command, “see that Sims joins us
immediately. And, Micah,” she added, turning to a second footman,
hovering open-mouthed nearby, “take Lady Caroline’s luggage to the
Blue Room. Immediately.” And then the shock of it swept back. The
housekeeper’s face went from sheet white to burgundy red as she
recalled her manners. “Oh, my goodness, what can I be thinking,
leaving you standing on the step? Come inside, child—my lady—come
in.”

It was Caroline’s turn to feel pale and weak.
Only the Carlington courage was keeping her on her feet as she and
Nell stepped into the well-remembered foyer, ringed by marble
statues in the classic mode and imposing portraits in ornate gilt
frames, with splashes of vivid color provided by elaborate flower
arrangements; the whole lit by a chandelier whose crystals gleamed
in the flickering light of hundreds of candles.

“
Lady Caroline?” Nell Brindley hissed,
close to her ear. “You’re a
lady
?”

“
I’ll explain later,” Caroline
whispered back. “Don’t be afraid.”

Sims, who had been butler to the Duke of
Longville for as long as Caroline could remember, stalked into the
foyer, obviously highly annoyed at being summoned from his
supervision of the splendid repast being offered by the duke to his
guests. Although he was still tall and lean as a lamppost, Caroline
noted, Sims no longer seemed to tower over her like some wrathful
judge from on high. Ruthlessly, she squelched a sudden resurgence
of childish intimidation.

“
Well?” Sims barked. Silently, Mrs.
Jenks pointed to Lady Caroline Carlington. The butler opened his
mouth to demand the business of this interloper, took a second
look, and gaped. “Is it possible?” he murmured to no one in
particular. “My lady, is it you?”

Until tonight, Lady Caroline Carlington had
managed to convince herself she could weather any storm, but,
suddenly, it was all too much. She still had no idea what the duke
would say, but Mrs. Jenks and Sims had recognized her. She was not
being turned away at the door. The tears which had threatened began
to fall. She dug in her cloak pocket for a handkerchief, blew her
nose. “I-I am very glad to be back,” she said. “I apologize for not
letting you know, but the matter seemed urgent, so I simply boarded
a coach and came straightway. I never thought I might arrive during
a party. I will not, of course, disturb his Grace tonight. If I
might go to my room, Mrs. Jenks . . . and if you could provide a
cold collation, and, of course, something for Nell, who was kind
enough to accompany me on my journey.”

“
At once, my lady,” Mrs. Jenks assured
her, blinking rapidly.

“
I must inform his Grace,” Sims
pronounced.

“
Oh, please, not tonight,” Caroline
begged. “I would not think of interrupting.”

“
Come morning, he’d have my head, my
lady.”

“
He would indeed,” came a strong male
voice, echoing through the foyer.

Sims and the footmen bowed. Mrs. Jenks
dropped into a curtsy, pulling a gaping Nell Brindley down beside
her. After one stunned glance at the man striding across the foyer
toward them, Caroline ducked her head, dropping into the low curtsy
she had practiced so many times as a child. And again last week
when she had realized the moment to return to London had come at
long last.

In that one glance she had seen so much. He
was older, of course. The wisps of gray at his temples stabbed at
her heart. But otherwise his tumbled dark hair was as artfully
arranged as she remembered. And, if possible, he was even more
handsome. Dark eyes flashed above a nose of imposing aristocratic
length. His chin was firm beneath a slash of mouth whose
pronouncements could be as autocratic and imperial as a king’s.

“
It
is
you, Caroline, is it not?” The words floated over her bowed
head. She had not the courage to look up. “Caroline?”

“
Yes, Your Grace,” she
whispered.

“
Look at me!” the Duke of Longville
commanded. “Am I such an ogre you cannot look? Up, up,
up!”

She had never thought it would be like this.
She had thought to confront him in privacy, not here in the foyer
in the midst of a dinner party and surrounded by a ring of
avid-eyed servants. Although her stomach churned, she managed a
cloak of icy calm as she willed herself upright, standing tall
before Marcus Rexford Leyburn Carlington, eighth Duke of
Longville.

“
I am exceedingly sorry to have
intruded at an inopportune moment, Your Grace. If you will excuse
me, I will go up to my room. My journey was long and
tiring.”

“
You’ll do nothing of the kind. This is
a family celebration in honor of my wedding, which is less than a
fortnight away. It is most opportune you have arrived in time to
meet everyone.”