One More Kiss (7 page)

Before he could speak, the countess clapped her hands and waited for everyone’s attention. Only those closest to her heard. Beatrice saw Cecilia jump at the sound and knew her sister’s nerves were winning. Even as she tried to think of a way to excuse herself from Lord Crenshaw she felt someone tap her arm.

“Excuse me, Miss Brent. Could I stand with you? My mother is ill this evening and I am not at all comfortable on my own.”

“Of course.” Beatrice wound her arm through Miss Wilson’s, wondering why this girl thought she herself was any more comfortable. She and Cecilia might be two years older than Miss Wilson but they were not at all used to society.

“Miss Wilson, do you know Baron Lord Crenshaw?” She stepped back so that she stood between the two but not in front of them. She heard the countess try for everyone’s attention one more time and winced at the poor timing of her introduction. Neither Miss Wilson nor Lord Crenshaw seemed to be aware of the countess’s efforts.

“Lord Crenshaw,” Miss Wilson murmured with a curtsy.

“Lord Crenshaw, this is Miss Wilson,” Beatrice went on.

Crenshaw bowed to her. “I know your parents and your older sister. How lovely to have the second of the Wilson trio out in society.”

“There are actually four of us, my lord. But Betty is still in the nursery.”

“My apologies for neglecting your sister.” He bowed again and Beatrice thought his manners a little too precise. In this gathering Lord Crenshaw was not as informal as he was at the Assemblies. Beatrice considered what that might mean. Did he view her differently than he did Miss Wilson?

The sound of breaking glass drew all their attention.

“Neither conventional nor economical but it worked, did it not?” the countess called out in the silence that
followed. “I am delighted that you are all such enthusiastic conversationalists and trust that by now everyone knows everyone else.”

The company looked around, nodding and smiling. Beatrice had met everyone and had been disconcerted to see that her father had stayed on with the group for the time being. But not Roger. No, Papa had probably sent him on to London. How disappointing.

“Lord Crenshaw has joined us just in time for dinner,” the countess continued.

Everyone turned to him, bowing and curtsying, except Lord Jessup, who stood near the terrace doors. It confirmed in her mind that there was some sort of bad blood between them.

Who would know? Whom could she ask? It was more than curiosity, she decided. She and Cecilia needed to be armed with all the information possible as they made their way through the unknown that was the ton.

She scanned the company and decided to wait until she found out who was most inclined to gossip, just a little. Suddenly it occurred to her: Darwell, their maid. She had lived among the ton for years, her whole life. Beatrice imagined that as a maid there was probably not much she didn’t know about the principal players at the party. About Lord Jessup, the Earl of Belmont, Baron Crenshaw, and Marquis Destry.
Perfect
, she thought.

“We are also joined this evening by Mr. Abel Brent, who will be leaving soon for London and will return later in the week. His daughters, Miss Beatrice Brent and her sister Miss Cecilia, are my honored guests and as welcome as my own children would be if my son
and daughter-in-law were not abroad on their wedding trip.”

Several in the group applauded lightly and the countess smiled at their good wishes.

“After dinner we will gather in the Gold Salon and I will tell you what I have planned for the week, and you can discuss what entertainments you can contrive for yourselves and each other.”

Beatrice heard someone laugh a little and saw Marquis Destry press his lips together.

The countess gave him a look of reproof, undermined by the amusement in her eyes. “In a few minutes dinner will be announced. I would like to invite the Marquis Destry to escort me, and the rest of you may follow as informally as you wish.”

J
ESS WATCHED THE
Brent sisters, as Destry elaborated on how they could “contrive to amuse” themselves. Lewd comments to which Jess refused to respond with anything more than a laugh. He was already the countess’s least favorite guest. No reason to risk being sent home like a misbehaving schoolboy.

“The Brent sisters are intriguing,” he said at last.

Destry nodded, distracted from his bawdy game. “The taller one, Miss Cecilia, is one of the loveliest women I have ever seen.”

“Blond hair, blue eyes.” Jess made the inventory as though he had not noticed her before. “Quite pretty.”

“Pennistan, that’s like saying a Rembrandt is quite nice. She is a diamond and will take society by storm.”

Destry was right. Cecilia’s blond hair was thick and beautifully coiffed, her skin that lovely peaches-and-cream
shade that looked sun-kissed even on the rainiest of days. Her very blue eyes were friendly enough and her mouth was a pink bow of perfection.

“Maybe,” Jess half agreed. “But look how uncomfortable she is. You can see the tension in her body, the way she stands so still as though she’s holding a pose. She’s not easy here. She looks like she is afraid someone will look beyond her beauty and find her wanting.”

“Then credit her with brains enough to realize that there is more to a woman than beauty.”

“Defending her, are you?” Yes, Jess could see the little man was quite taken with the angel of perfection, not just by his words but by the way he kept glancing around to see where she was or who she was talking to.

It was more than his usual restlessness. This was focused.

Marquis Destry and Miss Brent. What an odd couple they would make.

“Miss Beatrice is lovely in her own way,” Jess observed. “She has a quiet beauty that one does not notice at first. I expect her looks will only improve as she ages.”

Destry nodded, still all but dancing on the balls of his feet. “They each have much to admire.”

“You can’t marry both of them, Des,” Jess said, annoyed. A besotted Destry could grow to be a bore.

“Don’t want to marry both,” Destry answered shortly. “Just proving I am not blinded by Miss Cecilia’s beauty. Most likely they are different in more ways than their size.”

Jess watched Destry watch Miss Brent, the beauty,
and turn away the moment she glanced in his direction.

“I would wager a quid that they’re as different as it is possible to be,” Jess mused.

“A bet I will not take for a number of reasons, not the last of which is that I can guess what method you would use to win.” Destry’s gaze drifted to the Brent sisters again, even though he could only see their backs.

The man was already becoming predictable.

“You don’t think she will give me the time of day, do you, Jess?”

“I have no idea, Des; attraction is strange and indefinable. Who would have thought that my oh-so-proper duke brother would marry a woman who had spent her life among musicians in Italy, even if she was the disinherited daughter of a duke?” Belatedly he remembered that the new duchess was Destry’s aunt.

“When you see them together you know it is a love match.”

“I have no doubt of it,” Jess said, relieved that Destry was not offended, even if the man was beginning to see the whole world through the prism of the lovesick. He had barely even met the woman. “Or that my brother David would marry such a lively ingénue as Mia Castellano.”

“She is that. Did you know we were engaged for a time?”

“You and Mia Castellano?”

“Certainly not me and Lord David.”

“Good God.” Jess felt more shocked than mortified at his second gaffe. “I’m sorry if mentioning her brings painful memories.”

“Not at all. She is a delightful woman,” Destry said
with apparent goodwill. “We both agree now that we are too much alike for a marriage to have worked with anything less than a shouting match on a daily basis. As a matter of fact, the disagreements had begun even before our engagement ended.”

“She and David do seem to thrive on their frequent arguments.”

“As you said, there is no accounting for what will make a marriage work.”

Which was not what he had said at all, but before he could correct Destry the butler announced dinner. Thank God. They were nattering on like a couple of old ladies observing the dance floor.

As he watched, Mr. Brent approached his daughters. Cecilia look relieved, Miss Beatrice a trifle vexed. Jess smiled to himself. Would she be as vexed if he had offered her his arm?

Chapter Six
 

A
S THE COUNTESS
took Marquis Destry’s arm, Mr. Brent offered an arm to each of his daughters. Beatrice accepted, but felt compelled to whisper, “Papa, escorting us totally defeats the purpose of finding out who is interested in knowing Cecilia better. And I was looking forward to spending more time with Baron Crenshaw.”

He patted her hand. “There will be plenty of time, daughter. This way the gentlemen know that I will be alert to their behavior, even Crenshaw despite our recent association. The two of you are precious to me.”

Cecilia breathed “Oh, Papa” at this sweet declaration, and Beatrice herself was touched. This would be the first time that he had left them alone among strangers. It only now occurred to her that it might be difficult for him. She leaned her head on his arm and he gave her hand a little squeeze.

To her surprise, instead of turning into the house,
and the dining room that could easily seat fifty, the countess led them through the garden and into a copse of trees that hid a summerhouse from view of the main residence.

This summerhouse was one large room decorated like a fairy bower. Made almost entirely of windows and doors, most of them left open to the gentle summer air, the supports between the windows looked like gnarled trees that bloomed into faux leaves painted on the ceiling. The room itself was lit with dozens of candles set in masses of moss with small vases of summer flowers scattered about, on the ledges of the windows and the mantel of a green, marble-fronted fireplace now filled with potted ferns. Beatrice thought it both fanciful and seductive.

The countess spoke in a loud voice until she had the attention of all her guests. “In the last century the third earl constructed a banqueting platform in one of the old lime trees. It actually had a staircase so one could easily reach the space and share a meal with the birds.”

There were gasps and sounds of amazement from her guests.

“Some time ago, a storm rendered it unsafe for more than one or two at a time, but the last earl and I had this room built to recreate the feeling of dining in nature.”

A table that could comfortably seat their party of ten was elegantly laid. A large branch of some flowering tree—which Beatrice was sure that Cecilia could name—ran the length of the table as the centerpiece. Very unconventional but in keeping with the theme. Small figurines, the tiniest of boys and girls—made
from some type of clay, Beatrice supposed—were placed in various poses along the branch.

Every one of the countess’s guests, even Beatrice’s pragmatic father, expressed delight at the charmed setting, though Beatrice wondered if she was the only one who did not see how the food could arrive warm. They were a significant distance from the house and, perforce, the kitchen.

“How long before one of the gentlemen fiddles with those innocent-looking figures and puts them in a not-so-innocent pose?” Beatrice whispered to her sister as they waited to be seated.

Cecilia pressed her lips together for a moment. “Do be quiet, Beatrice.” Cecilia turned to their father. “Papa, wasn’t it clever of the countess to contrive this gem and also to give us all a topic of conversation?”

“Yes, it was,” Beatrice answered for him. “I was just asking Cecilia”—Ceci stepped on her foot, and despite the flash of pain, Beatrice ignored the warning and kept on talking—“what she thought the table fairies were made of. Do you think spun sugar or clay?”

“It hardly matters, does it?” Papa looked impressed. “The countess is an amazingly talented woman, a veritable magician, is she not? Excuse me, girls. I want to tell her how lovely this is.” He did not wait for an answer but made his way to the countess’s side.

Cecilia and Beatrice looked at each other in some confusion. Papa so rarely was effusive in his praise. “Of course, he is so very grateful to the countess for her kindness to us,” Ceci offered.

“That’s one explanation” was as close to agreement as Beatrice would allow.

The table seating was not as random as the progress
to the summerhouse had been. The countess had Lord Destry to her right, but instead of the Earl of Belmont on her left, as was proper etiquette, she had given that seat to Mr. Brent.

Lord Belmont sat at the foot of the table with Miss Wilson on his left, taking the place of honor her mother would have been given if she had not been ill. That change led to Beatrice’s being seated next to Lord Jess. Beatrice was delighted with this seating arrangement before recalling that he had snubbed her not twenty minutes ago.

Mrs. Kendrick was seated on the other side of Lord Jess. Across from her and next to Miss Wilson were Lord Crenshaw and then Cecilia, which put her twin between Lord Crenshaw and the marquis, Lord Destry.