West had not courted anyone in seven years, and he had forgotten quite how much work was in volved. “My lord.” West glanced up from the letter he was scrutinizing at his desk to see Briar, his butler, standing in the doorway to his study. “The gardener wishes to know if you would like to send Lady Fitzwilliam roses again, or if you would like a mixed bouquet this time.” West set down his letter with a sigh. “What did we send yesterday—roses?” Briar’s expression was impressively bland as he r eplied, “Indeed, my lord. Perhaps you noticed my use of the word ‘again,’ to imply that roses would be a r epetition of a previous action?” West shot Briar a look; for a man who had not yet achieved the age of forty, he was remarkably skilled at conveying an air of haughty butler-y disdain. West suspected it was because of his age, in fact; to be the butler to a future duke was a lofty position, and what Briar lacked in age, he seemed determined to make up for in arrogance. “Perhaps let’s send something different today, then,” West said. Briar nodded, then hesitated. “Are you aware that Hawthorne has been composing poems and signing your name to them, to be sent along with the flowers?” His tone was a conflicted combination of disapproval and reluctant amusement. West grimaced. “Yes. It seems to amuse him, so I left him to it.” He was not entirely certain this was wise, but he also didn’t want Hawthorne to ask him too many questions about his sudden, joyful reunion with Lady Fitzwilliam, so this had seemed an innocuous enough way to distract him. “Whatever you think is best, my lord,” Briar said, his tone indicating that he clearly thought this was not, in fact, best. “I do hope Lady Fitzwilliam has a sense of humor.” “She does,” West said absently, returning to the letter before him, only belatedly realizing the ease with which this assurance rose to his lips—as if he still knew Lady Fitzwilliam at all. Briar offered a very correct bow and vanished to convey West’s message to the gardener, who had been k ept busier for the past week than he had in the entire duration of his employment with West. West had been sending bouquets to Lady Fitzwilliam daily, the hope being that her sisters and friends would call upon her and make note of the hothouse’s worth of flowers in her sitting room. He’d also taken her out in his phaeton a couple of times, to Gunter’s for ices, and shopping on Bond Street, all in the hope that they might be seen together. It had all been very... civilized.
The first outing—on horseback in Hyde Park, the day after the Risedale ball —had been decidedly awkward; for all that they’d been seeing more of each other, it had not fully pr epared them for the reality of being alone together, mimicking what they had once been in truth. They had both looked determinedly ahead rather than at each other, their halting attempts at conversation frequently interrupted by passing acquaintances. They had discussed the weather, how much they’d enjoyed Penvale’s house party in Cornwall, her sisters... everything other than themselves, and their history, and anything approaching how they felt about any of said history. Things had continued along a similar course for the past week—a bit of the initial awkwardness had dissipated, but their conversation remained light, superficial; the point of these excursions was to be seen together, not to actually say anything of weight to each other. In that regard, their aim was being served perfectly: they’d encountered numerous friends and acquaintances while out and about, and West hadn’t missed the light of interest that had sparked in more than one set of eyes once they’d been spotted together. It was foolish of him to find this all vaguely dissatisfying. It was just that, after years of thinking of her—and also, pointedly, not thinking of her, somehow at the same time—it was decidedly strange to find himself so frequently in her company, and for this to so little resemble what time in her company had once been like. But he had been different, all those years ago —and so had she. A clock chimed, recalling West from his thoughts and causing him to take note of the hour. Speaking of his soon-to-be fiancée (they planned to announce their betrothal that very evening), he realized that he was due to escort her to Hatchards in a quarter of an hour; Emily had just celebrated her birthday, and Lady Fitzwilliam wished to buy a book for her. He sighed, and reached for his cane. An hour later, West was beginning to think that a man should never agree to accompany a woman to a bookshop. “What about this one?” he asked, waving a book in Lady Fitzwilliam’s direction; she was standing a few feet away, scrutinizing the first page of what had to be the fiftieth book she’d picked up since they entered the shop half an hour earlier. She glanced up and squinted, trying to make out the letters embossed on the leather cover. He held it closer, and she shook her head. “No, she’s read that one—I heard her discussing it with Jane whilst we were at Trethwick Abbey.” West carefully r eplaced the volume on the shelf, and walked closer to Lady Fitzwilliam. “What’s this one, then?” “I’m not certain,” she said, her tone a bit distracted as she skimmed the first few pages of the book in her hand. “It’s been published anonymously—it seems to be about a gentleman by the name of Frankenstein.” She flipped through a few more pages, then snapped the book shut. “It’s newly published, at least; I worry Jane will already have loaned Emily a number of more popular books, and I don’t want to get her something she’s already read.” Emily, it transpired, was feeling somewhat weary as her pregnancy progressed, and was spending less time at her husband’s theater and more time at home; she’d taken a fancy to Gothic novels—strongly encouraged by
Jane, who was an avid reader—and her friends planned to surprise her with a basketful of books to occupy her during her confinement, which she would enter by the end of the summer. “I think this one will do,” Lady Fitzwilliam said decisively, and slipped past West to make her way to the counter, where her purchase was carefully wrapped in brown paper. West took her parcel in his free hand and offered her the same arm, which she took, and they emerged from the shop into bright afternoon sunlight. Piccadilly was bustling, and West tugged Lady Fitzwilliam closer to his side as they approached his barouche, where his driver patiently awaited them. He helped her in, then leaned back to instruct his driver to take them through the park on their way home—it seemed a shame to waste perfectly good sunshine, particularly when the vagaries of English weather only allowed so many such days in any given summer. This done, he turned back to face her. She was wearing a white gown with a pattern of roses done in green, and her face was shielded from the sun by a bonnet with a matching green ribbon. She tilted her head back to look at him, and he realized that, on their previous trips to the park, they’d been side by side —either on horseback, or perched atop his phaeton. He was not used to having to stare at her face as they rode. Her cheeks were a bit pink, undoubtedly from the warmth of the day, and a single strand of blond hair had come loose, clinging to her temple beneath her bonnet. His hand twitched with the desire to reach out and tuck it behind her ear. Instead, he attempted polite conversation—another of their meaningless chats that touched on none of the things he truly wished to say to her. “Lady Fitzwilliam,” he began, then broke off at seeing a peculiar expression cross her face. “Is something wrong?” She hesitated for a moment, then said, “You ought to call me Sophie. If we are to convince everyone that we are courting, that is. I think we might dispense with the formality.” Sophie. The name he had once spoken so freely, which now felt like a dangerous intimacy. “All right.” He inclined his head, casting around for a topic of conversation. “Evidently Blackford’s sister told Emily she’d seen us out in the phaeton the other day.” Emily had then shared this news with Violet, who had conveyed it to West—with all manner of inquisitive looks and significant pauses—at dinner the night before. “Did she?” Sophie sounded satisfied. “I suppose our plan to be seen together is working, then.” She hesitated, and West frowned, wondering what she was considering. “I was surprised, when you took me out in your phaeton,” she said, after a silence had stretched between them for several moments longer than was polite. He met her eyes. “Oh?” “I wasn’t sure if—I didn’t know if you enjoyed—after Willingham—” She broke off, looking uncomfortable, but she didn’t break his gaze, and he admired her courage in asking the question (or, at least, attempting to); few people mentioned his accident to him directly, and he never raised the topic in conversation himself. The memories were still painful, even as they’d grown less sharp and jagged at the edges with time. “There’s a reason I bought a phaeton, rather than another curricle,” he said. He’d not been in a curricle since that afternoon—he doubted he’d ever climb into one again. Despite their r eputation for a certain appealing danger, phaetons were safer than curricles—not that he’d be racing, in any case. She nodded, and cast her eyes down at her lap, where her hands, carefully encased in white lace gloves, were gripping her paper-wrapped book. “I’ve realized,” she said haltingly, “that I never told you how—how sorry I was. About the accident, I mean. About Willingham.” “But not about your marriage?” he asked, the words coming out a bit sharper than he intended, and Sophie flinched; after a moment he took a slow breath, then pinched the bridge of his nose. More quietly, he said, “I apologize. When would you have had the chance to offer your sympathy, anyway? I seem to remember us taking considerable pains to avoid speaking to each other.” It was true: In the first couple of years of Sophie’s marriage, he had avoided so much as being in the same ballroom as her. Over time, he could manage to nod politely at her from a distance, to offer a word of greeting if they crossed paths directly
and to do otherwise would have been rude, but at first... Well, the West of seven—six—even five years ago had not been a man he was entirely proud of. “You’re right,” she said, looking back up at him now, her brown eyes somber. “But that is not an excuse. And I want you to know how sad I was to learn of his death—to think how much pain it must have caused you.” She glanced sideways as they rolled into the park. He swallowed past an unexpected lump in his throat; he was accustomed to living with this grief and guilt, but not to speaking of it. “I still miss him, every day,” he said quietly. Her brow creased. “I never would have thought otherwise,” she said, reaching out as if to grasp his hand, then thinking better of it, allowing her hand to drift back to her own lap. “I believe Jeremy knows it, too.” Jeremy’s name sat between them, like a gauntlet thrown; West and Sophie had never discussed him, or the events of the previous summer. It had hurt, when West first learned of the affair; now, however, with Jeremy happily married, their liaison having been short-lived, Sophie never having displayed the slightest bit of discomfort in his presence, West could tell that there had been no great feeling in volved on either side. Why, then, did a flicker of jealousy still course through him at the thought of her kissing another man—of her going to bed with him, and having the lazy, meandering conversations that arose in the wake of lovemaking? He held her gaze steadily as he fought against this feeling, and instead tried to focus on her words, which he knew had been intended as a gift. “Jeremy and I have only spoken of the accident once.” It had been about a year afterward; they’d both been the worse for drink, though not so much so that he thought it likely Jeremy had forgotten. “He said he didn’t blame me.” He could not prevent a wry twist of his mouth at these words, something Sophie noted with a frown. “Why should he?” she asked. “No one forced Willingham to get into that curricle—he’d been boasting to anyone who’d listen how fast it was. If you hadn’t challenged him to a race, no doubt someone else would have.” “Or perhaps not. It was a stupid and reckless thing to do, you know— perhaps no one else would have been so foolish.” She set her parcel aside, leaning forward in her seat. “‘Stupid’ and ‘reckless’ are not words I would usually use to describe you.” Without thinking, he reached out to tip her bonnet back slightly, giving him a clearer view of her face. “Well, I was upset that evening,” he said. “I don’t know that I was acting at all how I usually would.” She went still; he frowned, reviewing the words he’d just spoken, wondering what had unsettled her. “You were upset,” she said, very deliberately, “because I told you about your father’s threats to me—and my sister?” Oh. Damn it.
“Sophie,” he said, quietly and with great care, “you are not responsible for anything my father said to you—or for anything to do with how that made me feel. I’d have been more upset, later, if I’d learned you’d k ept that from me.” “Perhaps if I hadn’t told you about his threats that night, though, you wouldn’t have challenged Willingham,” she pressed, her face stricken. “And if I’d spoken to my father more firmly in the first place, he never would have threatened you,” he said firmly. He wondered if she could hear the regret that laced every word. “Besides,” he added, “it’s as you said—Willingham was an idiot about that curricle. He’d have found someone else to race.” Perhaps, if he could convince her of this, he’d eventually manage to convince himself, too. She held his gaze for a long moment, even as they rattled through the park, other riders and carriages flashing past with the occasional greeting from their occupants. West ignored this, though, all of his attention focused on the woman in front of him. Her expression eased somewhat, but she still looked troubled. “I think there is plenty of blame to be shared, if we wish to continue down this route,” she said after a moment with a slightly forced laugh, and it had the desired effect of shattering the odd tension between them. “It is in the past, I suppose, and there’s no use dwelling on it.” West, who had leaned toward her, reclined back in his seat, exhaling slowly. He did not wish her to feel guilty for anything to do with his accident—but why, then, did he equally dislike this feigned lightness to her voice, her attempt to dismiss the history between them? Was it because it served as a reminder that, to her, their history was just that—the past, and nothing more? This was not a question he could ask her, of course. Without breaking eye contact, he said after a moment, “Is the plan still to announce our betrothal at dinner tonight?” And Sophie, after a slight hesitation—an acknowledgment of all that had been said, and all that hadn’t, and the weight of the words that had been spoken —nodded. “I’ve been thinking, though—we’ll need to tell them when we plan to hold the wedding.” West went still. “The wedding.” Sophie blinked. “Yes. As we are betrothed—or we will be, as of this evening? They’ll likely want to know all of our plans.” West frowned, considering. “I don’t think we need to worry about that— they’ll be so caught up in wishing us happy, they won’t think to ask about something as fri volous as the wedding.” Sophie smiled sweetly at him. “If I needed proof that you’ve not spent much time with women in the years we’ve been apart, you have very kindly just provided it.” “Have you been paying attention to my romantic exploits, then?” She faltered. “Of course not,” she said quickly. “It’s none of my concern, whom you spend time with.”
He nodded. “Just as it’s none of my concern that you went to bed with Jeremy for the better part of the Season last year, I presume?” Sophie’s eyes widened, and he immediately wished the words unsaid. “I’m sorry,” he said stiffly. “That was abominably rude.” “It did seem rather out of character,” she agreed, then froze, like someone giving evidence at an inquest who belatedly realized they’d said something incriminating. “Not,” she added, “that I presume to know your character.” Anymore. The word hovered between them, unspoken but somehow thunderously loud as they rattled through Cumberland Gate and back into Mayfair. Whatever streak of madness had provoked him to speak so bluntly apparently still had him in its grip, for he leaned forward, braced his elbows on his knees, looked evenly at her, and said, “If you do not know my character, then no one does.” A long, heavy silence fell before she found her voice at last. “You’ll call for me at seven, then?” And West, not trusting himself to say anything else, merely nodded. West had been pr epared for many reactions to his announcement of his betrothal that evening, but he had not been pr epared for the we eping. He was standing at the dinner table of Lord Julian Belfry and his wife, Emily; he had just informed the assembled group that Sophie had done him the immense honor of agreeing to be his wife; he had proposed a toast; and now, Emily was we eping. This was, he supposed, not entirely surprising, given that she was expecting a baby; expectant mothers were prone to wild fits of emotion, he understood (mercifully not from firsthand experience). Still, it was rather disconcerting. He had no further time to contemplate this, however, because— “West!” His sister-in-law was out of her seat in a flash, and the next thing West knew her arms were around his neck so tightly that he became somewhat concerned for the amount of air flowing to his lungs. “Violet, let the man breathe,” James said after a minute or so of this, and Violet drew back enough for West to see that his brother was grinning like an idiot. James seized him by the shoulder and gave him a rough, back-slapping sort of hug, and West blinked back a strange rush of emotion. It’s not real, he reminded himself. Across the table, Sophie was simultaneously having her hand wrung by her sister Alexandra and being heartily congratulated by Penvale and Jane. Penvale’s sister Diana, meanwhile, was expounding to anyone who would listen—at the moment, merely her husband—that she had known this all along, that the seeds for this union had been planted when she had forced West and Sophie to go on a walk together the previous summer at Jeremy’s country estate.
“Didn’t they go on a walk in spite of your machinations, rather than because of them?” Jeremy pointed out. “Weren’t you trying to convince me to go on a walk with Sophie instead?” “I haven’t the faintest notion of what you are referring to,” she informed him, and then became conveniently deaf to her husband’s voice, joining Jane in her well-wishes. “How did this come about?” Violet asked, clasping her hands like an eager child; she had allowed James to tug her back down into her seat, though she continued to regard West and Sophie as though they were the products of a particularly cherished dream come to life. West shrugged, as if it were not a terribly interesting story at all, and one that certainly did not in volve feigning a romantic attachment in order to trick two of the people in this very room into marrying. “We were able to spend some time together, whilst we were in Cornwall,” he said, with a nod at Penvale and Jane. Jane brightened at this. “Was it when she hit a cricket ball into your—” She broke off, frowning, appearing to belatedly realize that this was not, perhaps, the most appropriate dinner table conversation. Jeremy and James both suffered simultaneous, conveniently timed coughing fits. “I doubt West’s—er—delicate cricket injury was the specific inciting incident for this romance,” Penvale informed his wife solemnly, his mouth fighting a losing battle against a smile. “I don’t know,” Jeremy said thoughtfully, having recovered enough to speak. “It might be an appropriate metaphor for marr—good God.” He broke off abruptly, his face having gone pale. Next to him, Diana removed her hand from beneath the table and smiled serenely. West felt a pang, as he did from time to time in Jeremy’s company, when the fierceness with which he missed David caught him by surprise. Jeremy resembled his brother, and they were only two years apart in age; Jeremy was now older than David had ever been. It was a melancholy, unsettling thought. His gaze flicked across the table, and he saw Sophie regarding him with a faint frown—something of his thoughts must have, somehow, shown on his face. With some effort, he pushed them aside. “In any case,” he said, raising his voice slightly to be heard over the general laughter in the room, “we’ve decided to marry.” It felt a bit anticlimactic, stated so plainly, and he wondered if he should have phrased it in a more grandiose fashion. That was decidedly not his style, however, and would likely cause his brother and friends to conclude he’d suffered some sort of head injury. “Sophie, what did Mama and Papa say?” Alexandra asked. “I haven’t told them yet—West only proposed this evening, you see,” Sophie said, with a quick glance at West to ensure that he had heard and would therefore be sticking to this story. “I am planning to speak to Lord Wexham tomorrow,” West added. Sophie dropped her fork. “Are you?” He frowned at her. “I know that, as you are a widow, we don’t need his permission, but I thought to discuss the matter with him, all the same.” “West, you should come to the picnic with us on Sunday,” Alexandra said, before Sophie could offer any sort of protest. West looked inquiringly at Sophie. “During the spring and summer, when the weather’s fine, my parents like to take the boat down to their Richmond estate and have a picnic every Sunday.” A brief hesitation. “You... you could come with us, this week.” “Could?” Alexandra asked. “He simply must! Oh, Mama will be so delighted
—are you going to tell her tomorrow, then, when you go to dinner? She will be beside herself, you know she always thought—” “Yes, well, she can express her delight to West in person on Sunday,” Sophie said hastily. Alexandra cast a quick glance at Blackford that West could not decipher. “Perhaps we could host a dinner to celebrate?” Violet suggested. “And we could invite all of your sisters, Sophie?” “Even better—why not a betrothal ball?” Emily asked. “Wouldn’t that be lovely? None of us had betrothal balls.” This last was uttered a bit glumly. Her husband looked at her askance. “I’m sorry,” he said mildly. “Whilst I was busy riding to Canterbury and back to procure a special license so that I might marry you in an idyllic pastoral setting, far from your parents’ meddling, was I remiss in not summoning half of London to a cow pasture—” “I beg your pardon?” asked Jeremy, who had been the one to provide said idyllic pastoral setting for Belfry and Emily’s wedding. “—so that they might all dress in their finery and wish us happy?” “No, of course not,” Emily said, pressing a reassuring hand on Belfry’s arm. Something in his expression softened as he gazed down at her. “But now that one of us is getting married properly, with a proper engagement—” “We had a proper engagement!” Jeremy pointed out, gesturing to Diana, sounding more and more indignant by the moment. “I had to wear a bloody waistcoat to my wedding, if you will recall!” “Who could forget?” James muttered. “I just want one of us to have a proper betrothal ball!” Emily burst out, halfrising from her seat; this was so out of character for her that it successfully shocked everyone assembled into a momentary silence. “If none of you object?” she added sweetly, looking angelic as ever. “I’m certain our mama will be delighted to host one,” Alexandra assured Emily, clearly deciding that it was best not to argue with the inexplicable wishes of expectant mothers. The rest of the party appeared relieved when Emily resumed her seat with a pleased smile. “She loves nothing more than an excuse to play hostess, and I’m certain Sophie and West wouldn’t dream of disappointing her,” Alexandra added, turning an inquiring gaze upon the couple in question. “Right?” West flicked a glance across the table at Sophie, who rolled her eyes heavenward but gave a slight nod. “Indeed we would not,” he said to Alexandra. “We would be honored, in fact.” What he was actually thinking, however, was: For a feigned betrothal, this was already starting to feel alarmingly real.