Page 38 of Guilty Pleasures

“Nonsense!” Mrs. Bennington said. “Both of you will do very well.”

Daphne saw the shop assistant was waiting patiently nearby with the pink gown in her hands, and she added, “Forgive me, but I cannot wait another moment to try on that lovely dress.”

She left the other two women and followed the assistant to the back of the shop. She could not remember feeling more excited about something as simple as a piece of clothing.

The patterned hem of the skirt had barely settled at her ankles before she knew she had been right. She stared at herself in the glass as the shop assistant began doing the buttons up her back, and something came over her, something so intoxicating that she felt as if she were the most beautiful woman in the world. As the assistant began pinning where the dress needed adjustments, Daphne looked at herself, and for once, she did not see a plain, unnoticeable woman who wore glasses and faded into the background. She felt beautiful, and the feeling came from the inside out. How a froth of rose-pink silk could create that sort of strange, instant alchemy was a mystery, but she did not need to know how.

An impatient knock followed her thoughts. “Does it fit?” Elizabeth asked from the other side of the door. “Do show me.”

Daphne padded over to the door in her stockinged feet, and Elizabeth’s reaction when she opened the door was all she could have hoped for. “You look lovely!” the girl declared as she entered the small room and closed the door behind her. “I knew it would suit your coloring and your figure. You are going to take it, are you not?”

“I am.”

“It does look ever so nice on you, miss,” the assistant said, coming up behind her to take the gown in a bit at her waist. “The bodice needs a gusset under each arm, for it is a bit tight there, and the waist is too loose, but with that and a few other little adjustments, it will fit as if it had been made for you.”

A voice behind Elizabeth called her name. She opened the door and looked back down the hallway to the shop. “Oh, that is Anne calling me,” she said, and came back inside the fitting room. “I suppose she and Mama are ready to return home, so I must go.”

Elizabeth grasped Daphne’s hands and gave them a quick squeeze. “I cannot wait until you come to tea, and you shall tell us all about Abyssinia, and everywhere else you have been, but especially, you must tell us about the duke. He is so handsome, and so tall. Rather like a prince in a story, I think. And a duke is very nearly a prince, is he not?”

Before she could reply, Elizabeth was slipping out the door to join her sister. Daphne leaned out through the open doorway and watched her new young friend walk away down the corridor to the front of the shop. “Yes, I thought he was a prince once, too,” she murmured under her breath. “But taken all in all, he is just a man.”

She stepped back inside the dressing room and closed the door. The assistant began to unfasten the hooks down the back of the gown, but Daphne stopped her. “No, not yet. I want to wear it a minute longer.”

The assistant met her gaze in the mirror with a knowing smile, then stepped away, and Daphne returned her attention to her reflection in the glass, savoring again that feeling of exhilaration, a sensation as heady and potent as drinking champagne. Right now, at this moment, she felt like the most beautiful woman in the world, a far more delightful thing than dreaming of a fantasy prince. Daphne hugged herself, and she couldn’t stop smiling. A pretty dress was a wonderful thing.

Chapter 14

Some peers were of the opinion that their rank made them gentlemen, but Anthony had always felt that being a true gentleman required honor as well as fortune of birth. He had offered to teach Miss Wade to dance in exchange for more of her time, and he had assured her that he would carry out that instruction to the best of his ability. He intended to keep strictly to his word, though she was beginning to test his honor in a very dangerous way.

He had told both her and himself he wanted that apron off of her because it was so damned ugly, but the truth was far less honorable. He wanted to look at her without it, envision again the figure he had discovered hiding beneath its stiff canvas protection that day in the rain.

He had been right about that thing. She wore it like a chastity belt, and with that body, she had good reason to need it. Standing so close to her last night, with his hands in her hair, it had taken everything he had not to lower his hands to far more intimate places. Her first dance lesson, and her tutor was imagining the oldest dance of all.

This morning, as he made his daily tour about the estate, just thinking of last night was enough to make him burn.

Anthony brought Defiance to a halt beside the lake, and the groom who rode with him paused a respectful distance away.

It was a glorious afternoon, pleasantly warm, though the chestnuts, elms, and oaks were showing the full glory of their autumn color. But he barely noticed. As his gelding took a drink, Anthony closed his eyes and allowed himself the indulgence of a bit of harmless imagining, in which a pair of long, shapely legs played a very significant role.

When he opened his eyes, Anthony found that Defiance had finished quenching his thirst. He pulled on the reins, starting to turn the horse around, intending to head toward the farm, but as he lifted his gaze above the water to the folly on top of the grass-covered knoll opposite, something caught his attention and he stopped again.

Sitting in front of the folly, shaded by a huge chestnut tree, was the woman who had been occupying his thoughts all morning. She was seated on a blanket spread across the grass, a large picnic basket on one side of her, and her discarded straw bonnet on the other.

Anthony gestured to the groom to follow him and spurred Defiance to a canter around the lake and up the hill toward the folly.

Like all the other garden ornaments of the estate, the folly had been designed by Capability Brown fifty years earlier for the ninth Duke of Tremore, Anthony’s grandfather. It had been given the grand name Temple of Apollo, but it was simply a small, round structure of curved limestone blocks capped with a dome and surrounded by decorative columns and faux Roman statues.

She looked up at the sound of their approach. “What a lovely place this is!” she called out as both men halted their horses about ten yards from her and dismounted.

Anthony handed the reins of his gelding over to the groom. “Wait here,” he ordered, and turned away to join Miss Wade.

“Thank you for the compliment to my estate,” he said, walking over to where she sat and coming to a halt at the edge of the blanket. He bowed to her, then clasped his hands behind his back and turned his head slightly to look at the sketchbook on her lap. On the top sheet of drawing paper was a half-completed image in charcoal of the lake, gardens, and fountains below, with Tremore Hall in the distance. “I see you have come to sketch the view.”

“Who could not?” She gestured to the basket beside her. “I also have a picnic. Would you care to join me?” She moved her hat out of the way for him to sit down beside her. “Your cook is generous with your larder, and I have far too much for one person.”

He remained standing. “Are you certain you want me to do so? After all,” he added softly, “you do not like me. Remember?”

“If you are still waiting for that apology, you can just go away,” she answered with spirit. “If you are prepared to be nice, you may stay.”

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