Page 33 of Baron in Check
“She will be there, invited or not,” Rachel mumbled as she pulled Hermy further.
“Your boots, oh-la-la!” Madame Giselle came after them, breathless. “Have I spoken out of turn?” She looked scared and confused.
“Ça ne fait rien, Madame. Merci pour tout et à la prochaine fois.” It doesn’t matter. Thank you for everything, and until next time. Rachel remained polite but rushed. Hermy slipped on her shoes as quickly as she could, and they left.
But it did matter, didn’t it? Rachel was furious in the carriage and called Sofia many nasty things in an impressive array of languages. When they pulled up the carriage, she stormed out of the cabin, and as soon as she entered the Pearler’s elegant foyer, she called, “Fave! Arnold!”
“Why are you so upset?” Hermy suspected it was because she was the fallen girl, and now Rachel’s good name was associated with her return.
“Fave!” Rachel called again as she shrugged off her gloves, and the butler took hers and Hermy’s pelisses. “Arnold!”
Footsteps appeared from the top of the stairs, and two well-built men, one blond and the other dark-haired appeared in cream breeches and white shirts. They held fencing masks in their hands and smiled as they chatted.
When they reached the bottom of the stairs and saw Rachel’s fury-red face, their miens fell.
Fave rushed to her side. “What happened?”
“Sofia was at Madame Giselle’s.”
Arnold’s breath caught in his throat, a strangled sound accompanying the shock that froze his features. “Oh no!” he choked out.
“And Madame Giselle told her that Hermy is marrying Greg.” Rachel wrung her hands, and Fave put his arm around her in support.
“Why is that so bad?” Hermy ventured.
“It’s not bad that you’re marrying Greg, of course. It’s the best thing that ever happened to him,” Fave explained.
“But we need to make sure that it can happen because you gave List fodder for blackmail,” Arnold added.
“I’ll take you home with our carriage, Hermy,” Fave said, and Rachel nodded.
“Perhaps she should stay with us until the wedding?” Rachel spoke to Fave, and when their eye met, it was as if nobody else was in the room.
“Nothing will help with the gossip, Rachel. You know the Ton will make her out to be a mistress if they so wish, whether it’s true or not.” He turned to Hermy. “You are, however, always welcome with us.”
Hermy shook her head in disbelief. “You think that is truly enough to warrant a scandal?”
“We don’t know that List will attack with this news,” Arnold said. “But you have to let Greg know not to let his guard down.”
“I will,” Fave said.
Hermy followed him to the carriage.
The middle game, that critical phase where strategies unfolded and true battles were fought, mirrored her own tangled circumstances. She couldn’t help but feel that her opening moves with Sofia had been less than ideal, setting the stage for a middle game fraught with uncertainty and peril. It was an unsettling realization, acknowledging that initial missteps could lead to a punishing round of maneuvering, where every decisionfelt weighted with consequence. How much of Sofia’s poison was lethal to Hermy’s hope to become Baroness Stone?
CHAPTER 16
The next morning…
“This is not a matter for the groom to witness,” Hermy snapped when Greg informed her that Madame Giselle had once again taken up half his study for her wedding dress fitting.
“You heard Fave last night, there’s danger lurking. We don’t know where the attack will come from.” Greg bent backward to peek into his office.
Madame Giselle waved at him and nodded, ready with the measuring tape around her neck and a pin cushion on her wrist. She’d brought a seamstress with her, too, one of the assistants Hermy had seen at the shop the previous day. She had a room separator in tow. A crate full of fabrics burst open the moment the footman set it down upon carrying it inside.
Hermy crossed her arms. “You’re not supposed to see the bride before the wedding. Can you go somewhere else?”
“I promise, I won’t look.” Greg walked into the room, greeted Madame and her assistant, and picked up a stack of papers from his desk. “See? I have plenty of paperwork.” He waved the stackof papers then sat on the settee next to the window with the chess set.
