Page 4 of Rescued from Betrayal
Melior detested it when Edith called her Mellie. It sounded so childish. She’d asked her repeatedly not to, but her friend continued to use the distasteful nickname whenever she disagreed with Melior’s behavior.
Agatha spoke up. “I do not blame you, Melior. My mother says Mr. Fairchild is a rake.”
“And you always listen to everything your mother says, don’t you, Aggie?” Edith lifted her chin and Agatha lowered her eyes to the floor.
Edith was in one of her moods again. Whenever the evening did not go as she wished, she would resort to using snide remarks and terrible pet names. Poor Agatha never knew how to handle Edith’s underhanded comments, so Melior tried to deflect Edith’s irritation away from her friend.
Melior gave Agatha’s arm an encouraging squeeze. “My father says the same, Agatha, and while I can appreciate a rake every now and then”—she cast Edith a knowing look, and the other girl smirked— “Mr. Fairchild and I would never suit.”
Mentioning their secret kissing conquests always did put Edith in a better mood, but this time her smile faded quickly.
“Not good enough for you, is he?”
“Hardly. My father will be the duke someday. I cannot take a chance on a man only bound for an earldom by supposition. His uncle could still possibly father a son in the future and then where would I be? No, best to set my sights higher.”
Edith flicked open her fan and began waving it beneath her nose. Perhaps the smell of sweaty bodies was getting to her, for her eyes appeared hooded above her fan.
A murmur rippled through the room causing Melior to peer at the dance floor. Her heart nearly stopped. Uncle Percy was leading Lady Jillian to the floor… for a third dance.
Melior made eye contact with her mother who looked positively panicked. When her brow slammed down over her blue-grey eyes, Melior swallowed.Not here. Please not here.
Her father swooped in to save them all from what could have been a social disaster, directing her mother out the door before anyone saw her fury.
“Then again,” Edith said close to her ear, “your uncle may also have a son in the near future. Maybe you should not be so particular on your dancing partners,Mellie.”
Chapter 2
The maid bustled about, organizing the dressing table and gathering Melior’s gown and underthings.
If only she would hurry up and leave. Melior had been strapped into stays and traipsed around a ballroom all night. She was ready to rest.
“Would you like me to turn down your covers, miss?”
“Yes.” Not really. She wanted the maid to go so she could retrieve the things hidden in the intricately carved box she kept beside her bed, but the young woman kept gathering and straightening.
“There you are, miss,” Jones said when she was finished.
“Thank you, Jones.”
“Anything else I could get for you?”
“No, you have done very well.”
The maid smiled at the compliment and bobbing a curtsy finally left through the servants’ door connected to the room. Melior let out a long slow breath, dropped her perfectly straight posture and rushed to the side table. She pulled a key out fromunder her mattress and unlocked the box Uncle Percy had gifted her. A burst of happiness bubbled up from her core as she retrieved her latest book and a pair of spectacles.
If her friends, or any of London for that matter, knew that she wore the horrid lenses, her image of perfection would be ruined. And while she strove for the superiority her mother had insisted on from her birth, she had one giant flaw. She was a bluestocking to her core.
Lord Byron’s poems were just one of many books she read late into the night after dismissing her maid—or early in the morning as was the case right now.
She glanced at her time piece. Four a.m. She could get in an hour of reading and still sleep enough to be up by noon. It was Sunday after all, and no one would be expecting her to have at-home hours.
Snuggling under her fluffy covers, she opened the book and slipped her spectacles on. Magical letters formed on the pages and she smiled. This was the one time of day she could fully relax and dream.
She began reading.
The kiss, dear maid! thy lips has left
Shall never part from mine
