Page 6 of The Mistletoe Countess
A laugh nearly shot from him, but he muted it into a cough. “So is it that you don’t enjoy playing or dancing?”
“I’m fond of both, but I’d prefer to do them in a smaller company.” Her grin tipped. “Perhaps even by myself.”
“You enjoy your own company, is it?”
“As an enthusiastic reader, Lord Astley, I’m never really alone.” Her voice lilted with easy kinship. “There are myriad book creations to share my mental space. I’ve danced with princes, and fought a few too. I’ve even swung through the jungles with Tarzan. Breathtaking!” Before he could react to her divergence into fictional raptures, she leaned closer and lowered her voice to a whisper, those sapphire eyes as alive as her sister’s were distant. “Did you know that Mr. Rochester already has a wife and tried to marry Jane anyway?”
He took a mental inventory of the invitation list in search of the scandalous Mr. Rochester without upturning the name, but he’d heard it before. Where? He studied the young woman and the answer emerged, along with a desire to grin. “You’d rather be reading.”
“Wouldn’t you? Or at least having tea and cake with a party of no more than four?” She worried her bottom lip and nodded toward her sister. “I don’t know how Lillias can love these parties so much, and hours on end too.” She sighed, a small smile returning. “But she does look exquisite at the piano, and you should hear her sing. Heaven’s angels and all that.”
He glanced toward his future bride where she sat poised as perfect as any debutante, more beautiful than most. She played the waltz well, commanding attention from the tilt of her chin to the charismatic glint in her eyes. Another rise of caution squeezed his chest, but he stiffened against the uncertainty.Duty over heart.“Indeed.”
“Isn’t she immaculate? Always so poised and in control,” Grace whispered, the woodsy scent of rosemary accompanying her nearness. The fragrance suited her, rather sprite-like. “And she’s brilliant too. Well, if that’s important to you. I realize not all men care about a woman’s brain, but you seem the good sort.”
His smile teased up on one side against his bidding. “Do you say everything that pops into your head, Miss Grace?”
“Oh goodness, not everything.” Her eyes rounded to saucers, but she didn’t lose one step in the dance. “If I said everything, I’d leave many more horrified expressions in my wake. But at times my feelings are so large, they must burst out into words. Don’t you ever have that happen?”
“I cannot think of any particular time.” Except when Celia ruined his family, and not even his strict upbringing controlled him in the wake of his wounds. Another instance of bowing to heart instead of head. “But I do hope I am the good sort, for I believe a wife with a brain is much better than the alternative.”
It took her only a second to recognize his jest, and that infectious laugh of hers bubbled forward without reserve. “Unless you’re writing some Gothic horror novel, and then they provide all sorts of glorious mischief.”
After the stilted reserve of Lillias Ferguson, Miss Grace’s authenticity slipped through his guardedness like wind through spring trees. Of course he needn’t feel as cautious with her. She wasn’t the one to save his estate and restore the honor of the Percy name. Miss Grace, however, would certainly add colorful dialogue when she visited Havensbrooke. His mother would be absolutely appalled.
“I see your brain is in good shape too.” Her chin dipped in assent as if he’d passed some test. “We’re going to get along quite nicely, I believe.”
“I’m pleased to meet with your approval.”
“I have very high standards, Lord Astley.” Her brows darted northward with a playful intensity. “I read fiction.”
He resisted the compulsion to laugh, shocked by its sudden arrival again. “What is it you find so appealing about fiction?”
“Where do I begin? Exploring new places, escaping into history.” She sighed as if her thoughts plundered some previous novel. “I’ve been on treasure hunts, solved mysteries, been captured by pirates, but my favorite stories are romances.”
“Of course you’d choose something as predictable as romance.”
“You say that like it’s second rate.” She wrinkled her nose, a tiny spray of freckles across the bridge momentarily distracting him. “But romance has to be worth something if people throughout all time have spent years, money, risk, and a whole host of daydreams in finding it.”
He studied her, his lips tempted into another grin. Hmm…young but quick-witted and thoughtful. He’d have to reevaluate his initial thoughts on her simplicity. “I stand corrected in my opinion.”
“Though I have to say I’ve never experiencedrealromance.” A rush of pink brought out the glow in her eyes. “Lillias raves about it—all the swooning and pining. She says men rarely think of much else when the conquest of a woman is involved.”
“Does she?” Not a very flattering thought to his general sex. His gaze shot to the pianist. And how would Lillias know? Had she been pining over someone? Did she still?
“But I’d rather keep my head while losing my heart, wouldn’t you?” She continued, oblivious to the utter inappropriateness of her divulge-ment. “A thoughtful romance makes much more sense for a lifetime friendship, even if kisses change things.”
He choked out the words. “Kisses change things?”
“That’s what Lillias says, anyway.” She studied his lips with such intensity, they warmed beneath her perusal. “But I’ve never sorted out how placing one’s mouth on someone else’s could render a person wit-less.” Mercifully, her gaze flitted back to his, no worse for the wear in the irregular turn of their conversation. “I suppose I’ll understand one day.”
He cleared his throat. “Indeed.”
“Oh dear, I’ve gone down the dark road of impropriety again, haven’t I?” Her bottom lip jutted out into a pout. Paired with the kissing talk, he couldn’t seem to pull his attention away fast enough. “I can keep my conversation dull and proper, if I put my mind to it. Truly. And you never need worry about Lillias speaking so scandalously. She’s the very model of decorum.”
Yet what Grace had said about Lillias’s statements lent doubt to how untouched Lillias Ferguson’s heart was, a fact Frederick had to uncover. Failing that, he must find a way to securely transfer her affections to him.
Frederick lowered his head to his hands at the desk in his bedroom and exhaled a shaking breath. This was never meant to be his lot. He was thesecondson—not the bearer of the family’s extensive legacy—but here he sat, shouldering a position that his heart and head felt utterly ill-equipped to bear. He squeezed his eyes closed against a lingering ache.
