Page 62 of To Woo and to Wed
“And perhaps a new gown for your betrothal ball would be in order, too, Sophie,” Violet put in helpfully, and Sophie cast her a look of wounded betrayal.
Alexandra clasped her hands together in delight, and Sophie sighed.
There was a particular kind of torture that came in the form of being trapped in a closed carriage with a woman one had recently bedded, then quarreled with, and West was currently suffering as its victim.
Sophie had sent him a note the previous afternoon, notifying him that her sister had requested their presence at dinner at her house, which was how he found himself here, sitting opposite his supposed fiancée, an uncomfortable silence hovering between them. More than a week had passed since they’d quarreled; he’d seen her at a dinner party and a ball since then, but by unspoken agreement, they’d avoided spending much time alone together, until now, in his silent carriage.
He was not a stranger to these silences—in the past year, as his orbit and Sophie’s had been drawn slowly closer by the tangled web of mutual friends and family that they shared, he’d found himself in her presence more often than he’d wished. But no—that wasn’t entirely true, was it? He was growing tired of lying to himself about what, precisely, he wished where Sophie was concerned. But it had certainly been more often than was wise, and he’d grown used to the awkwardness and weight of the silence that had often descended on these occasions—a stroll through a garden on an estate in Wiltshire; a silent walk through the corridors of Belfry’s theater, where they’d happened to arrive at precisely the same moment. Sophie was better at these moments than he was; for all that he’d been raised the son of a duke, trained to be nothing but gallant at all times, his instincts seemed to abandon him in these encounters, and he often found himself bitinghis tongue, uncertain what to say to her. She, however, always had a polite word about the weather, or a piece of news to share—anything to lighten the mood even a little.
Which was why it was so telling that she was not making the slightest effort to do so this evening. Instead, she was staring fixedly out the window as they rattled through Mayfair, her face looking strained in the light of the carriage’s lamps.
At last, moments before they drew to a halt outside her sister’s house, she glanced at him, her expression unreadable. “We’ll still need to put on a good show for Alexandra.”
He swallowed a wave of bitterness—hehadagreed to this, after all. And any man of sense might have known that his heart would emerge a bit bruised—he could hardly lay the blame for that at her feet, not when this outcome had seemed all but predestined. “Of course,” he said shortly, and reached for his cane as the door opened.
“West! Sophie!” Alexandra called gaily, as soon as they were ushered into the drawing room by a footman. “Won’t you join us for a tipple before dinner?” She took a sip from a small glass of sherry, and Blackford, who was shaking West’s hand, held a glass of brandy.
“We’re a bit informal tonight, as it’s only the four of us,” Blackford said, bowing over Sophie’s hand and inclining his head toward the sideboard along one wall. “Can I tempt you?”
West exchanged a quick glance with Sophie, who shrugged and nodded, and in short order she was sipping a sherry of her own, while West was enjoying a glass of quite excellent brandy.
“We’ll be dining on the terrace,” Alexandra explained, gesturing at the French doors that were flung open to admit a warm breeze, “since we’re so few in numbers, and it’s such a pleasant evening.”
West thought that he and Sophie managed a fairly convincingshow as they sat with their drinks; Alexandra carried much of the conversation with a lengthy anecdote about Lady Wexham’s increasingly elaborate ideas for the betrothal ball she’d be hosting the following week, and soon enough they were seated at a small table on the terrace, illuminated by candles and the clear light of a low-hanging moon.
Once the soup course had been brought out and the wineglasses filled, Alexandra lifted hers. “A toast, perhaps? To second chances.” Her gaze was on her sister as she spoke, wide-eyed and innocent.
West carefully did not look at Sophie as he clinked glasses with the others; for her part, Sophie was quick to find another topic of conversation.
“This soup isdelicious,” she said quickly—a compliment that might have been more convincing, had she waited to actually taste said soup before offering it.
“I did not think you so fond of soup, Soph,” Alexandra said, sounding amused.
“Well,” Sophie said a bit weakly, “it’s so… liquid.”
West looked at her skeptically, which provoked a glare from her in response.
“It has been a long day,” he said smoothly to Alexandra and Blackford. “We went riding on Rotten Row this afternoon”—a lie—“and it was terribly hot. We might have got a bit too much sun.”
He could feel Sophie’s glare, and reflected that she likely did not appreciate his implying that she was suffering from sunstroke, but he ignored her; until she stopped waxing rhapsodic about soup, he was perfectly happy to let the others think she was experiencing a temporary bout of sun-induced insanity. They were English, after all; they could not be expected to function under these conditions.
“Have you gone back to Madame Blanchet for another fitting,Sophie?” Alexandra asked a minute later, her gaze on her sister still mildly concerned. “She did say she’d write when she had something for you to try on.”
“Not yet,” Sophie said cautiously, taking a dainty spoonful of soup. “She wrote yesterday to invite me in for another visit, but I’ve yet to reply.” She paused, her spoon halfway to her mouth. “But wait. Haven’tyoureceived a note? I can’t think why I should have received one and not you.”
Alexandra looked momentarily flustered, but recovered quickly. “Indeed!” she said, perhaps a bit too brightly. “She—er—rushed mine, at my request. I went in a few days ago for another fitting.”
Sophie frowned. “Why should she rush yours and not mine? We’re to be married on the same day.”
“Er,” Alexandra said, “she thought that I might be more challenging to fit. Due to a… feminine complaint.”
The entire table went silent, contemplating the implications of this. Alexandra blushed rosily, apparently belatedly realizing it, too.
“Notthatsort of feminine complaint,” she said hastily. “More of an issue of… er… unusual hip-to-waist ratio.”
“Indeed?” Sophie sounded exceedingly skeptical. “I’ve never heard you complain of any such thing before.”
“Well,” Alexandra said, seeming to fully commit to this mildly unhinged explanation, “I didn’t wish to mention it to you, but my last modiste noted—apparently dresses have been fitting me incorrectly foryearsand no one had thought to mention it.” She offered a trembling lip by way of conveying her wounded dignity. “You cannot imagine how traumatizing it was to receive this information.”
