Page 18 of As the Earl Likes
How could she have forgotten the rogue rules? Her new friends had created a list of rules for avoiding rogues so that none of them fell prey to scoundrels who would either ruin them or break their hearts—or both, which had been the case for one of them.
The ruin of Pandora Barclay by the Earl of Banemore had prompted them to make the rules in the first place. And so far, three of the friends had fallen for rogues in spite of them. Although, Jo wasn’t sure if Tamsin’s husband qualified as a rogue. He possessed a somewhat surly nature, but Jo could see the warmth beneath his hard exterior. She could not, however, detect even a hint of roguishness about him. Tamsin assured her it was there—buried deep inside him.
As they walked to the library, Jo ran through the rules in her mind:
Never be alone with a rogue.
Never flirt with a rogue.
Never give a rogue a chance.
Never doubt a rogue’s reputation.
Never believe a rogue’s pledge of love or devotion.
Never trust a rogue to change.
Never allow a rogue to see your heart.
Ruin the rogue before he can ruin you.
Jo had already broken several of those, and not with Sheff. Did that mean she characterized her former lovers, of which there had been exactly two, as rogues? They were perhaps roguish, but they were not notorious for their behavior as Sheff was.
And she’d broken two of the rogue rules with him. They’d definitely flirted, even if it was just silliness between them, and she’d been alone with him when they’d gone to take care of his father last night. Actually, since his father had been there, they hadn’t really been alone. But they had been alone that afternoon in her sitting room briefly, before she’d taken him to walk outside. And while they weren’t alone on a busy street, they also hadn’t had a chaperone, which was probably the spirit behind the rule.
All that aside, she not only had to convince her friends that she’d fallen in love with Sheff, but that she’d fallen in love with a rogue. She glanced at Min and knew that convincing her would be the hardest.
As much as Jo wanted to try the whisky, she ought to have gone home. Now she was going to have to spend time acting just different enough so that her impending betrothal would not seem as though it had come from nowhere.
Perhaps she’d just remain quiet and drink several glasses.
They sat at a table near the center of the room. Several other tables were occupied.
“It seems as though there are quite a few ladies here,” Tamsin observed.
“Refugees,” Ellis said with a smirk.
“Can you blame them?” Min asked. “Rather, can you blame us?” She looked toward Jo with a commiserative chuckle.
In that moment, Jo realized she’d already somehow crossed into the land of make-believe. Since when did she go to balls and sit with her good friends, the daughter of a duke and a baroness? There was also the viscountess, who was not present, not to mention the duchess whom Jo had met at Gwen’s wedding celebration dinner earlier in the week. That was where she’d met the ruined member of their group, Pandora, who was visiting her sister and newborn nephew for a time but not participating in Society.
Why was Jo participating in Society? She’d floated around the periphery in her father’s company and at various literary salons, but a Phoenix Club ball was another level. And she was about to climb even higher. She ought to feel a sense of dread, but if she were honest, there was a faint sense of anticipation. To be able to move amid Society would give her entrée to all the salons and access to even more artistic and scientific minds. But would she be welcome?
A sense of unease grasped at her throat. When the footwoman arrived, she barely managed to ask for the Highland whisky.
“All right, Jo?” Ellis, who’d also requested the whisky, asked.
Jo summoned a smile. “Just parched.”
Again, Min sent Jo a look of mild suspicion. How on earth was Jo ever going to fool her?
Sheff departed his coach in front of Lord Gerard’s fine stucco-faced terrace in Portman Square. The front door was ajar, and the sounds of music and conversation drifted out into the cool spring night.
After informing his coachman that he wouldn’t be terribly long, Sheff went to the partially open door. He stood there a brief moment before it swept wide open, and a liveried footman admitted him. The footman closed the door firmly behind Sheff.
Unsure how to proceed—Sheff was, after all, invading a soiree to which he hadn’t been invited—he handed his card to the footman.
“Shefford?” Mrs. Ackley-Dewitt, a widow in her late thirties, approached him from the staircase hall with a surprised smile. “I didn’t know you attended Gerard’s parties.”
