Page 79 of My Deal with the Wrong Duke

Louisa looked at Frederick. His face was earnest, hopeful, arranged into an expression she had seen on him before at card tables, when he had calculated the odds and found them favourable.

She waited for the joy. She had imagined this moment so many times, lying awake in her narrow bed on Curzon Street, staring at the ceiling while the house settled around her. She had pictured his face, his words, the flood of happiness that would pour through her when Frederick Langley finally chose her, when she was no longer the woman men appreciated but never pursued. She had built the daydream across two Seasons, furnishing it carefully: his smile, his laugh, the way he tilted his head when he was listening.

To her mild surprise, it did not come.

What came instead was Oliver’s voice in a park, low and certain: You deserve to be noticed without having to hide in the background. Oliver crouching beside a small painting hung too low for anyone to see, looking up at her and saying, Some things are positioned badly. That does not diminish their worth. Oliver’s hand at her waist during the waltz at Lady Acker’s ball. Oliver in the library at Ashford House, his fingers on her jaw, the word slowly falling from his mouth before he kissed.

She closed her eyes. When at last she opened them. Frederick was waiting, the ring held between his fingers, his eyes expectantly on her.

Oliver had walked away, however, and the fond memories would not change that. Frederick stood before her. Frederick, who was real, who was here, who had crossed a garden to ask her a question she had once believed would make her the happiest woman in London.

“Yes,” she said at last, trying her best to sound overjoyed. “I will marry you.”

He took her hand and slid the ring onto her finger. She looked at the sapphire.

“You have made me the happiest man in England,” he said, and kissed her knuckles.

His lips were brief against her glove. She smiled. After all, she supposed, that was what a woman did when a good man offered her the life she had once prayed for.

He took her arm, and they walked back toward the party together.

Lady Caldwell saw them first. Her hand flew to her mouth. Mrs. Fenton grasped Lady Caldwell’s elbow, and Lord Ashton raised his glass from the refreshment table.

“Congratulations!” Lady Caldwell crossed the lawn at a pace no one would have believed possible in heeled slippers. “Oh, my dear girl! How wonderful!”

Frederick’s hand tightened on Louisa’s arm. His pride was visible, radiant, a man standing in full view of his peers, certain of the world’s approval and warming himself against it from every direction.

Louisa smiled. She accepted the congratulations. She allowed Lady Caldwell to embrace her and Mrs. Fenton to clasp her hand and Lord Ashton to declare that the occasion called for champagne.

Eleanor did not approach. She met Louisa’s eyes across the lawn, and the look that passed between them was long and quiet and held no celebration at all.

Frederick leaned close. “Are you happy, my darling?”

“Immensely,” she said at once. She ignored the small part of her heart that accused her of telling a lie she would have to learn to swallow every morning for the rest of her life.

CHAPTER 24

“The Countess of Hargrove has sent a card.”

Her mother held it aloft between two fingers, reverently. She set it on the breakfast table beside two others that had arrived in the morning post.

“We have never received a card from the Countess of Hargrove,” her mother continued. “Not in three Seasons. Not once. And now here it is. Look!”

Louisa reached for the teapot. The sapphire caught the morning light and threw a faint blue spark across the tablecloth. She poured without looking at it.

“Lady Cresswell’s luncheon on Thursday. Mrs. Ansell’s afternoon tea on Saturday. And the Countess.” Her mother arranged the three cards in a row and studied them as a general might study a map of favourable terrain. “I shall write acceptances for all three. You will need a new spencer for Thursday. The green one has been seen twice, and Lady Cresswell will most certainly notice.”

“The green one is perfectly serviceable, Mama.”

“Serviceable is not what an engaged woman wears to Lady Cresswell’s table.” Her mother rose from her chair and gathered the cards against her chest. “People will be watching you now, Louisa. You must give them a reason to keep looking.”

She left the room humming. Louisa picked up the nearest card and turned it over. The Countess’s hand was elegant, the ink still faintly glossy. Warmest congratulations on your engagement. We look forward to welcoming you. Three Seasons of invisibility, undone by a sapphire ring and the right man’s surname.

She set the card down with a sigh.

The knocker sounded at half past four that afternoon. Louisa was in the parlor rereading a passage from Guizot’s treatise on rural education when the maid showed Frederick in. She closed the book and slid it beneath a cushion before he reached the doorway.

“Good afternoon.” He crossed to her and bent to kiss her hand. His lips were brief against her glove. “You look well.”