Page 31 of A Foolish Flirtation

Jeremy eyed his son suspiciously, but Teddy gazed back, his eyes wide and innocent. Experience had taught him this was when to be most on his guard where his son was concerned.

“Lord and Lady Faris will receive their guests through here,” they heard a voice announce portentously, and the doors were thrown wide. The string quartet set up in the far corner struck up a tune.

Truth be told there were only about forty guests, so it was far from a large affair. Fulsham’s sisters were the most amiable for they were thrilled to have been invited. In Bath for their mother’s health, they had not expected a wedding to brighten their stay.

One of them was not even out yet and the other only twenty-one. They were in raptures over Emmeline’s embroidered veil and quite convinced that April was the finest month of all for weddings, despite the ever-present threat of rain.

“I hope I meet someone in my first season that never forgets me,” Miss Dorothea confided as she sighed over Emmeline’s engagement ring. “I hope you do not mind, but Lawrence told us all about it.” She sent a fleeting glance at her brother.

“We thought it was wonderful,” her older sister added quickly when Emmeline looked startled by this remark. “How you ran into one another again in Bath a decade later and reignited old flames.”

“Oh, er, quite,” Emmeline replied in a strangled voice.

“How could I ever forget her?” Jeremy asked, his eye on Emmeline’s flushed profile.

“Oh look, Amabel!” Miss Dorothea exclaimed. “The wedding band also has stones set directly into the gold band.”

The sisters bent over Emmeline’s hand. “A diamond, a sapphire, and another diamond,” puzzled Miss Amabel. “Is there a special significance, my lord?”

“Sapphires signify love, or so my jeweler informed me, and diamonds forever,” he supplied.

“Ohhhh,” the young ladies caroled.

After they had moved along, shepherded by their brother, it was the Arbuthnots’ turn to felicitate them. “Ah, here you are,” Jeremy greeted them. “So glad you could make it. It just would not have been the same without Mrs. Arbuthnot in attendance, after she was so instrumental in bringing the two of us back together.” He passed a proprietary arm about his bride.

Mr. Arbuthnot seemed surprised by this news. “Is that so, Lily?” he asked, turning to his wife.

Lily’s fixed smile looked as though it pained her by this point. “It was nothing, really,” she said shrilly.

“I assure you it is true,” Jeremy continued heartily. “If not for our kind benefactress here, I would never have dreamed that my Emmeline was in the vicinity and, lucky for me, still unwed.”

“Well, you’ve remedied that situation, by Jove!” Arbuthnot said and laughed jovially. His wife gripped his arm so tightly he winced. “Well, congratulations,” he added lamely, and they moved along the line to be quizzed by Teddy on why their son had not accompanied them.

Next up was Jeremy’s godmother, who was still stiff with affront that the wedding had not taken place in London. She offered her best wishes without thawing and the only time she cracked a smile was when informing him with malicious glee that she had told Lady Tipton she was attending the ceremony today.

“Is she still in London?” he asked breezily. “I would have thought family matters might have taken her to the Continent.”

Lady Wickford’s eyes gleamed with appreciation. “I believe she has sent her sister to try and mitigate matters there,” she said before moving off. Jeremy shot a quick look at Emmeline, but she did not appear to be attending.

Luckily the line of well-wishers was not very long, and the next dozen or so passed along without incident. Then Jeremy heard Emmeline draw in a quick breath.

“Ah, Mrs. Laverdale,” he greeted the lady as she gave her curtsey. She took great pains to explain she had recently remarried and was accompanied by her new husband, a Major Smith. Presumably the woman had a thing for military men. Introductions were made all around.

Smith looked like a bounder of the first order with his huge sideburns and air of forced gaiety. Jeremy was not sure if it was Emmeline’s decolletage he was ogling or her pearls. “Still not sure how it is you all know each other,” Smith admitted after giving his bow. “Not related, the wife tells me.”

“No,” Jeremy answered firmly. “Most assuredly not. You see, your wife was entrusted by the late Mr. Ballentine to oversee my wife’s introduction to polite society. Ensure she was not exposed to any undesirable elements, that sort of thing.”

Major Smith gave a gusty laugh. “That’s a good one, Mariah!” he joked. “Hard to imagine you in the role of protectress. I expect you were off flirting when you should have been standing guard!”

Mrs. Smith née Laverdale forced a rather mirthless laugh. “I was little more than a girl myself at the time,” she insisted, though to Jeremy’s reckoning she must have been at least thirty. “Little did I know that I would attend Miss Ballentine’s wedding ten years later,” she said, sending a fleeting glance Emmeline’s way. “I hardly dreamed…” Her words trailed off. “Well, how could I?”

“This must be quite a trip down memory lane for you, seeing the two of us together again,” Jeremy said, reaching across to brush a wayward lock of hair from Emmeline’s face. “Quite like old times, is it not?”

“As you say, my lord,” Mrs. Smith agreed after an awkward pause. “You were always sure to, well, pay your little attentions to Miss Ballentine, as it were.”

Jeremy’s smile broadened. “I certainly was,” he agreed. “I’m sure you were not the only one to notice my partiality.”

“Of course, if I had realized the serious nature of them, I would have encouraged them at the time,” she replied defensively.