Chapter Eighteen
The scandal did hit the front pages of the gossip rags, but not quite as Gideon had expected.
Jasmine was not going to be pleased with the result, for the story unfolded just as Berry had predicted: Gideon was made to be the hero who rescued her and Lord Berwick, never mind that it was Homer Barrow who was the true hero.
But a jowly Bow Street Runner who was an old, happily married man did not sell papers. Gideon was deemed the hero because the ladies thought him to be a very handsome bachelor and readily believed he was a valiant knight.
They were in raptures upon learning that Berry had fallen in love with him. Since everyone adored her, both the morning editions and the afternoon extra editions sold out when it was reported Gideon had also fallen in love with her and proposed marriage.
Are wedding bells about to chime for one of the ladies on Duchess Square? was the latest story.
No one raised an outcry when the gossip rags printed confirmation the following day that Lord Berwick had given his blessing to their union.
A fairy tale, one paper wrote.
A love story for the ages, said another.
Everyone had been swept away by the romance of it.
The fuss was still going on three weeks later, and Gideon gave silent thanks every one of those twenty-one days that Berry and Lord Berwick had survived the incident and were now recovered.
He climbed down from his carriage as it drew up in front of Berry’s residence on the now-quiet Duchess Square. She was hosting the Ladies Tea Society meeting in her home.
He could understand the need to hold it here in the first week after her abduction.
Berry had been in delicate health, and the only trip Dr. Farthingale would allow her to take was the one home after she had spent two days in his bed.
Two glorious and yet agonizing days for Gideon, because there she was, clad in nothing but his overly large nightshirt, her golden hair spilling over her shoulders and her smile radiant, but he could do nothing about it.
He shook out of the thought and returned to the present. Gideon strode to her door as the meeting was about to break up. “Good afternoon, Melton.”
“Good afternoon, Mr. Knight. Lady Berry is expecting you.”
He had promised to show her friends the results of all the work done on his new home.
Of course, Suzanna and Gwendolyn Carstairs, as well as Miranda and Gwenys Lawson, had been popping in throughout the renovations and were familiar with the progress.
But the other ladies were keen to see what Berry had designed for him.
They gathered around him when he walked in and followed him out like ducklings all in a row as he led them next door. Berry then led them on a tour of his home.
Upon the tour’s end, Gideon joined them as they stood in his ballroom, oohing and aahing over the chandeliers that had recently been installed.
“How beautiful!” Lady Alice exclaimed, and wished him many years of happiness in his new residence.
Lady Mabel did the same. “Oh, now I must redecorate! Berry, will you help me? What a beautiful job you have done here.”
Berry cast her friend a heartwarming smile. “Of course. It would be my pleasure.”
Maude Harcourt shook her head in dismay. “You will need to spend a fortune on a staff to properly maintain this house, Mr. Knight.”
“He can well afford it,” Miranda intoned. “Be happy for him.”
Maude frowned. “But there’s no furniture yet.”
Berry laughed. “It will take several months before all of it arrives and is put in its proper place.”
“Well, it shall be winter by then, and I shall probably be abed for most of it with a lung infection,” Maude declared.
“That’s looking on the bright side,” Gwenys teased.
“You lucky dog,” Bonham said, joining Gideon once the ladies had returned to Berry’s home to bid their farewells and arrange for their next meeting.
“I know,” Gideon said, surveying a home that had yet to be furnished, just as sourpuss Maude had indicated.
But the rooms were all painted, the chandeliers and sconces were installed, and the dark oak flooring had been laid in every room of the house, save for the kitchen and the entry hall, which were tiled.
The cherry bookshelves in his study and library had been set against the walls and secured. They looked quite splendid as the afternoon sunlight shone upon them and brought out their rich red tones.
All that was needed were books to fill them. He knew Berry would enjoy this task, and intended to ask her to join him when he went to the London booksellers to select the ones to complete what he hoped would be an impressive library.
Berry’s malachite stone, shaped in the form of a star, had become the focal point of his entry hall, the exquisite dark green standing out amid sparkling white tiles.
The hall would look even more magnificent in the evenings, for the malachite seemed to come alive under the amber glow of candlelight.
Of course, this was exactly the effect Berry had hoped for.
“Is Suzanna talking to you yet?” Gideon asked Bonham.
His friend winced. “Not yet, but she is warming up to me. I’m sure she is ready to forgive me.
She’s coming back in a few minutes to help me put the finishing touches on your drainage system.
And I rue the day I ever bothered with your shaft.
How is it my fault an innocent lift system is called the same thing as a man’s vital male organ? ”
Just yesterday, Miranda had explained to Berry and Suzanna the double meaning of the word shaft, over which they were properly horrified and refused to call that shaft mechanism anything but a pulley system.
Then Suzanna overheard Bonham jest with Gideon that Suzanna could pull-ey on his system anytime she wished, which earned him a resounding slap from her.
But Gideon thought it must have all worked out, because as he wandered upstairs twenty minutes later to see how his friend was progressing on the drainage pipes, he came upon Bonham and Suzanna in a heated embrace.
Who else but Bonham would kiss a girl with all his heart and soul beside a commode and sink in a water closet?
Perhaps they were meant for each other. Suzanna did not seem to mind at all.
Well, who was Gideon to pass judgment when he had given Berry her first true kiss not an hour after she had thrown up into his chamber pot four times?
He heard Berry returning after seeing the last of her friends off. “Gideon! Gideon! They all loved your house!”
He hurried downstairs to greet her. “I missed you, love.”
She laughed. “For all of five minutes that I was gone?”
“It was a bit longer than that. Your friends are leaving impaired. It takes at least half an hour to get them to the door once they stand up and declare they must leave. But come with me.” He led her into his study, closed the door for privacy, and then backed her against the wall.
She looked up at him, her eyes sparkling in expectation. “What are we doing in here?”
“Nothing yet, but I am going to kiss the daylights out of you and do not wish to be interrupted.”
She smiled. “That is excellent thinking. I love you, Gideon.”
“I really need to marry you or I am going to expire,” he said as he took her hands in his and gently held them to the wall. He pressed the weight of himself lightly atop her and kissed her breathless.
But for weeks now, all he had done was kiss Berry. The restraint required was agonizing. If it were up to him, they would both be shedding their clothes right now and exploring each other’s bodies as they coupled like wild monkeys. On the floor. Against the wall. Against the bookshelves.
Everything about her ravaged his senses and brought out his primal urges.
However, he had waited this long and would wait until they were husband and wife to complete this union.
Anyway, Berry was still on medical watch and restricted from heavy exertions.
Tonight was the night of Lord Stanhope’s ball and the first time they would be seen together at a ton function since their courtship had become public knowledge. This was the night that would determine whether he truly stood a chance of being accepted by the ton.
He did not care for his sake, for he still had no desire to become one of them. But this was important for Berry and her work on behalf of St. Brigid’s.
Horace made certain Gideon was dressed impeccably in his formal white cravat and coattails when he returned to the Musket Club to prepare for the ball.
Joss, Pudge, Bonham, Henry, and even William, the troubled lad newly sent to him from the orphanage, were there to look him over. He had placed William under Henry’s mentorship now that Henry had truly come into his own.
Saving Berry had changed Henry’s life, given him a sense of pride and an appreciation of his own worth. The incident had brought out his valiant nature, which might have stayed dormant forever had it not been for that fateful night.
There would be no cheap pilfering again. Henry was a reformed young man. He was a hero.
Horace frowned at Gideon when he complained about the stiffness of his collar. “And the cravat is too tight.”
“If you have the breath in your lungs to endlessly gripe at me, then you can manage just fine. Leave it alone,” the irritating lad commanded, and would not let him touch a single fold.
Horace even had the audacity to yell at him when he happened to sit down on his coattails.
“Get up! What are you, a barbarian? You’ll wrinkle the jacket! ”
“Bloody blazes!” Gideon shot to his feet. “Must you fuss? I hired you as a valet, not an alewife.”