Chapter 2 #2
Clara tried to extricate herself, but Crispin only shifted his grip, turning her so that she fit neatly against his side. She stiffened, her lips forming the most insincere smile he had ever seen. He would have laughed, had it not ruined the tableau.
“My darling boy!” Lady Oakford gushed, hands fluttering to her chest. “I had no idea you were courting!” Her eyes, sharp as owls, swept over Clara’s mussed hair and high color. “What restraint you have shown to keep it so private.”
“Indeed,” Lady Shipley echoed, relief and suspicion warring on her features. “We are…overjoyed, are we not, Clara?”
“Utterly,” Clara managed, her voice so strangled that Alice had to cover her mouth to hide a laugh.
Lady Shipley blinked rapidly, as though still processing the evening’s events. “I had no idea the two of you were acquainted, much less...”
“Surprises make life worth living, Mother,” Clara interrupted, laying a hand on Crispin’s arm with such stiffness it might have been carved from marble.
Lady Oakford waved her fan. “Oh, but it is exactly as I predicted. I told you, Lady Shipley, that once Crispin set his mind to a lady, the outcome was inevitable.” She cast her son a look of fond exasperation. “He was always so determined, even as a child.”
Crispin offered a shallow bow, his smile betraying more mischief than modesty. “You know me too well, Mother.”
The other women crowded closer, their eagerness a testament to the weight such public approval carried—being seen as affianced, especially by someone of Oakford’s standing, could turn the tide of an entire Season.
Alice leaned in with open delight. “It is a shame you did not tell us, Clara. We might have planned a proper celebration instead of forcing your intended to snatch you from the ballroom like a pirate.”
Eden seemed lost for words. Her mouth formed a perfect “O” before she snapped it shut. Blackstone observed the proceedings with narrowed green eyes.
Lady Oakford clasped Clara’s hands. “When did you know, my dear?” she demanded, eyes agleam. “Was it love at first sight? Or did Crispin’s charm require more time to wear you down?”
Clara, desperate, looked to her mother, who offered no rescue. “I suppose I have always admired Lord Oakford’s…spirit,” she said, the words choking her.
“A spirited match is best,” Lady Oakford pronounced. “Far better than a tame one, I always say. My own husband, rest his soul, was the same. Never a dull moment.”
“Mother,” Crispin interjected, “perhaps Lady Clara and I could have a moment to ourselves before we return to the ballroom?”
“Oh, nonsense,” said Lady Shipley. “There will be time for all manner of moments after the ball. The Duke of Winfield is eager to present you as the couple of the Season.”
Crispin hid a sigh. The ton’s hunger for fresh gossip was insatiable, and now they were the latest on dit. “Of course,” he said, making a show of glancing fondly at Clara. “We would not wish to disappoint.”
Lady Oakford pressed on, eyes agleam with excitement. “We must speak at once of wedding plans. Oakford House is ideal for an intimate gathering, but the country estate has a ballroom that is the height of romance. Of course you will marry at St. George’s. What do you think, Crispin? Lady Clara?”
He looked at Clara, half-expecting her to faint.
She did not. Instead, she gave a tight nod, never breaking character.
Her spine remained straight, but her knuckles had whitened where she clutched her fan, betraying the toll of restraint behind her composed mask.
There was, he realized, something ferocious in her willingness to endure.
Alice elbowed Eden, who rolled her eyes heavenward. “We shall have to plan the trousseau,” Alice said with an impish grin, “and the betrothal ball, and…oh, do say you will let us choose the colors, Clara!”
Clara smiled, the kind of smile that held steady under scrutiny but cracked at the edges for anyone looking too closely. “Of course, Alice. I could not imagine anyone more suited to the task.”
Blackstone spoke, voice pitched low but carrying. “Congratulations, Oakford. You have done the impossible. Caught a woman as clever as yourself. You do know you are playing with fire?”
Crispin pulled Clara closer. “That has always been my favorite pastime.”
He felt Clara’s shoulders tense under his hold.
It was all there. The mothers’ delight, the friends’ disbelief, the certain knowledge that tomorrow’s breakfast tables would hum with nothing but their names.
He wondered, as the crowd funneled them back toward the light and the music, whether Clara would ever forgive him for setting this in motion, or whether deep down, she would relish the farce as much as he did.
Either way, he had won the evening. And tomorrow, the world would belong to them both, whether they wanted it or not.
By midnight, the flood of well-wishers had become overwhelming.
Clara, lightheaded with exhaustion, clung to her role with desperate precision—her smile fixed, jaw clenched, and eyes wide with effort.
The crush of perfume, clinking glasses, and the shimmer of chandeliers blurred around her.
Even Crispin, master of composure, felt a twinge of sympathy as the night pressed on and even the hardiest matrons began to wilt.
It was Clara who broke first. She excused herself from a clutch of dowagers with the claim of a crushing headache.
The words were delivered in a voice that, to the untrained ear, sounded meek and apologetic.
To Crispin, it was the voice of a woman at the very end of her rope, using etiquette as a weapon rather than a shield.
He trailed her to the ladies’ retiring room, stopping just outside the door. Lady Shipley hovered like an anxious sentry as Clara pressed two fingers to her temple and mustered a faint smile for her mother.
“I do apologize, Mother. I am quite overwhelmed.”
Lady Shipley made soothing noises and summoned a maid with a snap of her fan. “The carriage at once.” She turned to Clara. “I will go make our excuses.”
“Thank you, Mother,” Clara said.
Crispin slipped into the room, then offered a half-bow. “Lady Clara, if I might?—”
She turned, revealing a flicker of weariness in her eyes and the tremble of her mouth, as if the weight of the night had finally cracked her resolve. “Lord Oakford,” she said, a warning tucked into the syllables. “This is the ladies’ retiring room. You are not welcome here.”
He stepped closer, lowering his voice. “You acted with remarkable poise this evening. Most would have fainted dead away.”
“I considered it,” she said, too tired for further venom. “But it would have given you an easy victory.”
He grinned. “I much prefer you conscious, Lady Clara. Otherwise, the game is dull.”
She shook her head, her lips tugging into a reluctant smile despite herself. “You are a menace.”
“Tomorrow, then?” he ventured. “Perhaps I might call on you and your mother at ten?”
But before she could answer, Lady Oakford appeared, trailed by Alice, Eden, Lady Shipley, and a conspiratorial hush.
“Nonsense, Crispin. Lady Clara needs her rest. We shall have them to tea at Oakford House at four, when she is well rested. I insist.” She patted Clara’s arm with an intimacy that brooked no argument.
Lady Shipley nodded. A delighted sparkle lit her eyes. “We would be honored.”
Crispin caught the flicker of gratitude in Clara’s gaze.
She had gained half a day’s reprieve, yes, but more than that, she had steered the situation in her favor.
He saw it now. She was not floundering. She was maneuvering, calculating the battlefield with every smile and curtsy. It was not surrender. It was strategy.
The mothers conferred while Alice and Eden closed in on Clara, their voices low. Eden said something about “never having seen her so brazen,” and Alice promised a detailed inquisition once she was recovered.
Clara gave her friends an impish grin. “I will explain everything later.”
“You had better,” Alice warned, voice low.
Clara endured it with a soldier’s stoicism, then allowed herself to be bundled out the side door by her mother.
He watched them go, her presence lingering like the aftertaste of a sharp, sweet liqueur—unexpected, heady, and tinged with the burn of unresolved tension.
The taste lingered, not on his lips, but somewhere deeper, unsettlingly close to his heart.
He would see her again soon. There would be teas and dinners and endless games of polite warfare.
And beneath it all, the slow simmer of something far more dangerous than scandal.
He could not wait.
Crispin turned back toward the ballroom, a faint smile curving his lips as he surveyed the elegant wreckage he had left behind. The ton would feed on this for weeks, but he alone knew the true delight lay ahead.
He smiled, wicked and self-assured, and disappeared into the shadows of the corridor.