Chapter Five
Sadly, there is only so long that a lady can pretend to have a megrim before her sister will march into her bedchamber and force her into a gown.
“Ouch!”
“My apologies, but if you keep wriggling like that, I am going to jab you in the head with a pin,” Irene said smoothly.
Jessica glared at her sister in the looking glass. “By accident, I presume?”
“Perhaps?” said Irene with a laugh. “I bet you wish we all had our own lady’s maids, but Wharton can only be spread so thin, I suppose. Come on, you’re all ready. I don’t suppose you are going to tell me why you were hiding up here all of yesterday?”
“And you would suppose right,” said Jessica with a sigh, picking up her gloves and glancing about her toilette table in case she had forgotten anything.
She did not miss the eye roll that her sister gave her silently but decided not to pursue it. After all, it was not as though she could provide much of an explanation. Not one that she was willing to give.
“You wish to be married, I wish to be married, you asked me, and I said yes. That is all there is to it. That is all we need to know.”
Those had been the last words that she had spoken to Lord Llyne, and they had been mortifying in the extreme.
As though it were not bad enough that the man had decided to stay for the entire house party!
As though it were not difficult enough to look into the eyes of a man who had decided, for goodness knew what reason, to marry her.
No, it had all been too much. His attempts to flirt with her, the looks he had exchanged with her parents…
No, Jessica had decided yesterday that it was much easier to plead a headache, and then a megrim, and merely remain in her bedchamber the entire day.
Her family had been concerned, in the main. Her parents had popped their heads in, Irene had banged on her door until Jessica had shouted at her to go away, and there had even been a note from Lord Llyne.
Devastated to hear that you are indisposed. I hope our conversation had nothing to do with it? Llyne.
Jessica had not replied to the note.
What could she say? Yes, your mere presence is overwhelming me. You are so damned attractive, so damned self-assured, and I do not know whether or not to believe a single word you say?
It was not exactly the picture of calm elegance she wished to portray.
But she could not stay up here forever, and the fresh autumn breeze that had blown in overnight was calling to her. Autumn was Jessica’s favorite time of year: the chill in the air brought a renewal after the heavy heat of summer—a sense of relief she just adored.
Besides, Irene had yelled through her door yesterday that a gaggle of Chance cousins would be going hunting today, and she felt in need of a good ride.
“And you are certain you are up to this?” Irene asked, her voice full of concern as Jessica rose from her toilette table and pulled on her riding boots.
“I am sure,” Jessica said shortly.
“It’s just, whenever I have a megrim, the next day I’m—”
“I’m quite well.”
“—absolutely useless. The megrim entirely exhausts me.”
“Irene,” said Jessica with a wry smile, wishing to goodness that her sister was better at taking a hint. “I did not have a megrim.”
Her sister’s mouth dropped open as Jessica picked up her riding crop, swished it through the air with a satisfying whoosh, and started for the door.
It was as she’d stepped through it that her sister’s voice called after her. “Did not have a megrim?”
Jessica sighed as she strolled down the corridor. She should never have told her, but she had been fussing so. “I just needed a day alone.”
“‘Alone’? At a house party?” Irene’s voice was incredulous as she caught up with her sister. “I know you always need time alone, but here, I thought—”
“You thought wrong,” Jessica said shortly as they reached the top of the stairs.
It was maddening. All her life, Jessica had needed time away from people—away from everyone. Friends, family—it did not matter. The world became overwhelming and she could no longer do anything or think anything because the noise in her head was just too much.
That was when she crept away, usually to her bedchamber, and spent a day…doing nothing. It was heaven.
Most of her family had grown accustomed to it now, although Irene of all her siblings found it the oddest. Jessica could understand why.
She and Irene could not have been more different.
Why, if there was a single moment that Irene was not with her best friend, the Duke of Aynor, it was a rare one.
She didn’t know how her sister put up with the lack of solitude.
“Well, I suppose a ride would do you some good,” said Irene with a sigh beside her. “I’m going to wake up Teddy.”
“I don’t think she will want you to.”
“Too bad,” called her sister over her shoulder as she trotted along the corridor. “If you’re not going to stay at the house and talk to me, someone has to.”
Jessica smiled to herself as she watched the retreating back of her sister. They were so different.
“Miss Chance?”
She turned, glancing over the banisters at the person who had called her name—and was relieved that she had the banisters to cling on to.
It was Lord Llyne.
And not the Lord Llyne whom she had previously encountered.
No, when the gentleman had first arrived at Stanphrey Lacey, covered in dust from the road and looking world-weary, he had not looked like that.
When he had dined with the family, he had been wearing the same clothes, though a little cleaner. He had looked handsome, but not…
Not like that.
Jessica stared down with open mouth at the Lord Llyne who was standing nonchalantly in the great hall.
He was attired in the smartest riding clothes she had ever seen.
Clear and striking lines, elegant tailoring, boots that elegantly revealed his strong legs and a coat that was perhaps too tight across the chest. The muscular, broad chest.
His hair was better attired too. The dark curls were casually arranged around his face now, one lilting over his eye, and when Lord Llyne gently shook it away, his entire face looked wry.
Dear Lord.
The man was an Adonis. Surely, he knew it. Surely, he had dressed in such a way merely to point it out.
Jessica’s fingers were trembling on the banister. And what was a gentleman who looked like that doing with a lady who looked… Well, like her?
All thoughts of how the shooting party would assist her in clearing her head were forgotten. No, she could not go—she could not ride alongside that!
“Miss Chance, I am so glad you are joining our party,” said Lord Llyne pleasantly, his eyes raking over her in a similar manner to her own. “I trust you are recovered?”
Oh, she was never going to recover from this.
“‘R-Recovered’?” Jessica croaked.
“Yes,” he said politely. “From your megrim.”
Oh, of course. The megrim she had told everyone she’d had. “Oh. Oh, yes. Much better. Thank you.”
All she had to do was retreat back down the corridor to her bedchamber, and she could hide there. It was hardly the done thing for a daughter of a viscount to hide from her betrothed, but honestly she saw no other choice.
“I am glad to see you dressed for shooting,” said Lord Llyne, his smile friendly. “I had hoped to enjoy the pleasure of your company.”
Oh, blast. Jessica glanced down at her riding habit, the forest green a perfect choice until now. “I… I rather thought I wouldn’t—”
“Right, then. Come on!” Her cousin Samuel, a man so good-looking that it was still a surprise to her that he never seemed to notice, grinned as he strode down the corridor toward her and the head of the stairs.
“If we don’t get out there soon, the beaters will have gotten bored and gone home. Ah, Llyne, you’re joining us?”
“If you’ll have me,” said Lord Llyne with a laugh, inclining his head. “I’ll have to borrow a gun, though.”
“Not a problem, the gun room is this way,” said Samuel as he started down the stairs. “Coming, Jessica?”
Jessica hesitated.
This was a mistake. She was attracted to Lord Llyne, more attracted than she had expected—and she was supposed to be making him attracted to her!
Not that her performance at dinner two nights ago had been that impressive.
Oh, she still cringed painfully every time she thought of the way she had attempted to be coquettish and had only succeeded in confusing the man.
“It is a strange man who would turn up here and request me for his bride.”
She was making a fool of herself, that was all she was doing, and going shooting with Lord Llyne would only increase her chances of being an absolute idiot. No, she should stay. She should remain here, where it was safe.
“Miss Chance?”
Jessica blinked. Lord Llyne had stepped to the bottom of the staircase and was holding out his hand.
Swallowing hard and wishing to goodness the man weren’t so charming, she descended the staircase, hoping with every step that she did not trip. Though if she did, maybe she could fall into Lord Llyne’s arms. His strong, powerful—
“I need you,” Lord Llyne said quietly as he tucked her hand in his arm.
Jessica cleared her throat, but her voice was still hoarse when she spoke. “You… You need me?”
He caught her eye and smiled, and she wanted to melt. “Yes. To show me the way. To the gun room.”
Her shoulders drooped. Do I have to embarrass myself at every possible opportunity? “Of course.”
It took about twenty minutes to get the family shooting party together.
Uncle John and Uncle William were determined to attend, but the latter became distracted when the news that Cousin Thomas’s bride had gone into labor on a sedate country walk—thankfully right beside the Dower House, where she was apparently now preparing for the arrival of her child.
“I’ll just see that they have everything they need!” he called out.