Chapter 2
Chapter
Two
“Idon’t know why you took in that terrifying creature,” Lizzie pouts as Alice brushes out her hair. “I would have put it out of its misery.”
Lizzie has far more in common with Aunt Teddy than she realizes.
“Esmeralda is a she, not an it.” My head jerks sideways as Mathilde encounters a frazzled knot. “And she was likely more frightened of you than you were of her. Especially with all your dreadful screaming.”
“Once I have a husband, you can be sure I won’t be sharing my household with a snake.”
I want to make a crude joke, but I am not sure Lizzie would understand it. And it’s not a joke a demure young woman should be making anyway.
Despite our seven-year age gap, Lizzie and I could be twins.
We share the same pale blonde hair, golden-green eyes, and heart-shaped face.
Only a few cosmetic differences separate us—the gap between my front teeth, my unruly hair that cannot decide whether it wants to be waves or curls, and my smattering of freckles from too many days sketching in the sun without a parasol.
Lizzie examines herself in the mirror. “Do you think I have a chance at Favourite?”
“You have as much a chance as anyone, I suppose.”
“I wouldn’t say that,” Lizzie scoffs as Alice slides the final pin into her chignon. “I have a better chance than you, after all.”
I huff out a little laugh, refusing to be stung by Lizzie’s casual cruelty today. Nothing can dampen the joy fizzing through my veins. After tonight, I’ll have George. Why would I care about winning the King’s approval?
I smile into my bodice, dislodging a section of my updo, then yelp as Mathilde yanks my head back to begin her reconstruction.
Lizzie walks to the bed, bracing her hands on the bedpost while Alice tightens her stays. “How did you feel heading into your first Season?”
Our eyes catch in the mirror, and her bottom lip quivers. Despite her bluster, Lizzie is nervous.
Something tightens my chest, an affection she probably doesn’t deserve but I cannot suppress.
I could tell her the truth. That even my first Season was horrid.
That making innocuous small talk week after week, year after year, with the same group of judgmental vultures—none of whom had any real interest in me—not only bored me to tears, but stole a part of my soul.
That the only thing that made last Season bearable was finding someone who wants to share forever with me.
But I know Lizzie well enough to know she doesn’t want that truth.
“Well,” I say, “I imagine I felt similarly to you right now.”
“I very much doubt that.” Lizzie burbles a laugh as Alice maneuvers her into a dusky rose evening gown.
“When have you ever been more than a curiosity? You have no idea the pressure I’m bearing.
If my match falls short of expectations, my reputation will never recover.
If you make any match at all, Bretonnic society will deem it a miracle. ”
So much in common with her mother.
Behind me, Mathilde has won her battle, and a pretty pile of curls sits atop my head. She directs me toward the bedpost while she fetches my stays.
“It will fade,” I assure Lizzie, though heaven knows why I’m still indulging her. “And everyone knows you will make the best match this year. Even if you are not dubbed the Favourite.”
“The title is no guarantee. Who was that woman last year?” Lizzie taps her lip. “The woman who was declared Favourite, but didn’t receive a single offer. What was her name?”
“Jane. Jane—”
“Spencer!” Lizzie finishes before I can.
Yes, I remember Jane Spencer quite well. The petty comfort I’d taken in her humiliation. To be declared the King’s Favourite and still end up alone? I was just as sorry for her as I was grateful; she replaced me as the butt of every between-Season joke.
“I’m not surprised.” Lizzie licks her pinky, then traces the tip along her eyebrow. “She’s quite plain.”
“Lizzie!”
“What?” she asks, the portrait of innocence. “She is. Not even her father’s money can make up for that face.”
“You’re terrible,” I scold.
It’s not true—Jane is lovely. In the right light. I will say, the peerage were shocked when she was chosen. Rumours abound to this day that Lord Spencer paid for his daughter’s title.
“I’ll be surprised if she shows up tonight,” Lizzie prattles. “Though no one seems to want to miss this one. Mother said she’d received more requests for attendance than ever.”
“Why?”
“People are whispering that George Somersby plans to open the Season with a proposal. I tried to pry the information from William, but he’s been stubbornly tight-lipped.”
I suppose if anyone were privy to George’s plans, it would be Lizzie’s brother William. Their relationship is the reason that George and I met, after all. Precisely one year ago, when we were both guests for the Season here at Stillwater Hall.
George’s father, the Earl of Westershire, funds Harbridge University’s biology department, of which William is the head. George, eager to plunge into the family business, had come down for the summer to shore up the department’s future curriculum.
I myself had recently arrived for my annual visit, an even more solemn affair than usual since Granny Maggie had passed that winter.
Losing my guardian, my constant companion—the woman who’d raised me—plunged me into the greatest loneliness I’d ever experienced.
It had an unexpected effect, coaxing me away from the wallflower I’d been in previous Seasons.
Emboldening me to try to make a connection with someone.
Anyone. After all, with Granny Maggie gone, what else did I have to lose?
I started making eyes at George every time I passed him in the gardens.
Lustful glances over the peony bushes. Coquettish lash-fluttering through the fountains.
A half-orchestrated tumble over a wheelbarrow that resulted in George accompanying me on my daily drawing session in the woods beyond the estate.
He accompanied me every single day after that. And by the fourth or fifth session, I was doing very little drawing and much more … well … George.
By the end of summer, we were quite infatuated with each other. He hired me to provide the illustrations for William’s scientific articles, a clever ruse to stay in each other’s orbit. Even if it hasn’t given us an excuse to meet more than once or twice a month.
Still, it’s been so refreshing to have found a man willing to overlook the debits in my ledger.
To everyone else in Breton, I am Lord Edward Fitzroy’s undesirable niece—parent-less, penniless, and problematic.
Six times overlooked on the marriage market due to a paltry dowry and a barbaric (Aunt Teddy’s words, not mine) upbringing in the southlands.
It is a role I have no desire to play again.
And based on what Lizzie’s divulged, I won’t have to.
There goes that joyous fizzing again. Mathilde contains it by roughly cinching my stays. Otherwise, I might blurt out the secret George and I have kept from William, from Lizzie, from everyone for the past twelve months. They’ll all know soon enough.
Mathilde helps me into my powder-blue gown as Lizzie chatters away, listing her rivals for Favourite along with a point-by-point comparison of her strengths to their weaknesses.
I nod along, throwing in a supportive comment every now and then, but I’m not really listening. My mind races forward, tripping over itself as I plan for my new future.
I wonder where George will want to get married and could I convince him to do it here, or no, maybe in the wild woods where our love was forged, how wonderful would that be, and of course I’ll have to ask him if I can spruce up Granny Maggie’s cottage, in fact maybe he’d even do it as a wedding gift to me, it would make the perfect artist’s retreat and I—
The clock on the wall chimes six o’clock. The official start of the ball. And with it, the Season.
For the first time ever, I am ready to walk into that room with my head held high.
This year, I will finally be chosen.