Chapter Thirteen #2
Fanny wrinkled her nose. “One can have too much of a good thing, I assure you, and as I now have six sisters, I think that applies to me. But you didn’t come here to talk about my sisters.
You came here for quite another reason, I’m sure.
I can read it in your eyes. So don’t tell me.
Let me guess. You are already quite fed up with Fitz as a husband?
I always knew he would make a very bad one.
He’s too set in his ways and too selfish to change.
And when my cousin Marianne told Stepmama that he’d married you…
well, I have to admit I quite quailed for you.
I also felt guilty that it had been I who sent you off to the Lyon’s Den.
If I hadn’t, you wouldn’t be stuck married to the worst rake in London. ”
Georgiana shook her head hurriedly. “Nothing of the sort. He is proving to be quite the gentleman with me. Nothing rakish about him at all.” Although this wasn’t quite true, was it?
Fanny’s eyebrows shot up. “Don’t tell me that you actually like him?”
Georgiana bit her lip. Answering this honestly would be a good idea, but talking about her feelings had never been easy for her.
This was mainly because she’d hardly ever had anyone with whom to share them, apart from the short time she’d been at school with Fanny.
And even then, she’d kept a lot of her thoughts to herself, as she’d never had the habit of sharing things with others.
Living at home in a household without a mother and with only a series of governesses to talk to had not promoted confidences being shared.
She’d loved Papa, but been unable to share any of her hopes and fears with him.
And then he’d died, and she’d been alone.
She nodded, if a little warily. “I do think I like him, but I don’t know whether he likes me. He’s…so much the gentleman I find it difficult to read him. Not that I’ve ever had much experience in reading people, as you know. And especially not gentlemen.”
Fanny’s eyes narrowed. “But you would like him to like you?” She still sounded astonished.
Georgiana gave a determined nod. “Yes. We are married. I know it was for far less than love, but nevertheless, we are contracted to remain together now for the rest of our lives. I would like him to like me at least a little more than he seems to. I would like to be able to get along with him, and for him to be…to be a proper husband to me.” She covered her face with her hands, conscious of the hot color rising to her cheeks.
“I should like him to want to…oh no, I cannot say it. It’s too embarrassing. ”
Peeping between her fingers, she could see Fanny appeared to be contemplating something. After a few moments, she spoke, her tone a little less astonished. “I must say that I have never heard Cousin Fitz described as behaving like a gentleman before. Whatever can have come over him?”
This felt unaccountably like an insult. She spoke from behind her hands. “But he’s a gentleman born.”
Fanny, who appeared to be tactfully ignoring Georgiana’s embarrassment, chuckled.
“He might have been born a gentleman but that does not mean he conducts himself as one, you goose. Fitz’s papa, my Uncle Robert, whom I scarcely knew but have heard all about, was one such.
He was the younger son of a viscount and very much born a gentleman, but that didn’t stop him running off with a girl he assumed was an heiress.
My Aunt Elizabeth.” She smiled. “Although he soon found out that her condition as an heiress was very much dependent on her papa’s whims, and once my grandfather discovered what she’d done, he cut her off without a penny.
Fitz is cut from the same cloth as his father, or so I’d always thought. An adventurer, not a gentleman.”
Georgiana pressed her lips together for a moment while she thought, the action uncomfortable, and lowered her hands.
“I suppose, in a way, that is indeed what Fitz has also done, as I am undoubtedly an heiress. I can’t deny that.
” If only she wasn’t. But then, he would have had no lure to marry her, and she’d have been stuck with whoever else Mrs. Dove-Lyon could have persuaded into marriage.
And, if she admitted it to herself, she was rather more than pleased at the husband that lady had chosen for her. A lot more than pleased, in fact.
Fanny gave a disrespectful snort of laughter. “Did you think he might be anything else other than a fortune hunter, a rake and a cad? After the way he has become your husband?”
Clearly Fanny had a rather jaundiced view of her cousin.
Georgiana, who had always nurtured hopes of romance and love, which was precisely what had got her into this fix in the first place, shrugged.
“I suppose I did not. However, he appears to be…how can I put it? He appears to be behaving in a way I would not have expected of the sort of man you describe.” She thought of how he’d taken her hand as they’d met his sister and of how it had made her feel.
It had perhaps been a very small thing to him, but now she knew she wanted more.
“Then what is the problem?”
She covered her hot face again. “I…I think I like him a little too much.” There, it was out, and now she was feeling like a traitor to Alexander’s memory, even though she now knew it had been a mere infatuation.
How could she, who had been mourning her lost lover, have so easily fallen for a handsome stranger in just five short days?
Was she that shallow? The fact that she’d fallen for Alexander and allowed him to take catastrophic liberties with her in a mere two days didn’t seem important.
He’d said he loved her and they’d marry the moment she turned twenty-one, so it didn’t count.
Or so she was telling herself. The fear that she might be the sort of girl who fell in love at the drop of a hat with man after man lurked.
Some of the girls at school had been like that, cooing over a different man each week, and she’d always looked down her nose at them as flibbertigibbets.
Fanny’s delicate brows arched. “You like him too much? Good heavens, my dear, are you making the mistake of falling in love with your husband?” Considering she was firstly not a married woman herself, nor even an engaged one, this felt a little rum coming from her.
Fanny might have been presented at court, but Georgiana was sure she knew very little more than she did herself about love.
However, more hot color rose up her cheeks under cover of her hands.
Was she making a mistake in liking Fitz too much?
She managed a shrug and spoke from behind the shelter of her fingers.
“Is that such a bad thing? My mama and papa were very much in love, I’m told, although I never witnessed them together for my mama died while I was just a baby.
They must have been, or my papa would not have mourned her as much as he did.
” She paused, a little affronted by her friend’s accusation.
“And I’m not sure what has made you think yourself an expert on this subject. ”
Fanny wrinkled her nose. “Well, I concede my experience comes mainly from observing my own papa and his two wives. My mama was fond of him, I suppose, but I never saw any sign of true affection between them. Nor between Stepmama and Papa, either.” She paused.
“Not in the way I would like to have a man behave towards me.” A naughty twinkle lit her eyes.
“In the way I admit I have already had some men behave towards me. So I am not all that ignorant, you know. You, my dear, have missed out on a lot by not having been presented. Balls are not at all the stuffy institutions you might think. Some very attractive men attend them and it’s fun to carry on a little dalliance with them, even if one has no intention of marriage.
The most handsome ones are usually the most unsuitable, and that only makes them more attractive.
You would do well to remember that Fitz is one of those men. ”
Determined not to be distracted by delving into Fanny’s amorous experiences, Georgiana soldiered on, peeping between her fingers. “Just because your papa did not love your mama, does not mean that all couples are the same.”
Fanny’s lips quirked. “Well, I do know one couple who appear to be deeply in love. Fitz’s cousin on his papa’s side, Viscount Ormonde and his wife.
My older sister, the one who died of a chill a few years ago now, had her eye on Kit as a possible husband.
He’s very handsome, you know. But a young woman from nowhere appeared and captured his heart.
Quite the romantic tale.” She chuckled. “In fact, he’s so very handsome it’s easy to see why a girl could love him.
” Her eyes twinkled with mischief. “Even though he’s a married man, I wouldn’t say no to an encounter with him on a dark terrace one night.
And when I say handsome, I mean devastatingly so. Puts Fitz in the shade.”
Georgiana, putting aside her own shock at her friend’s wicked confession and ignoring her insult to Fitz, lowered her hands and shook her head in frustration.
“I don’t care about some cousin of Fitz’s, however handsome he is.
I care about Fitz.” She clapped her hand to her mouth and giggled, aware of the flaming heat in her cheeks. “I didn’t mean to say that.”
Fanny laughed. “If it’s true, then you might as well say it. No point in not being honest with yourself.”
Georgiana, who had never been a girl given to revealing her innermost feelings, felt as though her whole body were on fire, but she was a Frampton, so she persevered.
“I’ve said it now. I care about him. I might have only known him for five days, but I think that’s long enough to know my mind.
” She shook her head, wishing the heat would subside.
“But the problem remains. What am I going to do? How do I get him to like me back? To…to love me?”
Fanny leaned towards her, eyes alight with a mixture of determination and excitement. “What we must do, my dear Georgiana, is formulate a plan.”