Chapter 1
Chapter
London
The carriage wheels clattered against the cobblestones as the city unfolded before them in all its grand chaos.
London in spring was loud, muddy, and quite crowded.
The streets were thick with horses and humanity and Julianna could hardly breathe for the thrill of it.
She loved Dorset and Farrow Cottage more than any other place on earth, but the spectacle that was London still made her heart soar.
She told herself she ought not to feel this light, not with Thomas gone to the sanatorium, his every breath still a struggle. But the city was dazzling no matter if she wished it to be or not, and for the first time in a very long time she let herself take what joy was on offer.
She had not been to the capital in years and she’d forgotten how it felt to be in the midst of so many people with the loud voices and brisk movements and energy.
The last time she’d visited had been for the debut of her father’s latest composition and Thomas had charmed their way into free toffees from street vendors.
That had been ages ago. Lifetimes, it sometimes felt.
Now, she leaned forward in her seat, peering out the window of the carriage at the endless press of tall facades, elegant townhouses, and women adorned in silks and feathers.
Fred lounged opposite her, one long leg stretched out, the other bent, his gloved fingers drumming lightly against his knee.
“What is it?” she asked when she caught him staring.
He raised one shoulder insolently. “It delights me to see you delighted. Can a man not appreciate his wife?”
She felt her cheeks flush. They were married of course. She’d stood next to him and said her vows, the same as he had. But the way he’d said it ‘my wife’ had sounded possessive and pleased. And she found herself enjoying that, almost basking in it.
“Look, Fred!”
She pointed at a man standing upon an upturned crate, wrapped in a navy blue cloak with velvet at the cuffs and collar. He wore multiple medallions around his neck and rings on his fingers, over a pair of white gloves. Above him hung a sign that proclaimed him a Master of the Mind Arts.
“He’s a mesmerist. Declared himself a Professor of Electro-Biology a while back I believe.” Fred stared at the man and then back at her and added, “The women of London are quite enchanted with him. Believe him to be rakishly handsome.”
There was something in the way he said it—a small tinge of hurt in his voice—as if she too might have her head turned by the strange man.
“Well, I may be a hayseed for all that but I have no appetite for such things. Charlatans are not to my taste.”
“Oh?” He raised his eyebrow. “What is to your taste then, wife?”
She looked at him then, truly looked. “Certainly not showmen who self-proclaim themselves professors.”
He’d been asking for a compliment, she thought, but she didn’t quite know how to give it to him. What could she have said: intense blue eyes and blonde curls and thighs that could crack a walnut like yours? A dimple on your cheek the exact same size as my fingertip?
She couldn’t say that; she wasn’t ready to. But it touched something inside her that he might want to hear it from her. “Not that it matters what a lady from Dorset thinks.”
“You’re a Countess now, Jules. They will be the ones vying for your favor, not the other way around. Even Lady Isobel.”
She felt herself making a face at the woman’s name.
So much so that Fred asked, “And what is it that caused such ire against her? Not that I’m defending her, mind you. I loathe the woman myself.”
“She was awful to us, after…” She trailed off, uncertain how to phrase what she wanted to say.
“After the accident. You can say the words, Jules.”
“After the accident. The Hawthornes had been patrons of Father’s but refused to so much as look in our direction after they died.
We applied for positions at Hawthorne Hall but they wouldn’t even accept the application.
I believe Thomas put in for a steward of some kind, although we would have done anything.
Scullery if need be. Charwoman. Gardener.
They acted as if they’d never laid eyes on us before. And—” She glanced at him sideways.
“And what?”
“There was something else too, wasn’t there? Thomas never spoke of it outright but I always got the feeling he hated them for something they’d done to you. Even after the accident.”
Fred looked away and she knew, she knew, there was still something more he was not telling her. But he’d already reached up and knocked on the roof of the carriage.
“We’re here,” he said. “At Madame Tremaux’s. As I understand it, she is the best modiste in London. My cousin Catherine adores her.”
“Will I get to meet your cousin?”
“If she ever returns from the wilds of Scotland, yes. But do feel free to drop her name. She’s a Duchess, you know.”
“You are incorrigible,” Julianna said, but she knew she was smiling while she did it.
The carriage rolled to a stop before a discreet set of double doors painted a glossy green. A gilt sign above announced Madame Tremaux: Modiste to Ladies of Discerning Taste. Even before they stepped inside, Julianna caught the faintest trace of lavender seeping out from the threshold.
Fred, as he always did, waited for the coachman to hand her down from the carriage. She tried not to be disappointed—perhaps that was just the way he did things—but she wished he would, for once, offer her his own hand.
But her disappointment quickly disappeared when he led her through the doors to the modiste’s shop and the world outside—all that noise and thronging and chaos—vanished.
Madame Tremaux’s shop was clean, beautiful, and calm.
The walls were papered in a soft cream and rose pattern, punctuated by gilt-framed mirrors that reflected back the feast of sights before her: Cascades of ribbons tumbling from the shelves.
Gossamer laces, gauzes, and jewel-toned silks that shimmered from hooks and rails.
Emerald, sapphire, ruby, amethyst—every color Julianna could dream of was arrayed like a rainbow in the front of the shop.
Bolts of ivory satin leaned in neat rows along another wall.
Her breath caught in her throat. It felt impossible that this shop should exist in the same London she’d just rattled through in their carriage.
“Fred,” she whispered, but did not finish that statement as Madame Tremaux herself glided toward them.
She was a tall Frenchwoman in dove-gray silk with pearls stitched into her cap. “Welcome,” she said, pausing in front of Julianna and taking her in from bonnet to slipper. “Chester said you were lovely, chérie, but he did you no justice.”
She turned to Fred and frowned.
“Next time you will tell me before you bring me such a vision, mon cher. I need time to prepare for this kind of beauty. Not have it sprung without warning.” She caught Julianna lightly by the hand and began to lead her away, with one last disapproving look at Fred over her shoulder.
“It is no concern. We will have you outfitted exactly as you deserve in no time.”
Julianna had to squelch her smile as the modiste showed her the fabrics. The woman certainly did have a flair for drama.
“I’ll just go make myself comfortable, shall I?” Fred said and went to find a chair to lounge in without waiting for an answer.
The seamstresses descended upon Julianna like a fluttering flock of sparrows, each bearing some treasure: silks that rippled like water, intricate laces, ribbons in every shade she could imagine.
She was ushered behind the velvet screen, her laughter spilling out despite herself as fabric slipped over her head and was pinned, tugged, and arranged with so much deft confidence.
When she stepped out the first time, pinned into a pale green satin that shimmered like dew at dawn, the mirrors multiplied her figure a dozen times over and she hardly recognized herself.
Fred sat in a brocade chair in the anteroom, one ankle crossed over his knee. His pose looked languid and lazy but his pupils flared as she stepped from behind the screen. She did not think she imagined the look of hunger in his eyes.
“Well?” she asked, turning slightly in front of the mirror.
“Too pale,” Madame Tremaux sniffed, snapping her fingers at the hovering seamstresses. “Bring me the sapphire.”
Moments later Julianna emerged again, this time clad in the color of twilight itself. The silk clung to her waist and hips before it spilled away in a sweep of skirts that whispered across the polished floor. The neckline dipped modestly but enough to reveal the delicate line of her collarbone.
“Oh,” Julianna said when she caught a glance of herself in the looking glass.
She turned to Fred, only to find him gripping the arm of his chair with a strength that whitened his knuckles. She smiled at him and his hands tightened further.
“Better,” the modiste said with satisfaction. She circled Julianna, tugging at a sleeve, adjusting the fall of the train and pinning, always pinning. “Oui. This will do. The men will forget their own names when you enter the room.”
Fred cleared his throat from the chair. “They best not.”
Julianna flushed and the modiste gave her a secret smile. “Oui,” the woman said more quietly, just for Julianna’s ears. “This one will certainly do. The…what do they call him…the Local Adonis? He finally has met his match, I see. You are a goddess in this color, chérie.”
Julianna’s cheeks burned. She dared another glance at Fred, whose eyes had not left her for a moment.
“But perhaps,” the modiste went on a bit louder, “we will lower the neckline just a mite, non?”
She unpinned and then repinned the neckline before stepping back. “Oui. A vision.”
“Mes filles,” she said to the seamstresses. “Help me a moment in the back, will you?” She looked at Julianna. “You can undress yourself?”
“Yes, of course,” Julianna said and disappeared back behind the velvet as the seamstresses followed Madame Tremaux out.