Kilted Lovers

Chapter 1

F inding true love when you have a noble title is as much of a myth as fairy godmothers, talking candelabras, and magic mirrors. My mother’s hand was won by a duke, and my grandfather found his own princess, but a peerage alone is not enough to make a fairy tale.

Cinderella would have certainly been a far less romantic fable had Prince Charming given his eponymous princess a spreadsheet of when and where she was allowed to hold his hand. No one would have stuck around for the ending of Beauty and the Beast had the household decided to remain forever cursed, to watch the castle crumble, rather than allow a commoner to marry into the family. Snow White would have never been granted her happily ever after had the press caught wind of her living arrangements and decided that she was too much of a hussy to deserve the hand of their precious prince.

I call it our family curse. Perhaps it’s reparations for history, or as payment for believing ourselves to be second only to God, but we are destined to be eternally unhappy in love. What is the point in crowns and castles, if at the end of all your days you are perpetually alone?

No one will bother to write the love story of Lady Alice Walpole. Even I cannot find the romance in my present situation: draped over the lap of the heir to the Fortnum and Mason fortune, trying to sound interested as he talks about how much he detests tea for the fifth time this hour.

‘It, well, it just hurts, doesn’t it? It’s so … hot—’

‘Music!’ I cut him off and get to my feet before he can utter another mind-numbing syllable. ‘This sad party is lacking in many things ( most notably in the quality of company ),’ I announce, adding the parenthesis in a murmur, ‘but it is music that I believe I am most desirous of. Don’t you agree, Barty?’ Tea-boy makes a series of posh vocalisations in a bumbling attempt to concur.

In the drawing room of Barty’s grandparents’ Kensington town house, the new-adults of the British elites have gathered to sip martinis from crystal glasses and chase them down with cheap cigarettes. Quite the juxtaposition, but they always like to pretend they’re down to earth when they’re trundling down to the local off-licence after one whiff of imported vodka.

‘Yes, some fucking music, please!’ A rasping voice speaks up from behind the haze of the room: Kitty Harley-King, daughter of a billionaire. Her ‘thing’ is that she swears like a sailor, but with about as much conviction as a priest repeating the words of a sinner back to him during confession. The heiress’s education cost her parents close to two and half million at a boarding school in Luxembourg and somehow the only skill sets she acquired were how to pick out the most expensive wine from smell alone, and how to curse her mother in every way possible whilst spending her billions liberally. But she’s harmless, and the most tolerable of the bunch.

Kitty glides across the room as though propelled by her boyfriend’s cigar smoke pluming under the folds of her dress. Dancing between the furniture as if she has already conjured the cadences of a song in her mind, her bare feet slap the marble floor before she stretches out a finger to finally hit play. A record spins on a rusting gramophone but the drum and bass music that is emitted from it is crystal clear.

‘Oh, what an absolute tune!’ Hugo Maddocks, the queen’s godson, takes another drag from his cigarette and rests his head against the arm of the chaise longue in the way that one would as one listens to Bach or a particularly moving Chopin, as opposed to Chase and Status.

It’s ironic really. They strive so hard to create an illusion of class and history, but it’s all just powered by a mistreated iPhone connected via an AUX cable.

I say ‘they’, but I suppose it is really ‘we’. Just like them, I am here, in this room, of my own volition, trying to scrape together just enough serotonin from socialisation and a little tipple so that I don’t lose my mind. Not one of them knows when my birthday is. Or any of my middle names. All they know is that my father is the largest landowner in the country, after the king, and that’s all that matters.

‘Don’t we have anything we can dance to?’ I attempt to elevate my voice over the music that thumps around the high ceilings. Barty only squints at me, as though it will help him hear me better. Kitty is already dancing, or convulsing. Either way, she doesn’t take any notice. ‘Hugo? Anything with a bit more melody?’ Without acknowledging me, he slides his sunglasses over his eyes and swigs from his glass.

I don’t bother attempting to ask Felix, Kitty’s Danish royalty boyfriend. He snores softly from the sofa and his still-lit cigar burns at the rug. The rest of the bodies in the room seem to continue their conversations as though their voices are in any way audible over the throbbing bass. I don’t suppose they have even noticed; listening isn’t really anyone’s strong suit here. We have very little to impress each other with. If they actually want to be listened to, they go down to the UCL student union and tell the students that their father’s accounting firms are offering internships. It usually gives them the required amount of attention for an evening.

‘Why do we never do anything fun?’ I cut the music and every eye in the room falls on me in a scowl.

‘Speak for yourself – I had a line off some army major’s sword last Sunday,’ a voice I can’t decipher shouts from a shadowy corner.

‘When did we stop hosting balls? And when did we start wearing dinner jackets to sit on ugly patterned sofas whilst we— Is that a … vape, Barty? Oh, for heaven’s sake!’ My ‘date’ chokes on his cloud of sweet-scented vapour.

‘It’s watermelon candyfloss …’ Barty sheepishly looks around the room. ‘Cigarettes do awful things for my asthma.’ He punctuates his sentence with another cough and all I can do is stare in disbelief.

‘Keep your bonnet on, Jane Eyre. The gentry no longer sit about in fine houses and drink tea. We have far better things to be doing,’ Hugo croons.

‘First things first, I’m pretty sure you mean Jane Austen . And secondly, if you took off those pompous sunglasses for half a second, you’d realise that is exactly what we’re doing!’ I fling out a hand to point at one of Kitty’s boarding school friends who sits at a table, cup of tea in one hand and the snout of her snorting pug resting on the other.

Hugo raises the lenses and follows my directions, and, after a short glance, shrugs as if to say: ‘I suppose you’re right.’ Though he would never say anything of the sort out loud.

‘I am so bloody bored!’ I huff like a disgruntled toddler and fall back into the seat beside Barty, the tulle of my dress bunching around me in an itchy blanket of rainbow.

‘Perhaps I’ve come to the wrong place; I was told there was to be a party here.’ In all my moaning, I hadn’t noticed that a tall gentleman, whose face I haven’t had the pleasure of seeing before, had slid through the door behind me. ‘I realise now I must have stumbled upon a morgue.’ Like a candle in a crypt, his smile seems to make the whole room glow a little brighter, feel a little warmer.

‘Atticus, my good man! How the devil are you?’ Hugo shows more gusto than I have seen from him all evening as he leaps up to take Atticus by the hand. ‘You shall have to excuse little Alice, the poor dear; she won’t stop dreaming about balls. And not the fun kind, mind you!’ I blush from my seat but still can’t draw my eyes away from the stranger, at least not until his dark pair find them and he makes me tremble with another disarming smile.

‘Hughie, Hughie, Hughie, perhaps if you made fewer jokes like that, you might actually see the appeal in culture.’ It’s Hugo’s turn to blush as Atticus moves to fix his full attention on me. ‘ Little Alice, I think a ball sounds like a rather fantastic idea.’ With a wink so subtle that I have to ask myself if it’s a figment of my imagination, he runs a wide hand through his blond hair before being chaperoned away to the bar by another of his friends.

‘Kitty,’ I whisper loudly to the woman now draped across the rug, flapping her arms and legs as though making a snow angel in the tufts.

She replies with an airy ‘mmhmm’.

‘Who was that? That just came in?’

Sitting upright with a jolt, she scans her eyes about the room.

‘Hugo?’ Kitty giggles to herself before flopping back down again. ‘You are silly, Alice. He’s been here the whole time.’

‘Atticus, Kitty. I meant Atticus.’

‘Oh, well why didn’t you say!’ I roll my eyes but don’t interrupt her in case she goes off on a tangent about Portuguese fruit or something. ‘That handsome pint of wine is Atticus Beaumont. New money. I’m not too sure in what kind of business but it seems to be good enough for half of the heiresses in London. He is rather sought after, but impossible to pin down.’

Atticus’s arrival has seemingly breathed a bit of life back into the room. He circles about the disengaged groups, chatting away like the previously absent host catching up with his guests. So preoccupied with observing the stranger, I don’t notice Barty sliding closer to me until he intertwines his fingers with mine and awkwardly bends my wrist in a strange attempt to kiss my fingertips.

‘My grandparents have a jacuzzi bath on the third floor. It’s very … steamy.’ Barty grins at me after he squeaks out the last word with a heavy breath.

‘It helps your asthma I suppose? You should probably head up now – you’re sounding a little wheezy.’ I stare straight ahead, unable to look at what I assume is his ‘sexy face’ without the threat of uncontrollable laughter overpowering me.

After clearing his throat, he continues sharper now, if not a little more flustered: ‘I mean, would you – do you fancy – perhaps joining me?’

A laugh bursts from me before I can attempt to hold it in. ‘You’re inviting me to join you in your grandparents’ jacuzzi?’ It’s hardly inviting me to his library with a rolling ladder, or scouring the country to return my glass slipper now, is it?

‘I was about to come over and properly introduce myself, but I think I may have chosen a rather inconvenient time.’ Atticus’s amused tone interrupts us before Barty can stumble over another word, and I have to fight the urge to throw my arms around his neck and have him whisk me away like Rapunzel from her tower.

‘I should like to argue, Atticus, that you might just be my fairy godmother.’ An amused glint flashes across his eyes and he follows my every move as I shuffle to the edge of my seat to stare up at him.

‘I would have preferred handsome knight in shining armour but in that case, my lady, you shall go to the ball.’ He offers me his hand and I oblige him, grateful to have any excuse to get away from Barty, especially a handsome one.

‘I suppose I should introduce myself, seeing as you have just saved me.’ I laugh as we reach the bar, trying to calm the erratic beat of my heart and pretend for a moment that I am not sweating profusely under the stare of an attractive man. Atticus still clutches my hand in his as he pours me a drink with the other.

‘No need. Everyone knows of the famous Lady Alice Walpole, the face of modern royalty. The Party Princess. The Heartbreaker.’ He pushes aside a fair curl that had fallen across my face and hands me my drink.

I can’t bring myself to say anything in reply. I feel detached from myself as my reputation is laid bare before me by a man who was a stranger only ten minutes ago. The national newspapers have hardly been kind in their representation, though that is a surprise to no one. After I was spotted having dinner with two men in a week, a few of the tabloids decided I had fallen from grace and gone from being the ‘nation’s sweetheart’ to a ‘serial dater’. Apparently, they were expecting me to just pop out with a husband without even giving me a chance to kiss a few frogs first.

One thing the fairy tales always get wrong is that your soulmate is the first handsome man you clap eyes on. If that were the case, I’d be stuck with Charles Devereux, the son of a family friend who was the love of my life at age six but once he had spent a few halves at Eton, developed an unfortunate habit of staring at my breasts with a smile that I can only compare to that of a serial killer. His hairline began receding as soon as he hit puberty, so I believe that was his karma.

If Prince Charming can scour the whole kingdom to find his princess, why can’t I go on two dates in one week without being branded a man-eater?

I take a swig of the drink Atticus had poured for me, and the burning sensation fights off the numbness that has grown within me. Recollecting my composure, I give him a broad, almost-honest smile.

‘Would you care to dance?’ Atticus slides the glass out of my hand and places it gently on the side before taking my hand and leading me back across the room.

‘What, here? They are all so miserable, I can hardly imagine that we’ll be able to convince them to do anything aside from drink and smoke.’ Looking about the room, I see that no one is taking any notice of us. Like spirits, we glide through the room unseen and I feel as though to hold hands with Atticus Beaumont is to be transported to another dimension. A dimension where one’s heart beats irregularly, and one allows one’s judgement to slip in favour of a little excitement.

‘Absolutely not. I would say there is not a soul in that room worthy of seeing you dance, my lady. We must go somewhere where you have a true, worthy audience.’ He pushes open the mahogany door and pulls us both through into the shadowy corridor.

‘And who might that be?’ The rational part of my brain attempts to remind me that I am disappearing into the night with a man whose name I only just learnt. And yet, my romantic heart soars as we seem to float down the spiral staircase.

Atticus pushes open the front door. The June breeze licks at my bare arms, and prickling goose bumps soon follow the early summer breath. ‘Why, the stars of course.’

Instinctively I look up. The splattering of stars is hidden beneath a blanket of smog, unable to outshine the orange fluorescence of the street lamps. This is London after all. The sentiment was there, and it is perhaps the most romantic thing someone has ever said to me – though that isn’t hard considering just half an hour ago I was being propositioned to try out someone’s granny’s bath.

I dance better without an audience anyway.

Beneath a street lamp in a Kensington alleyway, Atticus takes me by the waist and the heat of his body soon overtakes me until I no longer feel the cold of the night.

‘May I be honest with you, Lady Alice?’ Atticus speaks deeply, lowering his head so he is within a breath’s distance.

‘Just Alice, please,’ I whisper, my heartbeat thumping in my ears.

‘I could never do you the dishonour. Your title is your crowning glory and I have never seen one so deserving of the distinction.’ He stares so intently into my eyes that I feel almost naked stood before him. ‘I came here only with the wish of being your next object. To have my heart broken by you would be my greatest privilege.’

‘I’m sorry?’ I manage to splutter.

‘I apologise for being so forward, but I came tonight with my only intention being to see you, and only you. I have admired you from afar and if you will have me, I wish to continue to love you closely this time.’ I look for any hint of a smirk on his face, any sign that this may be some elaborate joke. Scanning the streets, I look for any long lenses poking out from between bins, or any journalists crouched behind any concealed corners. There are none. His face is sincere as he blinks at me expectantly.

‘But—but we’ve only just met,’ I whisper.

‘Do you not believe in love at first sight?’ He leans in and presses his lips to my cheek, lingering for a moment before pulling away.

Flustered, I reply, ‘Yes, yes I suppose I do.’

Not all of the fairy tales can be wrong, can they?