Chapter 19
Chapter Nineteen
“Ihad an idea,” she said as he entered the room, not even giving him time to greet her.
Andrew finally came home to find his wife present, glowing from having been in the sun all day. She looked even more beautiful than usual, and his heart clenched dangerously when he saw her.
“Oh?” He came over to see what she was doing: rearranging the decorative snuff boxes in a glass cabinet. “And what’s that?”
“Lady Marwich is throwing a ball, and she has invited us.”
He looked down at her mahogany head, trying to make sense of it all. “I see,” he said.
“Do you disagree?” She turned, cradling a snuff box against her chest, and he had the strangest feeling she was in the mood to argue with him.
Perhaps in a valid way, considering the fact she had risen and left the house when he’d been with Nicholas, and thus, she probably thought him avoiding. When, as far as he was concerned, considering he returned to the house to find it empty, it was the other way around.
“Not necessary,” he said evenly. When she looked at him like that, all smoldering defiance, it reminded him of how she had been in his bed, and the memory only made him want her more. He stepped back to give them both more space. “Is there a particular reason?”
“Well, we’ve been married a little while now, and I don’t want to give the gossip mongers any reason to think we’re anything but deliriously happy.”
“Ah.” He smiled a little. “So this is a kind of vengeance.”
“Not vengeance.” She scowled. “More that… I don’t want them thinking the worst of us.”
“No, neither do I.”
“It’s for William,” she said then, still more defiantly.
“Even if it were for you, I would not have fought against it,” he said, and won himself a startled glance. “Does that shock you? I don’t want rumors about you or your unhappiness any more than you do, and if a few appearances is all it takes, then that’s what we will do.”
“You will have to seem as though you like me,” she warned.
She was being increasingly standoffish, and it amused him enough that he couldn’t keep the distance he had intended. “That will be all right,” he said. “I’ve managed it before.”
And after he had managed it, he had taken her to bed and kissed her until she reached her peak on his lips.
But better not to think of that.
“When is the ball?” he asked.
“In three days. Will you be… Can you be ready by then?”
“Yes.” He took the snuffbox from her hands and placed it at the end of the neat row she had already set in place. He closed the lid. “Will you have a dress?”
“You made sure of that.”
So he had. And the memory only brought a fresh wave of torment.
“Then we’ll attend together,” he told her, and took a step back. “I’ll visit William now.”
To his relief, and perhaps his disappointment, she let him go.
On the day of the ball, Jessamine wore a green gown, smoothing her hands down herself as she took a breath. Her maid pinned the last pearl in her hair.
Her first ball since she had married.
She’d been to a few before, of course, after she had moved back to London.
Irene had been determined to do right by her, and so she’d had every social event one could imagine laid at her feet.
Her introduction to London Society had been something spectacular, though short-lived before Rebecca had died and Jessamine’s life had changed forever.
There was a knock on the door, and Andrew stepped in. Her maid stepped back and curtsied, leaving the room.
Jessamine curled her hand into a fist by her side. They’d had little to do with one another since…
Well, since that night.
But he hadn’t avoided her the way she had expected. More, he kept his physical distance while engaging in conversation about mundane things.
“You’re dressed,” he said gruffly.
“Do you like it?” She turned away from their reflections in the mirror and turned to face him. There was a perfume bottle in her hand, and she anointed her wrists, rubbing them together. “I thought the green could be symbolic. New beginnings.”
A smile touched his mouth. “Yes. Very symbolic.”
“So you don’t like it?”
“I never said that.” He cleared his throat as he stepped closer. “I thought we might check on William together.”
Secretly, Jessamine was delighted. Both that his gaze kept traveling down her silhouette as though he could not help himself, and that he had come to her with this request about William.
It wasn’t that she thought he didn’t care about William, but often their different types of caretaking took place at different times and in different ways.
Perhaps Lady Marwich was wrong; she was offering William love, yes, but perhaps Andrew offered the child more than merely security.
“Yes,” Jessamine said, and she smiled at him. “Thank you.”
“You’re welcome.” He extended his arm to her, and she took it, as though they were walking into a ballroom. Together, they walked into the nursery, where William lay in his cradle, eyes open and his little fists waving. Lucy sewed in the corner, darning a pair of stockings.
“He’s perfectly contented just lying there,” Lucy said.
Jessamine scooped William into her arms. “What a brave little man,” she said, kissing his cheek. His hand batted her cheek, and she carefully removed it before he could grab her earring. “How can I leave you for an entire evening?”
This had been her idea, her plan, but now it was coming to fruition, she started to doubt whether she could go ahead with it.
This would be the longest time she had left him for. What if he cried and wanted her, and she didn’t come? Her stomach twisted at the thought.
A hand slid up her back, and she glanced over her shoulder to find Andrew standing close behind her, his body heat leeching into her. “He’ll be all right,” he said gently, as though he knew she needed the reassurance.
“But what if something goes wrong?”
“Nothing will go wrong. Look how healthy and happy he is. Lucy will take good care of him, feed him when necessary, and put him to bed. You know his routine. It’s almost his bedtime.”
And it was. Andrew, despite not being present for most of it, knew William’s routine just as well as she did.
She sniffed, kissing William’s head again. “All right.”
“And if there is a problem,” Andrew glanced up at Lucy, “then I’m sure someone will send us note, and we can come straight home.”
“Of course, Your Grace,” Lucy said immediately. “If anything goes wrong, I shall send for you at once.”
“So you see? There is nothing preventing us from attending.”
Jessamine sighed, because he was right. And she wanted to show the world that she was happy, that her marriage was not a farce, and she would not cave under the pressure of their idle gossip. Lady Marwich had been defending them, so let them stand up and prove their happiness.
Andrew stroked a hand down William’s downy head, and Jessamine placed him back in the cradle. With Andrew’s hand still on the small of her back, they moved to the door.
“Thank you,” she said.
“I know it can be… alarming to feel as though you’re not in control.”
She glanced up at his face. “Have you felt like that?”
“Often. And with far more reason to think so.”
She squeezed his hand, and they went downstairs together, more in harmony than they had been in a long time. The carriage had been waiting for several minutes, so they climbed inside, and Jessamine attempted not to notice how many times their knees touched as they sat together.
Then they were at Lady Marwich’s grand home, walking up the steps together.
A footman greeted them and brought them to the ballroom, where the butler announced them.
A hush spread across the room as people turned to stare—the unexpected duke, freshly back from the army, and his new, almost Scottish bride, daughter of a man who was imprisoned for his crimes—a rare punishment for the nobility.
She knew she was infamous, but it seemed her connection to Andrew only made her more so. Not only was she her father’s long-lost daughter—as though he had not been the one to send her away—but she was also married to a duke who had, in the eyes of the ton, produced a son for her to care for.
A duke, moreover, who did often not play to the regular niceties of society. He did not simper and smile and offer fake assurances of regard. He looked at them all as though he had no interest in being alongside them, and as though their shallow materialistic natures disgusted him.
Jessamine put her hand on his arm and leaned up to him. He glanced down as though he couldn’t help himself, his gaze dropping from her eyes to her mouth for a fraction of a second before returning.
“Smile,” she murmured, smiling sweetly up at him as though he were the only thing to exist in her world. “You must act as though you want to be here.”
His hand covered hers. “I suppose you can convince me of that. Will you dance with me?”
“As many times as you like.”
A light sparked in his eyes, and she caught her breath.
Was this flirting? Was her stoic, stern husband flirting?
“Your Graces,” Lady Marwich boomed as she made it through the crowd to her.
“You must be introduced to everyone who has not already met you. Come, come. And then, yes, you may dance with your bride, Your Grace.” This, she directed at Andrew.
“I can see the way you look at her. I will not keep you from her smiles long.”
To Jessamine’s relief, he cracked long enough to offer her a smile. “You are very kind, Lady Marwich.”
“Nonsense. I look out for my own interests as much as anyone else’s, and it’s in my interest that you enjoy your time here. I already know the most enjoyment you will get is with your wife, who is looking exceedingly pretty tonight. You are magnificent, my dear. Truly, a diamond.”
Jessamine touched the diamonds around her neck, which were a gift from Irene upon her marriage. “Thank you.”
With Andrew’s arm in hers, they were taken on a brief tour around the room, and Lady Marwich made it plain at every introduction that Jessamine and Andrew were wildly in love and wanted nothing more than to dance with one another.