Chapter 14
The morning had moved toward noon by the time Mya returned to the house.
Together, they decided it would be best if Kayden returned to his own manor, alleviating suspicions, though Mya was not sure exactly who they were trying to hide their activities from, considering that Ella and Lottie, as Kayden had said, almost certainly knew what they had been up to.
And if they didn't already, they were going to now. The back of her dress was a wreck.
Mya reached behind herself again, feeling the fabric that had practically shredded between the tree trunk and the steel bones of the corset.
Lottie was almost certainly going to laugh at her.
She would have to keep the whole thing away from the maids, who were probably as aware of what was going on as the other inhabitants of the house.
Or more aware, likely. That didn't mean that Mya wanted them seeing firsthand the obvious damage or speculating about what had caused it.
Attempting to make it back into the house without getting caught was, unfortunately, easier said than done. Mostly because Lottie and Ella were waiting in her room, sitting together on the bed. Mya felt her cheeks flushed, and knew she must be scarlet all the way down to the neck of her gown.
“Oh,” she said, stopping in her tracks with her hand still curled around the edge of the open French door. “I didn't expect the two of you to be here... In here, rather… This specific room, I meant.”
The corner of Lottie's mouth twitched upward, though she managed not to smile outright. Eleanora hid a laugh behind her hand in a neatly executed cough.
“We thought we would wait here and make sure that you hadn't fallen in a hole or some such thing out in the fields,” Lottie said, obviously struggling to keep a straight face. “You were gone quite some time, after all.”
“I do hope you are well?” Eleanora added.
If they were any more pleased with the gossip they had picked up, Mya thought, the both of them would be giggling like children. She gave them a disapproving look. “I am just fine. Thank you.”
“And Kayden?” Lottie asked, pretending to look behind Mya, as if expecting Kayden to appear any moment. “He made it home safely, I assume?”
“I’m sure he did.”
Mya edged around the room, toward the closet, hoping to slip into the dressing room and change there, without them seeing the damage to the back of her dress. She had, of course, no such luck.
“Grass stains on the back?” Lottie asked, with the air of someone who had experienced just that particular trouble.
“What?” Mya blurted. “No! There aren't any grass stains. What on earth would give you that idea?”
“Perhaps,” Eleanora suggested, “the fact that you are attempting to move all the way around the room while still facing us. And the babbling.”
“Also the blushing,” Lottie said. “You went an even brighter red just now when I asked about grass stains.”
Mya sighed. There was going to be no getting past them, it seemed. “There are no grass stains,” she said again.
The other two women looked at her expectantly.
Slowly, shaking her head, Mya turned around…and waited.
There was a moment of silence. Mya wasn't sure whether they were startled, or appalled. When she glanced back over her shoulder, they were both staring at the back of the dress.
Lottie broke the silence first, clapping her hands delightedly together. “How did…? No,” she said, laughter filling up the words. “Those are, admittedly, not grass stains. I think those are better than grass stains. What do you think, dear?”
Eleanora bit her lip, her eyes dancing with laughter. “Certainly a unique sort of wear and tear.”
“It is actually rather impressive, I think,” Lottie said. “I have never been accused of being traditional in my… adventures, but I have never done such things… up against a tree?” She looked up at Mya, head tipped to the side in question. “Did you enjoy it?”
Mya groaned softly, covering her face with her hands, and pretended that neither of them existed.
A moment later, there was movement, and then Lottie was beside her, laying a hand over her shoulder. “Mya?”
“Mmm?”
“You know that we do not mean to actually shame you? It is only the sort of teasing shared between friends. There is no judgment here.”
“We are hardly the people to hold your desires against you,” Eleanora said, still sitting on the bed if the direction her voice came from was anything to go on.
Reluctantly, Mya lifted her head, regarding Lottie through her fingers. “There is no need to harp on it so,” she said.
“We only harp on it because it is terribly exciting.” Lottie grinned at her. “We have not had anything so scandalous happen here in quite some time. I am afraid that we are both living vicariously through you. It is not fair, but such is life.”
At that, Mya laughed. It was rather impossible not to. “Sometimes,” she said, “I wonder why I am friends with you.”
“Because I am a lovely person,” Lottie answered without pause for thought. “And because we are allowing you to live in our house without any sort of rent, which is rather the sort of thing that friends do.”
That was, in fact, true. “I suppose that is sufficiently balanced reasoning.”
“I presume, then, that you are finished with avoiding Lord McGregor?” Lottie dropped back onto the edge of the bed and looked up at Mya. “Or have you found some new reason to shun him?”
“No,” Mya said, shaking her head. “I have not found any reason to shun him. We have dealt with the disagreement, and decided to continue on as we were.”
“I am glad to hear it.” Lottie smiled. “He was a bit of a mess when you would not let him in to apologize. I am not sure he is quite prepared to be shut out so.”
Then he should not have spoken so nastily to her.
But Mya didn't say that. They had, as she said, dealt with the disagreement, and she was not going to drag it all out again when her hosts seemed more than ready to move past the issue entirely.
In truth, Mya herself was rather ready to be done with it as well.
“Wait! Did you say continue on as before?” Lottie grinned wickedly, even more pleased when Mya didn’t answer.
“Would you like some help getting yourself out of the dress?” Eleanora asked, changing the subject without being too jarring about it.
“Since waking from your wound, it appears you have not had so much practice with it.” She smiled tenderly.
“You remember how to do many things, but some seem new to you, like you’ve never done them before.
It makes me wonder…” She waved her hand. “Never mind. Why don’t I help you?”
Mya looked down at the dress she was still wearing. “Is there any point in bothering to preserve it?” she asked. “Or is the back too shredded for a tailor to do much about the damage?”
“The skirt could perhaps be salvaged,” Eleanora said after a moment.
“We can cut it from the gown entirely and hem it into a separate piece. The bodice, I think, is beyond rescue. As for the corset, we will have to see what that looks like beneath, but I think it will still serve its purpose, even if it is a little less pretty than it had been.”
“You should perhaps consider not using trees as support in such situations,” Lottie said. “In future. If you wish to avoid doing any further damage to your wardrobe.”
“Yes,” Mya said, laughing. “Thank you. I should never have thought of such an idea on my own.”
“That is what I am here for,” Lottie agreed.
Mya ducked into the dressing room and began stripping off the ruined dress.
The mirror told her that the corset was not too badly damaged.
A little rent in the fabric here and there, but that hardly mattered.
She pulled on a long skirt and a blouse, and attempted to put her hair back in some semblance of order.
“I do have some news that is relevant to your interests, I believe,” Lottie said from the main room, voice pitched to carry.
“And what is that?” Mya asked, leaning into the mirror.
“It appears that the Auteberrys have their sights set on Lord McGregor as a suitor for their daughter. Seems they think he is quite the match for her.”
Deciding that there was nothing else to be done with her hair, Mya pinned a last loose lock back and stepped back out of the dressing room. “The Auteberrys? Does Kayden have any interest in Blanche, do you think?”
“Why would you even ask?” Lottie stared at her, shaking her head.
“Kayden has eyes for no one but you, dear,” Eleanora said kindly.
“I do not think he would see her naked and dancing the tarantella in front of him if you were in the room,” Lottie said.
“And in fact I do not put much stock in the rumors. Kayden has never shown much interest in English women. I do not know what would make the Auteberrys think that he might look any differently on their daughter.”
“Everyone believes people will look differently on their daughter,” Eleanora said. “But I do not believe that you need be worried, Mya. Truly, Kayden is not going to look for another. He is quite smitten. You have no cause for alarm.”
“I am not alarmed,” Mya said defensively. “I am the one he has been walking with this last week, and the one to whom he brought flowers.” She wondered if she was trying to convince them, or herself.
Either way, it settled some of her concern to know that Kayden was not and never would be interested in Blanche Auteberry. Jealousy was hardly a rational emotion, after all. But there were some paths of logic that even it could follow.
She was the one Kayden had gone to his knees for, and the one he could not keep his hands from. If young Miss Auteberry had ever intended to be competition for his affections, she had lost the fight before it even began.
Unless of course, she was a distraction, and Kayden McGregor was looking for someone with a title or money to keep his Lordship intact.
No. Mya shook her head. Kayden only had eyes for her. And she, for him.