The next morning, Frederick called for Stacie before any callers had had a chance to descend, and they hailed a hackney, traveled to Leicester Square, and took refuge with Mr. Griggs.
“It feels like sneaking away,” Stacie had confessed as they’d jolted over the cobbles.
Frederick had grinned. “That’s because it is.”
Griggs had received the book Stacie had ordered, Courvoisier’s Arrangements for Harp. She fell on it, eagerly turning the pages.
Along with Griggs, Frederick indulgently watched the joy and delight in her face.
When she finally looked up, blue eyes shining, and shut the book, Frederick reached for it. “May I?”
She smiled and slid the book to him, then turned to Griggs, exclaiming over the excellence of his contacts on the Continent and arranging for him to send her his bill, before settling to discuss another book.
Frederick studied her new tome. When, eventually, Stacie and Griggs glanced his way, Frederick looked up and met Stacie’s eyes. “If you would like, from this”—he lifted the book—“I could create piano accompaniments to these songs.”
Her eyes widened. “You could?” When he nodded, her face lit again. “Thank you—that would be wonderful!”
Smiling, Frederick set the book by her elbow and joined her and Griggs in a lengthy discussion of their shared obsession.
Thursday evening saw them at yet another major ball. The Season had commenced in earnest, and Lady Cartwright’s ballroom was packed. It seemed to be a night where many of those who had been present at Stacie’s musical evening just a week before sought out her and Frederick, to offer their congratulations in person and also to inquire as to their plans.
As many of those inquiring had every reason to expect to be invited to a wedding that would link two marquessates, Stacie and Frederick had to grin and bear with the incessant questions with what civility they could muster.
After one such encounter, Frederick met Stacie’s eyes and laconically arched an eyebrow. “I’ve said the same thing so often in recent days, the phrases just roll off my tongue.”
She pulled an expressive face. “Sadly, it’s only to be expected. As we effectively sprang the initial event on them, now, no one wants to be behindhand with our news.”
They continued to play their parts and circulated through the milling throng, occasionally being separated by the crowd and by connections of Frederick’s or Stacie’s wanting to privately bend their ears.
While both of them were experienced in ton ways and, however reluctantly, at home in this sphere, and both had grown sufficiently at ease with their situation to deal with any and all interrogations, Frederick noted that, when separated, more or less instinctively they gravitated back to the other’s side.
Not because either needed the support of the other but simply because they preferred each other’s company.
That was a somewhat surprising and rather refreshing realization.
Tonight, Stacie looked ravishing in a draped silk gown in a particular hue of magenta that rendered her dark hair and dramatic features even more eye-catching than usual, while the silk lovingly caressed her generous curves, in Frederick’s opinion drawing far too many male eyes.
Just how aware he was of that was another telltale realization.
Among the compliments showered upon her, he again heard the apparently perennial comment comparing her to her mother. Alert, he watched her exceedingly closely and, from the faint tightening about her eyes and luscious lips, judged his earlier supposition that she viewed such compliments in a negative light to be correct.
She hid her reaction, doubtless understanding that the ladies who so gushingly pressed the comparison on her intended to be kind. As they parted from the latest unintentionally offending lady and moved on through the crowd, he tried to put a name to the emotion he sensed such comments evoked in Stacie. It wasn’t offense, not really; it wasn’t resentment, either. She wasn’t angry or annoyed or sad.
He felt her reaction—understanding it—was important, that it might hold a clue to her stance on marriage, although he couldn’t see why being told she was “just like her mother” in a comparison based solely on physical resemblance should cause her to reject the married state.
While Stacie was aware that Frederick was studying her, she didn’t feel she had to shield herself from him; like her brothers, he was one of those men in whose company she felt entirely relaxed. At base, it came down to the fact that she trusted him. Indeed, she had from the first.
They continued to play the game they’d embarked on, deliberately deceiving the ton, and as they passed from one group of her ladyship’s guests to the next, Stacie inwardly and rather guiltily admitted she was actually enjoying her role.
Being Frederick’s fiancée… Essentially, she was savoring an experience she’d never thought to have, being the affianced bride of a thoroughly eligible nobleman. It was another piece of the silver lining of their situation; courtesy of Fate’s interference in their lives, she could experience this, and all in complete safety, both hers and Frederick’s.
I might as well enjoy it to the full.
She could see no reason why she shouldn’t, so she lowered her guard another inch and actively embraced the moment.
She’d slipped into the withdrawing room and was behind one of the screens when she heard several ladies—at least three—gossiping about her. About the engagement. Unable to help herself, she paused where she was and listened.
“Ah, but the source of tension won’t be the Cavanaughs or the Bramptons, my dear. I note Lady Halbertson hasn’t shown her face tonight. Understandable, but telling, don’t you think?”