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Glad to be back in London, Izzy sat working, or at least trying to work, at her small table in her room at Chodstone House. The room was smaller than her chambers at Chodstone Hall, but it was cozy and comfortable.
After staring at the blank sheet of paper for who knew how long, Izzy wiped the now dried pen nib as best she could and stood up. Maybe a walk in the garden would clear her head.
She stood at the wardrobe, staring at the clothes without seeing.
Edward wouldn’t stay out of her thoughts. Touching her fingers to her mouth, she could feel his lips, taste that kiss. Tears sprang into her eyes at the thought of never seeing him again, let alone touching him.
She let out a long, noisy breath and snatched up the first spencer in her reach.
It wasn’t as if his sexy form were the only thing she liked about the man. He was everything she had unconsciously wished for in a man. She widened her eyes in surprise. Everything she wanted in a husband. She rubbed her eyes. How would she ever find someone like him again?
Someone who cared about his family, someone who loved children, someone who was kind to those in his employ. She snorted and glared at her reflection in the wall mirror. “Someone who is engaged to be married to someone else.”
With the spencer in hand, she plopped onto the bed. “What should I do?”
She thought about her own time. She loved and missed her family and her own room in the family house. She fit in there, at least to the outside viewer. She was a respected writer and her own boss, but somehow that was never enough to make her feel she truly fit in. She always felt out of step, no matter how busy she kept––and she was always busy. There was always something she could do, whether it was writing, organizing her schedule, lunching or dining with agents, publishers, directors, script writers. She huffed. But had she been happy? If she was honest––and she always tried to be, at least with herself––she wasn’t. She was always trying to find that safe place, the place where she fit.
In 1812, though, she drew comfort from the rules of society. She liked them, and even though she wasn’t busy every moment of the day, she didn’t care. A walk in the garden filled her with satisfaction like no seven-figure contract ever could. She enjoyed the manners of the time, the courtesy, and especially the chivalry. Edward had saved her life, for gosh sake. She couldn’t think of one man who would risk his neck for her in modern times.
Laying the spencer over her lap, she absently picked at a small loose thread. But she definitely didn’t fit outwardly in Edward’s time. If there were to be any chance, she could stay where she was, she would have to learn how to go on. She smiled at that turn of phrase in her thoughts. Even now, she was beginning to think in the way people of this era spoke.
She snorted and immediately berated herself for the unladylike noise.
“Maybe... no––mayhap––I can stay.”
The words appeased her soul. She laughed. Cheerful once again, she pulled on the spencer as she stood up. And there was a spring in her step as she made for the door. She paused. Edward’s marriage notice in the paper that morning popped back into her mind.
Well, he wasn’t the only reason she wanted to stay. He was a big reason, a major reason, an enormous reason, but not the only reason. The time suited her perfectly even if she couldn’t have Edward. Oh, but to have him would be so sublime.
Vera Crompton’s sour image appeared in her mind. How he could agree to live a lifetime with that cow, she didn’t know. She shuddered. But then Michael’s smiling face replaced Vera’s. Of course, Edward felt responsible for his friend’s son. Izzy knew he loved the boy, and Michael was the sweetest little thing she had known, so she understood why.
As her hand touched the door handle, a knock sounded on the other side. She opened it and stared at the silver tray the butler was holding.
“You have a caller, Miss Davis.”
She questioned him with a look, expecting him to tell her who.
He angled his head and gave a slight nod to the tray.
Izzy followed his eyes. The only thing on the tray was a small folded card.
She snapped the card up. “Couldn’t you just tell me who it is?”
Unfolding the card, Izzy noted his lips twitch in a hidden smile and she wondered just how much Hampton knew. He never seemed perturbed at her lack of regal manners. In fact, the lack of them seemed to amuse him. She wondered then what the other servants thought of her, but her thoughts stopped there. The card was Lady Vera Crompton’s calling card. Izzy had to stop herself from rolling her eyes. It was as if her thinking about the woman had somehow summoned her.
Plonking the card back on the tray, she said, “Thank you, Hampton. Where did you put her?”
“Lady Crompton is in the front parlor, miss. Would you like tea served?”
Rum and coke, please. But she nodded. “Yes, thank you.”
With that, she swept by the butler and made her way down the stairs. Pausing outside the parlor, she took a breath and let it out slowly. Keep calm, keep calm.
Vera, seated on the blue settee, looked to all the world like a princess with her pink day dress and straight back, although to Izzy’s eyes, the small puffy sleeves only accentuated the width of her shoulders. The sneer on the woman’s upper lip suggested Lady Crompton thought herself in some stench-filled sewer pit instead of Chodstone’s lovely blue parlor scented by freshly cut roses and lavender.
“Lady Crompton.” Izzy made her appearance with a small bob of a curtsy. She wasn’t going to go all out for the woman, especially when Vera had that you’re-so-less-than-me look on her face.
She didn’t even bother to stand but instead honored Izzy with the slightest bow of her head. “Miss Davis.” She smiled but only with her mouth. “How good to see you.”
Taking the chair near the low table, Izzy said, “And you.”
“It is such a lovely day out today I was wont to take a walk, and I thought, how nice to visit Miss Davis and His Grace.”
“I’m afraid His Grace is out at present.”
She waved her hand. “No matter. Have you received an invitation to the Marchioness of Brampton’s soirée tonight?”
“Yes, I believe we did.”
“Divine. The on-dit has it that the marchioness’s daughter has a beautiful voice for singing opera. I am so looking forward to hearing her.”
“I am too.” Izzy stopped a frown from lining her forehead and kept her expression as pleasant as possible. The woman was up to something, but she couldn’t for the life of her think what. She couldn’t fault her manners, and Vera did seem truly excited by the prospect of the soirée, but something in her eye had Izzy fidgeting with her skirt.
She clasped her hands in her lap.
Vera smiled a cat-who-caught-a-mouse smile. “Have you seen the papers this morning?”
“Yes.” Izzy had a hunch her real reason for visiting was about to be revealed.
“I knew the banns were to be posted today but I had no idea the date for the marriage would be so soon. I am beside myself with excitement that Edward went out of his way to obtain a special license.”
Izzy blanched. A special license? Was he so angry that James had announced she was engaged to him that he would hurtle headlong into a loveless marriage? She hadn’t had the chance to speak to him after that night but now she decided she must, and soon.
Vera wasn’t finished with her, though. “You don’t believe Edward would be honorable to someone as inconsequential as you, do you? That little escapade in the garden at Chodstone Hall was his way of saying goodbye to his roguish ways. Of course, he might have seen you as a possible mistress, but I have put my foot down about that. I will not put up with my husband taking mistresses like the rest of the gentry, and he has promised not to do so.”
The butler knocked and pushed the slightly open door out of his way so he could keep both hands on the tea tray. Vera stood up and wandered to the window as the tray was placed on the table.
Izzy tried to pull up a smile. “Thank you, Hampton.”
He bowed, but Izzy noted the look of concern in his eyes, so she widened her smile before he turned and left.
As if she was just waiting for the sound of the door to close, Vera spun around, her soft-pink muslin floating in the breeze. “You cannot have thought Edward would be interested in you for more than a brief dalliance.”
Heat filled Izzy’s cheeks. “How dare you?”
“You are not suitable to be a countess. Although the ton may never hear of it, you are ruined in Edward’s eyes. He would never lower himself to a match with someone so free with their favors.” She spun on her heels and gazed out of the window. “And to think, you were already affianced to the duke.” She turned back. “I think you will make a poor duchess, but that is the duke’s decision, not mine.”
Izzy stood up, clenching her hands into fists at her sides so hard that her nails bit into the soft flesh of her palms.
Vera swept past Izzy to the door and turned back. “I find I have no liking for tea at this time of day. Good day, Miss Davis.”
The woman’s walking shoes clicked over the tiles of the foyer. Hampton must have been waiting at the door, because there was no stutter in her steps as she clicked down the stairs.
Izzy plonked back down into her chair then leapt back up and started pacing the parlor. Grief ripped through her and she gasped at the strength of the hurt in her heart. She had thought she could live there without Edward. She had thought she could handle him marrying another. But she now knew in her heart, she would be pained to the core every time she saw him with his wife. There was no way her heart could handle watching Edward marry Vera. And to protect herself, she would have to leave. As soon as James returned, she would tell him she had to go home.
As she exited the parlor, Hampton held out another silver tray with a letter on it. Izzy broke the seal and read it. James would be out all day and wasn’t sure when he’d return.
***
Izzy kept herself busy waiting for James to return and was happy to finally get close to the end of her novel, but every minute he was away, it was a minute closer to Edward’s wedding the next day.
By late that evening, Izzy was yawning but tried to stay awake. She needed to leave, and she needed the orb to go. James had the thing locked away. Oh, she understood it was so no one accidentally played with it, but that didn’t make her feel any better at that moment. The darn man always carried his keys with him as well, so she couldn’t even use her ability to sneak and snoop to get the orb.
She had almost drifted to sleep when the sound of carriage wheels crunching on the gravel drive sounded outside. James. She sighed. She would speak to him first thing in the morning.
The next morning, Izzy rushed out of her room and hurried down the stairs at the same time James entered the foyer. He smiled widely at her, so widely that little lines crinkled around his eyes. She had never seen him so happy and she couldn’t help but smile back.
He strode to her. “Let us talk.”
He paused just long enough for her to enter the parlor.
“Please sit,” he said, and once she sat on the settee, he took the wingback chair to her right.
Wondering why he looked so pleased with himself, Izzy straightened her dress over her knees. She gazed at him, waiting.
“I’ve grown fond of you and I dislike seeing you so sad, so I have spent yesterday thinking about what you said about your sister and how she stayed in the past.” He smiled. “And I had luncheon with Alice.”
“Alice?”
“She, too, is fond of you and has concluded she should not have interfered with Edward’s happiness. However, she can’t retract the banns and now they are in place. The haut-monde and the Prince Regent will expect a wedding to take place this day.”
“I know, that’s why I’ve decided to go home.”
“Home?” James raised his brows in surprise. “That’s why I wanted to speak to you. After much thought, I would like you to stay.”
Izzy opened her mouth to tell him she couldn’t, but he held his hand up.
“During my time at Brooks’—”
Izzy couldn’t help interrupting; she hadn’t heard of the place. “Brooks’?”
“A club.”
“Oh, I thought you’d go to White’s.” Nearly every gentleman in the books she read went to White’s.
“Too many Tories spend their time at White’s. Anyway, while I was playing faro with a friend it occurred to me that although you have developed a tendre for Wellsneath, he is by no means the only gentleman of my acquaintance. In fact, my friend, the Viscount Grisham, is a most satisfactory gentleman.”
Tears burned the back of her eyes. “Oh, James, that is so sweet, and if you’d said any of that at Chodstone Hall, everything would have been different, but I can’t now. The man I love is about to be married and I can’t stay and see him with another.”
She stood up and walked to the window. The sky was gloomy with gray clouds meandering over the bleak sky and hiding any sign of the sun. Perfect. She spun back to James, who had also risen and stood watching her. “Please give me the orb. I have to go home.”
The spark went out of James’s eyes. “I am disappointed, but I understand.”