“There you are.”
Alex’s fork nearly toppled from her fingers. She’d been in the breakfast room, eating eggs and fruit, when her sister found her. Alex glanced around the room. No. No one else was there. Lavinia must be speaking to her.
“You’re looking for me?” Alex asked incredulously.
“Yes, you, silly,” Lavinia said with a long-suffering look on her face.
Alex laid down her fork and watched warily as her sister approached. Lavinia never ate in the breakfast room. She always had her breakfast sent up, and Mother didn’t dare gainsay her. For Lavinia to be up and dressed at this hour of the morning and to make an appearance in the breakfast room … something was definitely not right.
Lavinia sailed around the edge of the gleaming wooden table and took a seat directly across from Alex. Then she folded her hands together in front of her and leaned across them.
“What … what is it?” Alex asked hesitantly, watching her sister as if she were a wildcat of some sort that might very well attack her.
“I wanted to see how your evening went last night.”
“My evening?” Alex’s eyes widened. She jerked her hand and knocked the lid off the delicate china sugar bowl.
“Yes.” Lavinia settled her shoulders.
“What do you mean?” Alex replaced the lid.
Lavinia leaned back in her chair and shrugged. “I merely wondered how your dance with Lord Owen went.”
Alex took a deep breath. Ah, this was what she’d been waiting for. Lavinia couldn’t stand anyone else to receive attention meant for her.
“It was a bit of a bore, to be honest,” she said, hoping her sister couldn’t read the lie in her eyes.
“A bore?” Lavinia sat up straight and blinked.
“Yes.” Alex nodded rapidly.
“Why so?”
Alex affected a long dramatic sigh. “Lord Owen could only talk about you all night.”
“He did?” An unpleasant grin spread across her sister’s face, but a kind of sparkle lit her eyes, too.
“Yes,” Alex continued. “And I hope to cause no offense, but it was hardly interesting for me to answer questions about you all evening.”
Lavinia leaned forward. “What did he want to know?”
Alex sighed again for additional dramatic effect. There was never too much dramatic effect when Lavinia was involved. “He wanted to know what you were like. Your favorite pastimes, your favorite foods, even how you take your tea.”
A catlike smile unfurled across her sister’s face. “He did?”
“Yes. Of course, I didn’t reveal much. I know he was only fishing for information to woo you, and you’ve made it clear that you’re wholly uninterested, haven’t you?”
Lavinia tapped her fingers along the edge of the table. “Yes. Well, perhaps, but he certainly made you the belle of the ball, now, didn’t he? And the rumor on everyone’s lips was that he was taken with you.”
Alex bit her lip. Confound it. Lavinia sounded jealous. That was no good. Alex had been worried that her sister might not take well to her gathering attention from gentlemen, but she couldn’t very well tell Lavinia that she was courting attention from the one man Lavinia had the least interest in.
“Oh no, rest assured. If he was taken with me, it was solely for the purpose of asking about you.”
Lavinia seemed pleased with that answer. “Tell me, have you had any luck finding a suitable suitor for me?”
Alex froze. She hadn’t expected Lavinia to ask so soon. “No. Not yet. But I haven’t given up.”
Lavinia frowned at that answer, but fortunately, Alex was spared additional discussion on the matter when their mother strode into the room. She was wearing an overly formal taffeta confection of an olive hue with a matching turban. Mother loved to overdress. “Oh, there you are, Alexandra. I’ve been looking for you.”
“Me?” Alex blinked. Her mother was rarely looking for her. To be sought after by not one but both of the other ladies in the household today—why, it was unprecedented. Alex glanced at Lavinia. Lavinia looked surprised, too. She shrugged again.
“Yes, you,” Mother continued, bracing her hands on the top of the chair next to Alex.
“Whatever for?” Alex took another tentative bite of eggs. This couldn’t be good. Mother hadn’t said a word about her suitors last night in the coach on the ride home from the Rutherfords’. Though that might well have had something to do with the fact that Alex pretended to promptly fall asleep as soon as they’d all settled into Father’s coach. Of course, Thomas hadn’t believed it for a moment and took great pleasure in elbowing her in the ribs each time the coach jostled. Something told Alex that Mother was about to make up for it.
Her mother raised her eyebrows imperiously. “I saw Lord Owen Monroe dance with you last night.”
“Yes,” Alex replied hesitantly.
“She said he was asking her all about me,” Lavinia added, her nose pointed in the air and a smug smile on her thin lips.
Her mother’s face bloomed with relief. “Oh, that’s good to hear.”
Alex clenched her fist. “Would it be so odd for Lord Owen to be interested in me?” As soon as the words were past her lips, she regretted them. And not just because both Lavinia and Mother instantly laughed, but also because she didn’t want to even hint about her relationship with Owen. Not now, not yet.
But the laughter hadn’t helped. Now Alex was becoming angry. Her cheeks heated. “Who am I? Cinderella?”
“No, of course not, Alexandra, but you’re hardly the sort an experienced gentleman like Lord Owen would look at twice,” her mother said in a tone that was meant to be sympathetic, but came out irritatingly condescending.
Alex braced both elbows on the table. “What sort am I, Mother?”
Lavinia waved a hand in the air. “You know … short, plump, too talkative, too starry-eyed.”
Plump! Alex sucked in a lungful of air through her nostrils. “There’s nothing wrong with being starry-eyed.” She folded her hands together on the table to keep from slapping her sister.
Her mother shook her head. “Of course not, dear. Don’t be so sensitive. I only meant you two don’t suit. That’s hardly news.”
“But you think Lord Owen and Lavinia suit?” Alex replied.
Her mother snapped her mouth shut and glared at her. Obviously, Alex had gotten too close to her secret.
“Don’t be ridiculous,” Lavinia interjected, taking a sip of the juice a servant had promptly delivered to her. “I wouldn’t look twice at a scoundrel like him if he were the last titled lord in London.”
Mother swallowed and turned to Lavinia with a pleading look on her face. “Oh, now, dear, don’t be too hasty. Your father says Lord Owen has quite a future ahead of him in Parliament.”
Lavinia’s eyes nearly bugged from her skull. “You cannot be serious, Mother. Why, you yourself said not a month ago that he was nothing more than a drunken lout. The man actually offered me champagne and seemed put out when I refused it last night.”
Mother wrung her hands. “Yes, well, your father thinks well of him, and it’s made me reconsider.” She didn’t meet Lavinia’s gaze.
Lavinia’s face turned bright red. “Father’s wrong! Owen Monroe would never make a proper husband!”
Oh no. Lavinia was shouting. It was certain to get worse. It always got worse. Mother glanced around frantically, as if searching about the dining table for something else to say.
“Well, he is handsome,” Alex provided.
“Yes!” Mother nodded so hard, her turban nearly flew off her head. “Don’t you think he’s handsome, Lavinia?”
Lavinia scowled. “Who cares what he looks like? His behavior is atrocious. Do you know he actually told me last night that he doesn’t care for horses? Can you imagine?”
“I haven’t heard of anything awful he’s done lately,” Alex added. “The horse comment notwithstanding.”
Lavinia narrowed her eyes and glared at Alex. Among many other things, her sister had never properly appreciated sarcasm.
“That’s quite a good point,” Mother hastened to add, still nodding.
Lavinia’s ears were practically purple. “You two have both lost your wits.”
Mother pointed a finger in the air and eyed her eldest daughter carefully. “He does seem to be enamored of you, dear. Alexandra said so. Doesn’t that count for something?”
Lavinia slapped her palm against the table, making the glasses bounce. “No. No. It does not! I doubt that man knows so much as a line of poetry.”
Well, she couldn’t argue with Lavinia there. Alex calmly smoothed the tablecloth as she met her sister’s angry glare. Sometimes Providence handed you an unexpected gift. The proper reaction, of course, was to take it and use it promptly in thanksgiving. “So you’re saying that no matter what he says or does, nor how much he might hope to woo you, you’ve absolutely no interest whatsoever in Lord Owen Monroe?”
Lavinia turned her head away and sniffed. “Certainly not. None!”
Next Alex turned toward her mother. “And you’re saying that despite the fact that you haven’t always been one of his most vocal supporters, you now actually believe him to be a suitable husband for your daughter?”
Mother swallowed and tugged at the throat of her gown. She turned her gaze to Lavinia. “Yes. If your father accepts him, so do I.”
Lavinia opened her mouth, no doubt to protest further, but Alex stood up and plunked her juice glass down on the table. “Then I don’t see how either one of you could possibly object if I try my luck with him. Good day.”
And with that, Alex flounced out of the breakfast room with an enormous smile on her face.