Always a Lady Page 16

  “Or the look on his face when he walked into the chapel stinking to high heaven and the entire assembly shouted, ‘Piss on that and piss on him. I don’t shake hands with or apologize to anyone who insults my mother.’ ”

  As punishment for their disobedience, all of the boys assembled in the chapel that day, except Pool, had all received three stripes of the cane and the forfeiture of dessert puddings for a fortnight.

  But even that had been worth it.

  Kit looked at his friends. “Thank you for protecting me from my enemies and from myself and for always persuading me to see the error of my ways.”

  “That’s what friends are for, old man,” Dalton reminded him. “Now, go do what must be done and apologize to the girl. You hurt her badly.”

  “I humiliated her in front of everyone,” Kit said. “I think it best if I offer my apologies the same way.” He took a deep breath and slowly expelled it. “Now all I have to do is persuade her to come back downstairs.”

  Chapter Eighteen

  Fine words dress ill deeds.

  —GEORGE HERBERT, 1593–1633

  Mariah rolled off the bed and walked to the dressing table, looked in the mirror, and frowned. Her eyes were puffy and her nose was red from crying, and she was glad that no one could see her. She wasn’t a vain person by nature, but she couldn’t stop staring at the reflection she made wearing that blue silk ball gown. She touched the silvered glass, amazed at the luxury of having a looking glass in her room.

  To the sisters at St. Agnes’s, vanity was a sin and mirrors, the devil’s handiwork. And there had been no need for mirrors in the convent. No reason to preen and primp, for the only man with access to it was Father Francis. Besides, everyone in the convent wore black. The sisters wore black habits with scapulars, coifs, white wimples, and black veils. The orphans wore black frocks with black bonnets for outdoors and black caps for indoors, and their hair was always tightly plaited. Black was practical. It was sturdy. It was ugly. Nothing like the wonderful blue silk evening gown she was wearing now.

  Nothing like the wonderful blue silk evening gown Kit had despised on sight.

  Mariah sniffled and blinked back the tears that were hovering at the base of her eyelashes. How many times must she remind herself that crying never did any good? Crying never changed anything. It made her eyes and her throat burn, stuffed up her nose, and left her with a throbbing head, but it never solved any of her problems.

  And it did nothing to alleviate the pain that Kit’s unexpected reaction to the sight of her in her ball gown had caused or the way his hateful words seemed to embed themselves on her heart and in her mind. So she’d never had to use any but the most basic of eating utensils like the knife, fork, and spoon. He’d probably never baked six-dozen loaves of bread in a day. Or strawberry tarts. Or dreamed of having the most wonderful white layered wedding cake covered in pink confectioner’s sugar rosebuds … Or dreamed of a wedding at all … At least, not a wedding in which she was the bride …

  Mariah reached up and traced the outline of her bodice. It was daring. After so many years of covering up everything except her hands and face, she’d never dreamed it was not only possible, but permissible to expose this much of her bosom, but Madame Thierry had assured her that all the fashionable ladies in London and Paris wore their dresses this way. Mariah sat perfectly erect. Madame Thierry had praised Mariah’s regal bearing and told her that she wore her clothes like a duchess. Mariah smiled. She could thank the nuns for that as well. Perfect posture was a sign of discipline. And Mariah understood discipline better than most. Reverend Mother had insisted upon it.

  Mariah stared at the reflection in the mirror and saw her mother. She’d spent the past fifteen years staring up at the stars from the tower ruins hoping to find her mother. Hoping to catch a glimpse of her mother smiling back at her. All those years she’d wished upon the stars for her mother to come back and get her. Mariah swiped at the solitary tear rolling down her face with the back of her hand. All those years she had followed her mother’s advice and looked to the stars, but all she’d ever really needed was a mirror.

  For the face staring back at her was the one she remembered. They shared the same hair and eyes and nose and mouth and chin, the same bone structure. The same firm jaw.

  Her mother had worn dresses similar to this one, colorful dresses made of muslin and lightweight silks and satins in summer and soft warm velvet and wool in the winter. And jewelry. Her mother had worn jewelry.

  Mariah stood up and walked over to the wardrobe. There, in the top drawer, in the back behind her extra set of unmentionables and the little monogrammed handkerchief, was the linen drawstring sack Reverend Mother had given to her. The linen drawstring sack that contained the jewelry her mother had been wearing the last time Mariah had seen her.

  She pushed the wardrobe drawer closed and walked back to the bed. She climbed up onto it, sat down, untied the drawstring bag, and poured the contents onto the coverlet. Out tumbled a pair of diamond stud earrings, two pins, one an ivory cameo on a pink background, and the other a gold chatelaine with a lady’s timepiece attached. The last piece of jewelry was her mother’s betrothal ring—a single large blue stone set in gold and accented by a ring of diamonds. Mariah stared at the mound of jewelry. Her mother’s jewelry. Her jewelry. She picked up the ring and slipped it onto her finger, then pressed her hand against the folds of her skirt. Slightly darker than the pale blue of the silk, the color of the stone looked lovely against the fabric of her dress.

  Mariah suddenly wondered how Madame Thierry had managed to construct a ball gown to fit her on such short notice. She shrugged her shoulders at the thought. Making dresses was Madame’s occupation, just as baking bread and pastries had been hers. A good baker always kept the needed ingredients at hand, and Mariah supposed a dressmaker was no different. She studied the remaining cache of family heirlooms and decided that she would have Madame Thierry fashion dresses to match all of her jewelry. A pink one to match the cameo and others in blue and green and red and yellow and lavender and purple …

  She wanted dresses in every color of the rainbow. She wanted dresses in every color except black. She never wanted to wear black again as long as she lived.

  Mariah picked up the diamond earrings. She remembered her mother wearing them. She remembered the diamonds; only Mariah hadn’t called them diamonds back then. She had called them twinkles. Because they twinkled like stars. She always thought of her mother when she looked at the stars.

  But Mariah wasn’t thinking of her mother now. She was thinking of Kit.

  Kit who had accused the dressmaker of making her look like a whore instead of a lady. Kit, who regarded her as an obligation to be endured and then discharged. Kit, who didn’t remember who she was or care that he had wounded her so badly. If only he hadn’t taken such a dislike to her evening gown … If only she hadn’t had such high expectations … If only he had remembered and kept his promise …

  She glanced over at the bedchamber door. She wasn’t sure she would forgive Kit if he did come knocking at the door. He was already late. He was supposed to run after her, fall to his knees, kiss the hem of her skirt, and beg her forgiveness. That’s what always happened in the stories her mother used to tell her, and in the copy of Grimm’s Fairy-Tales, her mother used to read to her, the prince always did everything he could to make the princess happy. And perhaps that was the problem. Mariah frowned. Kit wasn’t a prince. He was an earl. Perhaps earls were different. Perhaps the rules governing princely behavior didn’t apply to earls. Or perhaps the rules governing princely behavior only applied if the female in question was a princess.

  And if that was the case, Kit might never run after her or fall to his knees and kiss the hem of her skirt and beg her forgiveness because she wasn’t a princess. She wasn’t really even a lady. She had been born one, but she didn’t remember how to be one. The best she could hope for, at the moment, was that he consider her to be almost a lady.

  Mari
ah glanced down at the blue ring on her hand. Looking at it made her feel good and wearing it made her feel closer to her mother. Her mother had been a lady, and a lady always wore jewelry.

  She smiled at the thought, then picked up the pink cameo and pinned it in the center of her bodice, below her breasts, taking great care not to damage the silk. When that was done, she took great care in pinning the lady’s timepiece on the left side of her bodice. All that remained was the pair of diamond earrings. She scooped up the diamond studs and rolled off the bed. Her mother had worn them all the time. They had been her favorite pair, and Mariah always loved the way they caught the light and sparkled. She walked to the dressing table and sat down on the stool so she could put them on in front of the mirror and see if they sparkled on her. But the earrings wouldn’t go on. They were made to go through the earlobes. She couldn’t wear them. Her earlobes didn’t have holes for them. She had no choice except to do without them.

  She was disappointed, but she would get over it. Disappointment was a part of life, and she had already learned to manage fifteen years of disappointment. One more wouldn’t matter.

  * * *

  Kit took a deep breath, murmured a fervent prayer of contrition, and knocked on Mariah’s door.

  “Who is it?” came the muffled reply from the other side of the door.

  “Kit.”

  “I don’t know anyone named Kit.”

  Her words were precise and clipped, the tone very cold, very English. The Irish lilt he found so enchanting was gone, and Kit deeply regretted the loss.

  “That’s right,” he agreed. “You’ve never been introduced to Kit. You’ve only met the dunderheaded fool who goes by the name of Lord Kilgannon.” He pressed his forehead against her door. “I know that you’re—”

  Mariah cut him off. “You know nothing about me.”

  “I know that you’re angry with me,” he said. “And you’ve every right to be. My behavior this afternoon was appalling.”

  “That it was.”

  A hint of the Irish lilt had returned.

  “I’m trying to apologize.”

  “Not very successfully,” she retorted.

  “Does that mean you’re not going to forgive me?” Kit asked.

  “It means you’re going to have to try harder.”

  “I’m standing in the hallway shouting through a door trying to tell you that I’m sorry,” Kit said loudly. “The entire household—even Sister Mary Beatrix—can hear me.”

  “I suppose that’s only fair,” Mariah reminded him. “Since the entire household heard you insult Madame Thierry and the beautiful dress she brought for me to try on, I suppose it’s only right and proper that they hear you offer your apologies.”

  “My sentiments exactly,” Kit told her. “I’m sorry. I apologize. I love the dress. It’s a beautiful dress and you look beautiful in it. Now, won’t you please open the door and allow me to introduce you to Kit Ramsey?”

  “No.”

  “Why not?”

  “I’ve no guarantee that Lord Kilgannon won’t return.”

  “You have my word as a gentleman …”

  “A fat lot of good that does me!” The Irish in her voice returned with a vengeance. “Seeing as how you were such a gentleman to me earlier.”

  “Miss Shaughnessy,” Kit pleaded. “Mariah, I promise—”

  The door to her bedchamber opened so quickly Kit nearly fell into the room. He collided with her, placing his arms about her waist to keep them both from falling.

  With his hands nearly spanning her waist, Kit felt the soft silk beneath his palms and the curve of her hips below it. She still wore the blue silk evening gown. Seventeen. The number popped into his brain and Kit realized that both he and the dressmaker had been right. Mariah’s waist was that small, and the bodice of her dress was cut too damned low. So low that it easily afforded any man who towered above her an incredibly provocative look at her bosom.

  Don’t look down, he told himself, don’t look down. But not looking down took more willpower than he possessed. Especially when the pink cameo she was wearing drew his attention like a big, red X marked on a treasure map.

  Kit looked and the sight of her beautiful, creamy white breasts was one he would remember the rest of his life.

  “You promise? You promise?” Mariah gave an unladylike snort. “Don’t be promising me anything else as Lord Kilgannon or as Kit Ramsey because I don’t believe your promises anymore.”

  “When have I ever made you a promise I didn’t keep?”

  Mariah almost told him, but the genuine look of righteous indignation on his face was a thousand times more painful than the hurt he’d caused her earlier. “If you don’t remember,” she whispered, “I’m not going to remind you.”

  Kit pulled his gaze away from her bosom and looked into her eyes. The expression of raw pain on her face cut him to the bone. “All right,” he surrendered. “I admit that I promised you a London season, and I was about to renege on the promise by packing my bags and heading back to England. But I’ve changed my mind and I’m standing good for it.”

  Mariah gave him a look of haughty disdain. “I’d rather marry the squire, receive my fortune, and have done with it.”

  “Not on your life!” His whole body vibrated with anger. “I promised you a London season, and that’s what you’re going to get.”

  “I don’t want it.”

  “That’s too damned bad. The dressmaker will be staying here at the castle until she completes the fittings for your wardrobe. Your lessons begin in the morning. Be dressed and downstairs at seven.” He turned on his heel and started down the stairs. “We have a lot of work to do and only a few short weeks in which to accomplish it.”

  “Why not save yourself the work?” she challenged. “I doubt the squire will mind.”

  “Believe it or not, that’s exactly what I planned to do when I returned from the village this afternoon.”

  Mariah held her breath, closed her eyes, and began to pray. Be careful what you ask for because you just might get it.

  “I planned to pack my bags, cut my losses, go back to England, and leave you and the castle to its fate.”

  “What stopped you?”

  Kit didn’t know what had stopped him or when he’d changed his mind. All he knew was that, suddenly, he had no desire to run home to Swanslea Park unless Mariah Shaughnessy was with him. When he returned, it would be to help her make her debut. Last night, he’d been planning to send her to London and let his mother and sister teach her what she needed to know. And this afternoon he’d decided to toss it all and leave her to the squire or whoever else took a fancy to her. But all of a sudden he was excited by the challenge of molding her into a lady that anyone would be proud to offer for. Maybe it was something Ash had said about promising oneself that things would be different, but all at once he wanted to give her the opportunity to try. “Let’s just say I like a challenge.”

  “Let’s just say that’s a horrible thing to say. I may not have grown up with the same opportunities you’ve had to learn the rules of society, but I’m no dockside whore, either, and I resent being treated as if I were a project you must accomplish.”

  “I apologize once again,” Kit said. “I didn’t mean to imply that you were a project or compare you to a prostitute. The challenge to which I refer is the time constraint. My mother and sister have been planning Iris’s coming out for nearly six months. We have less than half that time.”

  “You threatened to marry me off to the squire without a backward glance if I uttered a single complaint,” she reminded him. “And in all honesty, I must admit that I complained about your manners.”

  “A minor slip of the tongue, I’m sure.” He smiled at her. “And one I’ve chosen to overlook.”

  “Why?”

  “Because I like a challenge and because Father Francis promised your mother he’d see to it that you had your coming out.”

  “My mother isn’t here any longer,” Mariah
said softly. “She isn’t going to be disappointed.”

  “What about you?” he asked. “Aren’t you going to be disappointed? You told me a London season was what you wanted, and I promised you and Father Francis that you would have it, and by God, I’m going to keep that promise if it kills me.” He turned on the stair and met her unflinching gaze. “I’m going to keep that promise if it kills us both. You can serve yourself up to the squire like a sacrificial lamb if you want to, but it’s going to be after you’ve made your bow and had your coming out, because I always keep my promises.”

  Mariah looked him right in the eye. “I’m heartened to hear it, Your Lordship,” she retorted. “Because I intend to see that you do!”

  Taking a step back, Mariah punctuated her intention by slamming her bedchamber door so hard it rattled in its frame.

  * * *

  Kit met Ash and Dalton at the foot of the stairs. “I apologized,” he snapped.

  “Is that what you call it?” Ash’s eyes twinkled with mirth.

  “Why?” Kit demanded. “What would you call it?”

  “A prelude,” Dalton answered.

  “A prelude to what?” Kit was rapidly losing patience with the wordplay.

  “That remains to be seen.” Ash grinned. “But from what I can discern about the topic, I’m fairly certain that what just took place here is a prelude to a rather passionate marriage.”

  Dalton nodded his head in agreement and began to laugh.

  Kit gritted his teeth, then stalked off toward his office with the sound of his friends’ laughter ringing in his ears. “Go to hell. Both of you.”

  Chapter Nineteen

  We forgive to the extent that we love.

  —LA ROUCHEFOUCAULD, 1613–1680

  Kit thought that he and Mariah had finished with each other for the evening. She hadn’t appeared at supper, and Kit hadn’t had the stomach for forcing her. He’d simply instructed the housekeeper to have Cook send a tray to her room.