An Heiress at Heart (19 page)

There was a light tap at the door, and Lady Thornborough entered, her dark silk dress shimmering in the candlelight. Her gray eyes shone, set off to best advantage by the gleaming jet-black broach on her dress. “I cannot believe the vision in front of me,” she said, her face alight with pride. She placed a gentle hand on Lizzie’s cheek. “It’s as if the trials of these past few years have been wiped away. You are older in experience, perhaps, and yet still so beautiful. What an enviable advantage for any woman to have!” She continued to inspect Lizzie. “You have your mother’s slender figure, although you did not grow nearly as tall as we thought you might.” She gently tilted Lizzie’s face to one side and studied her profile. “I cannot say that I see much of her face in yours.”

Lizzie’s chest tightened. Lady Thornborough’s attempts to find similarities with Ria’s mother would, of course, be fruitless. She stepped back, straightened to her full height, and exclaimed, “I am sure I am quite tall! I shall positively tower over half the men at Lord Beauchamp’s ball.”

“I doubt that,” Lady Thornborough said with a smile. “However, there is no doubt that you have your father’s eyes—and his confident look. At times I fancy that I see him in you.”

Now here was a topic Lizzie did not wish to avoid. She had gazed at Herbert’s portrait many times over the
past few weeks, looking for traces of herself in him. “Do I really favor him?”

“There is no doubt in my mind,” Lady Thornborough answered.

“Dearest Grandmamma.” Lizzie’s voice caught in her throat. It was easy to address her that way now. She fully believed she was a Thornborough—not the one everyone believed her to be, but a Thornborough nonetheless.

Lizzie turned to check the mirror one last time, but Lady Thornborough took her by the arm. “You have spent more than enough time on your toilette, dear. The carriage is waiting.”

“I blame Martha for my tardiness,” Lizzie said gaily. “She spent ages on my hair.”

With the barest smile, Martha replied, “It might not have taken so long, madam, if you had remained still.”

Lizzie gave an exaggerated sigh. “Isn’t that just the worst irony of life? The more excited I am to get out of this chair, the longer it takes.”

Lizzie followed Lady Thornborough out the door of the bedchamber and down the hall. She paused as they were about to descend the stairs.

“What is it, dear?” Lady Thornborough asked.

“I’ve forgotten my fan.” She turned back toward her room. “I’ll only be a moment.”

When Lizzie entered her room, she found Martha sitting at the dressing table, staring pensively at a small framed silhouette of Ria. She jumped up when she saw Lizzie, looking as though she had been caught doing something wrong. Lizzie wondered what train of thought she had interrupted. “I’ve come back for my fan,” she said, trying to keep any unease from sounding in her voice.

Martha snatched it up and placed it in Lizzie’s hands. “How careless of me not to notice.” She did not meet Lizzie’s eye.

“That silhouette never did me justice, you know,” Lizzie said. “The artist was far too kind about the shape of my nose.” It was true that when Lizzie and Ria were compared side by side in profile, their noses were clearly different. Lizzie had always considered Ria to have the prettier of the two; her own was a tad straighter and longer. “They will pander to one’s vanity if they think they will get more money for it, after all.”

Martha did not know how to appear to answer this remark, since by agreeing with Lizzie, she would seem to be agreeing that her mistress was perhaps less than beautiful.

“Martha,” Lady Thornborough called from the hallway. “I need you to fetch my smelling salts from the parlor.”

“Grandmamma, however, is delightfully misguided about my charms,” Lizzie said with a playful grin. “She believes the ladies at the ball will faint with envy when they see me!”

Martha’s gap-tooth smile reemerged, as did her placid demeanor. Even so, Lizzie worried that she had not managed to entirely erase any doubts that might have been in the old servant’s head: from the corner of her eye she saw Martha give one more furtive glance at the silhouette before following her out.

*

“The ladies certainly are taking their time,” Geoffrey remarked, looking at his pocket watch yet again. He had
been waiting in the Thornboroughs’ library with James for what seemed like an age, keenly anticipating seeing Ria again. Each hour he’d spent with her over the past several weeks increased his desire to see her more, like some kind of inverted appetite that grew sharper with each morsel of food.

“Her tardiness is to be expected,” James said. “Ria is such a vain creature, you know.” He checked his lapel and flicked some minuscule fleck of dust off his coat sleeve as he spoke, causing Geoffrey to wonder briefly who was the more vain of the two.

Geoffrey noticed a slender book that was poking out from under a pile of newspapers lying on the table next to him. He pulled it out and opened it to the title page. It was a volume of poetry by Lord Tennyson. “Is this yours?”

James shook his head. “I find poetry deadly dull, except for a few sonnets that can be read aloud to garner the right reactions from the ladies.”

Geoffrey suspected that James’s arsenal of poetic overtures was probably small, but effective.

“Ria’s been reading that book,” James explained.

“Has she?” Geoffrey said, bemused. “I don’t recall hearing that Ria cared for poetry.”

“It seems to be something she picked up in Australia.”

“Picked up?” Geoffrey smiled. “You say that as though poetry were a disease of some kind.”

“So it is, as far as I’m concerned.”

“I happen to like poetry,” Geoffrey said.

“Well, that’s one more thing you two have in common, then.” He gave Geoffrey a knowing look. “Who knew you and Ria would have so many similar interests?”

“Yes,” Geoffrey murmured. “Who knew?” He leafed
through the tiny volume. It opened on a poem entitled “Adeline.” He began to read.

“Mystery of mysteries,

Faintly smiling Adeline,

Scarce of earth nor all divine,

Nor unhappy, nor at rest,

But beyond expression fair

With thy floating flaxen hair;

Thy rose-lips and full blue eyes…”

Geoffrey scarcely realized he was reading aloud until James remarked, “Now
there
is poetry I could use—if I were courting a blonde, of course.”

“With thy floating flaxen hair…”

The author might as well have called the poem “Victoria,” he thought with a start.

“Thy rose-lips and full blue eyes…

Take the heart from out my breast.”

Just then Ria appeared in the doorway, breathtaking in a shimmering blue silk gown. Diamonds sparkled at her throat and wrist.
“Wherefore those dim looks of thine—shadowy, dreaming Adeline?”
Her blond ringlets bounced a little as she spoke, drawing attention to her violet-blue eyes, which the dress seemed to have brought out and darkened. Her voice, too, seemed deeper. Sultry, almost.

Geoffrey stood up, closing the book, acutely aware
his hands were shaking.
Take the heart from out my breast.
He cleared his throat. “I see you know the poem.”

Ria nodded. “Edward used to quote it often, except he would change ‘Adeline’ to ‘Ria mine.’ He used to say that Tennyson’s muse must look exactly like… me.” She laughed softly. “I used to chide him for it, but now I would give anything to hear him reading that poem again.”

The room grew still. Geoffrey stared at her in quiet fascination. Even James appeared taken aback by the depth of feeling in Ria’s words.

He could picture Edward reading this poem to her. Like James, Edward had probably used romantic poetry for the artful seduction of the ladies. But Geoffrey had the sense that, for his brother, things would have changed dramatically when it came to Ria. Edward would have spoken the words with more depth than even the poet himself could have intended. He would have joyfully lost himself in her exquisite beauty.

Even as he was.

Every nerve in his body thrummed with this knowledge. He was beginning to care for Ria in dangerous and forbidden ways.
Be careful, man,
he warned himself.
This is your brother’s widow.

Ria closed the book and wiped a tear from her eye. Even in sorrow she was more beautiful than the best poet could describe. Geoffrey was discovering to his profound chagrin that the heart could not be reined in as easily as he had once believed.

“Dear Ria.” James took gentle hold of her hand. “You are not alone. You have us.” It was a rare display of genuine tenderness from James. Ria gave him a grateful smile.

Geoffrey was tempted to be envious, seeing how much the two cousins cared for each other. He wished he and Ria might one day share that kind of bond, even if all else was denied him. She turned her stunning eyes in his direction, and he tried to do as James had done, to give her some reassurance. “Though Edward would happily point out that I am a poor second, you have me as well.”

She shook her head. “You are your own man, Geoffrey. To say you are a poor second is to do yourself a great injustice.”

As far as Geoffrey was concerned, the Queen herself could not have bestowed a greater honor.

Lady Thornborough entered the room in time to hear Ria’s words. “Who is a poor second?” she asked.

“I am, of course,” James said smoothly. “Ria is lavishing praise upon Geoffrey and utterly forgetting about me.” He gave a dramatic sigh. “Shall I never get the respect due to me as the head of the family?”

“You?” Lady Thornborough countered. “Head of the family?”

“You see?” James indicated his aunt’s incredulous expression. “That is precisely what I mean.”

Ria laughed and took hold of James’s arm. “Well, you
are
the last man standing. There’s something in that.”

“That’s a girl,” James said, patting her hand. “Always looking on the bright side.”

Lady Thornborough looked expectantly at James and Geoffrey. “Are we ready to go, gentlemen?”

As they made their way out to the moonlit night, Geoffrey drew nearer to Ria while James assisted Lady Thornborough into the carriage. He said quietly, “You look lovely this evening.”

He was rewarded by her smile. “Thank you.” Her brow wrinkled just a tiny bit. “You don’t feel I am coming out too soon?”

Geoffrey shook his head. “I’m sure that Edward would not have wanted you to remain a recluse.”

“Grandmamma assured me of that, too, and yet I am glad to hear it from you.”

“Is my opinion really so important to you then?” How far they had come since she had first declared that she did not care what he thought of her. Had she changed? Or had something changed between them?
No,
he said to himself once more.
Do not go down that path. Even if her regard for you grows greater, she thinks only of you as a brother-in-law.

“Geoffrey,” Ria said—his name sounded delightful coming from her
rose-lips
—“if I thought my presence at tonight’s ball would bring disrepute upon either of our families, I wouldn’t go.”

“Trust me, there is nothing shameful in your actions.”

Geoffrey could not say the same for what was going on in his own mind. He helped her into the carriage, and in the close darkness her rose scent reached him with a more intoxicating pull than ever. He would have to be careful to spend no more time with her this evening than would be considered customary. But he would dance with her. This was allowable, and he had no intention of appearing to spurn his sister-in-law. For the first time in longer than he could remember, the right thing to do was the thing Geoffrey also wanted to do above all else.

                                                          
Chapter 19

T
he Reverend the Right Honorable Lord Somerville!”

The footman announced Geoffrey with a booming voice that carried easily across the din of music and conversation. Lizzie’s nerves tingled in anticipation. She must have been gripping James’s arm more tightly than she realized, for he gently loosed her hand, giving her a wink as he did so.

“Relax, cousin,” he said in her ear. “Everyone will love you. They always have.”

“Mr. James Simpson! Mrs. Edward Somerville!” The footman’s voice once again boomed across the ballroom.

Lizzie and James stepped forward to join Geoffrey and Lady Thornborough. Lizzie might well have been stepping out onto a stage—and what an opulent stage it was. From the wide landing where she stood, a long flight of stairs led down to an immense ballroom crowded with men dressed in elegant black or in the rich red of army uniforms, and women arrayed in a rainbow of colors, and everyone pausing to look up at her. She had just made
a very grand entrance indeed. She was breathless, terrified, and ecstatic.