Page 22 of A Counterfeit Engagement

“Ah, mademoiselle,” Madam Duvall said warmly, “indeed, if I had not already known your wedding was to be so soon, I surely would have guessed it. Now you truly have the blushing, joyful look of the true bride-to-be.”

Sophie did blush indeed, thinking that Madam Duvall little guessed how accurate her words really were.

After all, it was now mere days that she had been a bride-to-be in truth, instead of merely a player in a strange and not entirely welcome game.

But it was necessary to respond, despite all her confusion.

“Thank you, Madam Duvall, you are too kind,” Sophie murmured, taking welcome refuge in social convention.

They had commissioned so many dresses of late, she almost wondered at Madam Duvall taking her measurements afresh, but then, Sophie supposed that was the mark of a true artiste .

She would cut no corners in making their gowns look as close to perfection as human hands could manage.

Isabel and Sophie had consulted long by candlelight over the four dresses to be ordered. Though Isabel had pointed out that, as a duchess, Sophie might easily have a dress made for her wedding and nothing else, Sophie had insisted on it being practical for other occasions as well.

“For,” Sophie had pointed out, “I shall have much joy in wearing it again, and being reminded of our wedding day.” And at that, Isabel had no choice but to admit the force of her argument.

They had decided to ask Madam Duval to show them her finest silks, and allow the choice of material to guide the dress to be made.

At length, they had chosen a material of surprising simplicity.

Sophie had expected, indeed almost planned, to be taken by one with a cunning pattern woven in the delicate threads, but in the end, it was not so.

Her eye had been caught by a bolt of material that would have been utterly plain, were it not for the sheen of the fabric, so lovely and opalescent it almost seemed to catch rainbows.

And when Sophie pointed it out and explained to Isabel, Sarah, and Madam Duvall how it might contrast the lace of her veil, they were equally struck by the vision.

Sophie drifted off into her thoughts as Madam Duval and Isabel began a passionate discussion of each detail.

It was plain to see that Madam Duval was overjoyed to have an informed discussion with one of her customers.

No doubt it was a rather uncommon event.

Without meaning to, Sophie could not help but think again about the two kisses she and Jonathan had shared.

Yes, those kisses had changed both their lives forever, trapped or blessed them both into a marriage neither had truly intended, but she was not thinking of that.

No. Though more than a little shocked at herself for it, Sophie was thinking of how those kisses had felt.

They had awakened something in her, something she still did not entirely understand.

When Jonathan had rescued her from Roger Webb, the fear and fury had still been coursing through her body, leaving her trembling and weak.

He had stood before her, his hands resting so lightly on her arms, and she had wanted.

Wanted him to take her in his arms and shut out all the world, wanted to be close to him, wanted him to touch his lips to hers as she had read in novels.

Then they had come crashing together, drawn as inevitably as the opposing poles of two magnets, and she had realised she knew nothing at all.

His mouth on hers had been no soft, polite touch, but the reflection of desperate hunger.

He had opened his lips and, utterly without thought, she had opened hers to him as well.

So this was a kiss — a true, passionate kiss of the kind only alluded to in books.

Not since the bad old days had she thought about the things Roger had asked for and hinted at while their engagement had lasted.

She had been glad for her heart and for prudence’s sake that she had always rebuffed him.

Now she knew, all the way down to the soles of her feet, that he could never have fit so with her, could never have called forth this response.

“Sophie, what about this one?” Isabel called, holding up a bolt of lace.

Sophie quickly brought herself back to the present.

“It is lovely. Would it be for all three gowns?” she asked.

Perhaps inevitably, the question set off another round of discussion and argument, lace being compared with the fabric selected and with innumerable other laces, until Sophie found herself lost in thought again.

I want more, Sophie thought. I want Jonathan to kiss me again. And perhaps I am no proper lady for it, but I want — him.

I want everything I felt promised in that kiss.

∞∞∞

Alone in his study, Jonathan took up a glass of fine brandy and drank deeply. Had he been asked a year ago, he would have described himself as a happy man, wanting for nothing. He had his dear Sarah, his friends, wealth, a high position in society, and his good name. Those were blessings indeed.

And none of them had lost their value in his eyes. He was as sensible as ever of the blessings he had been given. It was only that a new desire had come into his life, and its urgency, for the moment, had all but eclipsed his old world.

Sophie. Her soft lips, so often curved in a smile.

He could not say which he liked best — the wry smile she wore when discussing the foibles of those around them, a pastime they had been forced to engage in all too often of late, the loving smile he so often saw directed at Isabel, and now at Sarah, too, or the smile he had of late seen directed towards himself.

It was something new to his experience, that smile, and had taken him some effort to decode.

But when he had realised it, when he knew it for the smile of a woman who looks on a man she is glad to call her own —

Jonathan took another sip of the brandy.

It had all been in her eyes as she stood looking up at him, still trembling.

He had seen the fear and anger in them slowly extinguished: she felt safe with him, he knew, and felt that knowledge resonate all through him.

Then her eyes had changed and her lips slightly parted in surprise as the air between them became charged with potential.

Had it been only his own feelings, Jonathan was certain he could have remained in control of his lower instincts. But to look into her lovely face and see his own desire reflected in it, to see her wanting him without even fully understanding what that meant –

He could not regret the kiss in any sense, either in the moment or its consequences.

Their marriage would be both sensible and gratifying to both parties.

Jonathan reflected that he was a lucky man, indeed.

Had Sophie’s head been all stuffed up with visions of romantic love undying, they never could have come to such a beneficial arrangement.