Page 2 of A Diamond for Christmas (Diamonds of the First Water #6)

G eoffrey had never heard of the blasted Chimes family before, but now he intended to know everything he could. He’d done the only gentlemanly thing he could think of in the impossibly awkward situation. Nevertheless, he vowed to see Lady Caroline again.

Even if her mother guarded the castle door like a fire-breathing dragon. A red-headed one at that. Speaking of mothers, his own was no shrinking violet.

“Mother!” he called out as soon as he arrived at his parents’ townhouse on Hanover Square the following morning.

If he wished, he would have inherited it and lived out his days there in later life, except he’d found a residence more in the thick of things on Piccadilly where he intended to raise a family.

Their butler, Mr. Fogerty, didn’t mind when he showed himself into the drawing room to wait.

“Geoffrey,” Lady Marianne Diamond greeted, sweeping in on her satin-slippered feet.

“How wonderful of you to visit but how dreadfully naughty. It’s frightfully early.

The sun is barely up,” she declared, even though it had gone half-past nine.

“Fogerty, bring me a cup of chocolate as soon as you possibly can.”

“Yes, my lady. And for you, my lord?” he addressed Geoffrey, who hadn’t lived there for going on three years .

“Coffee,” Geoffrey said. “With cream. Thank you, Fogerty.”

When the man had gone, Geoffrey turned to his mother, who had seated herself upon the gold velvet sofa.

“What can you tell me of the Chimes family, and why do they hate us?”

He had her attention at the mention of the family’s name.

“Hate us?” She sniffed, then sighed and looked at her nails, plainly stalling.

“Yes, you know them. I can see that.”

“Don’t tell me the frightful Lady Chimes has come back from Bath and brought her handsome, beleaguered husband with her?

It was so pleasant knowing that family was on the other side of England.

I suppose she made a scene. She is the lowest mushroom I can imagine.

I don’t know how Lord Chimes puts up with her. ”

Geoffrey narrowed his eyes. And then, thinking of his mother’s wild youth, considered the most sought-after young lady at the turn of the century, a favorite at King George’s court, he could guess she was involved.

“What did you do to them?” he asked.

“Me?” She was all blue-eyed innocence.

“Yes, you.” He took a seat, determined to hear the whys and the hows of it.

“Why does everyone always think I am responsible when things go badly? Your father used to say I caused those three big stones to fall over at Stonehenge.”

“No, Mother, that was due to frost and happened a long time ago. More recently, if you recall, you caused Lord Spiren to leave Lady Spiren.”

Her nostrils flared. “It was not my fault the man became entirely besotted with me.”

“Perhaps. Perhaps not.” His mother was an unconscionable flirt.

“You are my son, and I will not be interrogated by you,” Lady Diamond declared .

After the chocolate and coffee were served, Geoffrey tried again. “I only want to know why Lady Chimes wouldn’t accept a simple introduction from me. Although come to think of it, she said Father had no honor, not you.”

Instead of being bothered by a slight against her husband, his mother shrugged.

“Coming from a mushroom,” she muttered.

“An attractive one,” he said, trying to learn the truth, all fiery hair and green eyes like her beautiful daughter. “Did Father love her very much?”

“ Pish,” his mother said, and the story came from her lips like water from a fountain.

“It’s the other way around. Lord Chimes adored me, but your father enticed me away from him.

She’s simply annoyed at being chosen second.

She knows if her husband could have had me, she would have ended up some obscure baronet’s wife, or worse, instead of a countess. ”

Geoffrey stirred his coffee. “Are you telling me on behalf of her jealous husband, she considers my father dishonorable? That’s unlikely. After all, Lord Chimes’s loss of you was her gain.”

His mother sipped her chocolate. “There may have been something else.”

“May have been?” Geoffrey prompted.

“Your father may have placed a wager with Lord Chimes and against all odds won, thereby draining the other man’s coffers a little. I don’t think the money mattered. It was the issue of the wager, which I never did suss out.”

Geoffrey sighed. His mother liked to dance and batt her eyelashes and sing, too, whenever asked, and his father liked to laugh and occasionally to gamble. Mostly, they were both harmless since his mother never took her flirtation too far, and his father usually came out on top. But, still!

“Anyway,” his mother asked, “why do you care if you are introduced to Lady Chimes? She’s a bit long in the tooth for you, dear son of mine.” Her familiar, ready laughter erupted .

He didn’t feel like laughing.

“I wanted to dance with her daughter.”

Lady Diamond perked up. “Don’t even think it.”

“Mother, you don’t know the Chimes’s daughter.”

“True, and you don’t either. Only think how she could exact revenge upon her parents’ behalf.

She might lead you on simply to break your heart.

Or worse, lead you down the garden path to ensure a proposal.

The idea of being linked through marriage to Lord and Lady Chimes is absolutely out of the question. ”

“I wouldn’t mind,” he said, thinking again how lovely Lady Caroline was and how sweet her lips.

“Not you ! Us!” she said. “Your father and I could hardly invite them over for supper, could we? It would be excruciating.”

“Liable to end in a duel if you behaved as your normal self,” Geoffrey suggested.

“Preposterous,” his mother said. Then added, “But entirely likely. Thus, the answer is no, no, no!”

“I wasn’t asking your permission,” Geoffrey reminded her. He would dance with, kiss, and marry whomever he damn well pleased.

His mother rolled her eyes. “Never mind. I don’t need to do anything to stop this carriage wreck. Lord and Lady Chimes won’t let you within a furlong of their precious daughter. Mark my words.”

“Why won’t you tell me?” Caroline demanded of her mother as soon as the ball ended, and they were in their carriage, on the way home to Upper Brook Street near Grosvenor Gate. Her parents had purchased the residence upon returning from fifteen years in Bath.

Her mother had refused to speak of the Diamonds at all. But her aunt raised a single perfectly auburn eyebrow, and Caroline knew she would find her answers the following day.

Thus, taking her maid, Caroline went directly to the home of her mother’s sister at the polite hour of two o’clock. If they hadn’t been out late at the ball, then she might have gone at regular visiting hours, beginning at eleven, but she knew Aunt Cordelia wouldn’t have yet awakened.

As it was, her aunt, while still wearing her dressing gown and house slippers, invited Caroline upstairs to her bedchamber.

“We’ll take tea in here,” Cordelia told her maid, and they sat on the soft, blue velvet chairs by her aunt’s window overlooking Berkeley Square. “You want to know about that dash-fire, Diamond, don’t you?”

Caroline smiled. “Yes!”

“What a family!” her aunt exclaimed.

“Tell me,” Caroline insisted.

“His mother was a stunner. She still is, I would warrant, although I haven’t seen her in ages. She caught your father’s eye, along with every man’s, in her first year out in society. My sister saw it all. You know she loved your father at first sight but was too shy to tell him.”

“My mother ... shy?” Caroline mused.

“You become more of a tiger with age, dear girl, especially after having children. You and your two brothers are her whole life. And your father’s, too, of course.”

Caroline contemplated her mother as a young, unsure woman. It was hard to do.

“So, Father fell for Lady Diamond —”

“ Before she was Lady Diamond,” her aunt reminded her.

“It was anyone’s guess whose lady she would become.

I believe for a little while, your father thought she would become his Lady Chimes.

And then Diamond decided he wanted her for himself.

I believe he secured her by compromising her.

A little scandal brewed, and then suddenly, they had announced their engagement. ”

“Really!” Caroline’s imagination took flight. After having gazed into the younger Diamond’s blue eyes, she could well believe he might get her into a compromising situation with a crook of his finger.

On the other hand, what if it had been a forced marriage? “Maybe Lady Diamond really loved my father but had to marry Lord Diamond,” Caroline considered.

Her aunt wrinkled her nose and shook her head. “I think she knew exactly what she was doing and whom she wanted. In any case, with her out of the way, your father noticed your mother. And that, as they say, was that.”

“And my mother disapproves of Lord Diamond because of his rakish behavior with Lady Diamond?” Caroline asked. “That seems absurd, considering he cleared the way for Father to be with Mother.”

“I think my dear sister states that she dislikes Lord Diamond but is actually still a bit green at the gills over Lady Diamond, although she shouldn’t be. Your father was absolutely besotted with your mother from their first dance, and he’s been a devoted husband ever since.”

“I know,” Caroline agreed with a nod. “I’ve seen evidence of their love many times over the years. Just the way they look at one another.”

“Precisely,” her aunt said.

“And does Father dislike the Diamonds, too?”

Aunt Cordelia sipped her tea. “Lord Diamond and your father both belong to White’s. There was a wager. Diamond won.”

“Oh dear,” Caroline said. Her father hated to lose.

“Some said Diamond cheated.”

“At least now I understand why Mother thinks him dishonorable.” And maybe she was correct. “And thus, she’ll never let me have an introduction to his son.”

“It is highly unlikely,” her aunt agreed.