Page 30 of A Duchess of Mystery (The Mismatched Lovers #3)

I sabella stood in front of her cheval mirror admiring her reflection with some satisfaction.

The gold gown, in satin with an embroidered bodice and an overlay of richly embroidered gold net, suited her alabaster skin to perfection.

She patted her hair, which had been piled on her head in curls by Hawkins in a style of artful disarray.

Pearls, on the heads of the pins which held her curls in place, sparkled amongst the rich auburn.

Yes, she looked as near perfect as it was possible to be.

Wait until Richard saw her. All the other girls would fade into the background compared to her and hopefully he would have eyes for no one else.

Of course, she only wanted him to notice her because she couldn’t bear to be anything but the most admired woman in the room.

Didn’t she? No other possible reason. Nothing to do with how handsome he was and how much she…

No. Not at all. She stamped her foot as though to put an end to such thoughts.

It didn’t quite work.

To distract herself, she did a little twirl.

How wonderful it was not to be wearing black.

There was a limit to what could be done with such a dull color, if you could even call it a color.

It was more a non-color, an emptiness, a shadow, that even lace and fine jewelry couldn’t truly garnish enough to make it beautiful, although she’d tried hard to do so for the last two months.

But this… now this dress was divine. And as a duchess, what did she care what people thought or said behind their hands?

Having to pretend to mourn a husband she’d both hated and at times feared had been an almost unbearable burden.

Now she’d made the decision to end that mourning, nothing was going to change her mind.

At least, this was what she was telling herself, although her pounding heart told another story.

No. Determination to stand her ground was everything. She could brazen this out.

Hawkins passed over her long silk gloves, pale gold of course, and she put them on, smoothing out the wrinkles in the delicate fabric and taking the time to admire her slender arms and long-fingered hands.

The gloves reached above her elbows and left only a short section of pale skin visible below the off-the-shoulder elegance of her gown.

Gazing at her decolletage a little ruefully, she gave her small breasts a helping hand, pushing them upwards to gain a little more visibility.

Not that she had any doubt about her attractions for men.

No, she was used to being the honeypot her coterie of bees liked to buzz around, and tonight would be no different.

Let Richard see how very popular she was.

And how beautiful. That would be sure to make him…

What? What was it she wanted him to do? No.

There she was again imagining quite the wrong thing.

No man, still less another Carstairs, was ever coming near her again.

She spotted Hawkins’s purse-lipped expression in the mirror, half pride and half reproval.

Her maid had made it clear that she thought mourning a husband, even a hated one, should go on for at least a year and had huffed her not-quite-silent disapproval more than a few times as she helped her mistress into the gown.

Having been with Isabella since before she married, she considered her length of service meant she had a right to air her views.

Isabella, of course, had ignored her. And not only because a part of Hawkins had also obviously been delighted to be dressing her mistress in something pretty again at last. Silly creature with her old-fashioned fancies.

Isabella glanced at the clock on the mantlepiece.

Eight o’clock already. Their guests had been invited for nine, although a select few, mainly those living closest, had been invited earlier for drinks in the drawing room and to meet Richard before anyone else, as though he were a new animal on display at the Exeter ’Change.

They would be arriving soon. She’d best take herself down to the hallway to greet them.

And let Richard view her in her splendor.

A small nub of satisfaction burgeoned in her breast. What fun it would be when he had eyes for no one but her, when all the ambitious, and jealous, mamas would be after him for their daughters.

With a last satisfied smile at her reflection, she glided across the room to the door which Hawkins already had open for her, and stepped out onto the soft red carpeting of the galleried landing.

Downstairs glowed with light, and even up here, where it could be shadowy and gloomy, had been illuminated more brightly than usual.

Well aware of the light dancing over her glimmering gown and her russet hair, Isabella set her hand on the banister at the top of the stairs and paused, looking down into the hall, waiting to be noticed.

Richard and Dora were already down there, standing together near the doors, Dora looking awkward in the blue gown Isabella had chosen for her. Neither were looking in her direction.

Isabella coughed as discreetly as possible.

Nothing. They had their heads together, talking.

She coughed again, more loudly this time.

Dora turned her head and broke into a delighted smile. “Bella.”

Richard swung around, his eyes widening in the most satisfactory fashion as he stared at where she stood at the head of the wide oak staircase.

Good. Exactly the sort of entrance she liked to make.

Long years of maintaining a facade of not caring, of femme fatale, of hauteur, and and of aloofness had ingrained themselves into Isabella’s being so deeply, she was almost unaware of their effect and how much she’d changed since she’d been an innocent eighteen-year-old bride.

Taking a step down, the silken skirts of her gown rustling about her, her dainty slipper pointed, she met Richard’s eyes with an open challenge, certain he would never have seen anyone as beautiful as she was.

Enough men had told her that over the past ten years for her to be convinced of their veracity.

And it worked. He was staring at her as though he’d never seen her before, his eyes wide and full of what could only be admiration. She’d seen enough of that before in the eyes of her admirers, and she knew it now when she saw it in the eyes of her late husband’s dashing cousin.

She allowed herself the smallest of smiles, a little more than pleased.

She’d formed a habit over the years, as a reaction to her husband’s infidelities, of requiring all men to be her admirers from the most callow youths to their wrinkled, gray-haired grandfathers.

Perhaps because she’d known from almost the start that her own husband was never going to be amongst their number, and she’d wanted, with all the fury of pent-up jealousy, to teach him a lesson.

To show him that whatever he thought of her, other men wanted her.

Starved of his love, she’d set about to win the love of every man she met. The unrequited love.

And now Richard was about to be added to that number. It would suit her very well to have him dancing at her beck and call and ignoring the daughters of those women who’d looked down their aristocratic noses at her for so long.

Restraining the impulse to widen her smile, she continued on down the stairs, supremely conscious of the impression she must be making in this beautiful gown. A gown fit for a princess or even a queen, not just a duchess.

He watched her all the way down, and she, well aware of her own allure, kept her eyes fixed on his.

She’d learned a long time ago that men liked to think they were the only one in the room you could be interested in.

Granted, he was the only man in this room, but that didn’t stop her from making the same moves she always made towards a new conquest.

Yet was he the same as her other conquests?

Her legions of devoted, lust-filled men, all of whom thought they might be the lucky one to breach her barriers and inveigle her into bed.

For despite rumor, her conquests remained exactly what they were when they started out—conquests waiting on her hand and foot, for nothing but a smile or a dance in return, and perhaps, if they were lucky, a squeeze of her waist or her thigh.

She’d never even bestowed a kiss on any of them.

Not that many of them hadn’t tried, of course.

How handsome he looked in his new evening suit, even though it had been made by Philip Sanders’s tailor and not at Weston’s.

Mr. Chalke might be just a small-town maker of gentleman’s apparel, but he had a rare skill with both his eye and the needle, and Richard’s military bearing lent itself to looking good in anything.

His tailcoat fitted his well-muscled body like the proverbial glove, hugging his broad shoulders and tapering to a waist that was neither too narrow nor too wide.

His silk breeches and stockings left her in no doubt about the power of his lower body.

Infantry, of course. No wonder he had strong legs.

She suppressed a chuckle. He was used to having to walk everywhere.

But it was his face that caught her attention.

Gone were the rather rough edges that had shouted soldier, and in their place was a man of elegance, his military bearing only adding to that impression.

Clean shaven, hair arranged with casual artistry by goodness knows who, the scent of cologne about him, and even his hands had been transformed, the nails scrubbed, trimmed, and filed.

Had his soldier servant done all that for him?

If he had, he must be excellent at his job.

Who’d have thought a common soldier could make such a grand job of a gentleman’s appearance.