Page 14 of A Duke for Opal (The Carmichael Saga #2)

E arlier that afternoon, Flint had been so, so adamant in his asseveration about Locke, Opal went through the remainder of the day actually…believing him.

That’d been until all guests gathered for dinner and he’d spent the better portion of the meal speaking with the Duke of Savage’s young, sadly, recently widowed sister, Lady Emerald. Exquisitely golden and full-figured, kind, and a devout reader and patroness of Abaddon’s, the lady was perfect for Locke in every way.

“Youth’s the season made for joys,

Love is then our duty;

She alone who that employs,

Well deserves her beauty…”

Seated at the last row of the Duke of Strathearn’s music room, Opal fought with everything she had to keep from staring at the gentleman in the adjacent aisle, just one row in front of hers.

Hers was just the perfect vantage to stare.

But she had some pride left. As such, Opal had settled for sneaking furtive glances at Locke and the enthralling, buxom, blonde-haired beauty who occupied the seat next to his. His partner for the evening’s entertainments also happened to be the same woman who’d sat beside him at dinner.

A detail made all the more painful by the fact that after her and Flint’s discussion, she’d gone to search Locke’s library for a book about the ancient Romans. What she’d uncovered was that Locke had been truthful about the details surrounding opals in gemology. What he’d carefully omitted was one small but not-so-insignificant fact—opals were second to emeralds.

Let’s be gay,

While we may,

Beauty’s a flower despis’d in decay.

Let us drink and sport to-day,

Ours is not tomorrow.”

Yes, opals symbolized hope, love, and good fortune. But emeralds were the superior stones that were associated with Venus, the goddess of love and fertility, and which adorned the king’s crowns.

Where opals came to symbolize ill-fortune and disease during the plague, emeralds were heralded for mythical healing powers that protected its wearer from disease and famine.

Flint’s droll voice intruded on her silent suffering. “You know, in the absence of telling Strathearn the duke’s plans for you, you always could just tell the gentleman how you feel?”

“Love with youth flies swift away,

Age is nought but sorrow.”

She wrenched her gaze away and glared up at her brother.

“Dance and sing,

Time’s on the wing,

Flint shrugged. “I am just saying.”

“Well, just don’t .”

Frantically, she looked about to see whether anyone had heard them. Fortunately, at that moment, the room erupted into applause for the latest lady to sing this evening.

“You needn’t say anything,” she said between tightly clamped lips.

“ One of us should and it’s increasingly clear that someone is not going to be you.”

Opal shot a glare up at her brother to keep him from saying a word more.

A young lady near in age to Opal took her place at the pianoforte. The shy beauty dipped a curtsy and seated herself.

They settled in for the next performance.

“Can you make me a cambric shirt,

Parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme,

Opal attempted to give the haunting, lilting, performer’s tune the proper attention she deserved.

“‘Without any seam or needlework?

And you shall be a true lover of mine…”

Her feat proved an impossible one.

Lady Emerald whispered something to Locke and his lips quirked in the same real, affable smile that’d endeared him to Opal at their very first meeting.

“Can you dry it on yonder thorn,

Parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme,…”

Here Opal believed nothing could hurt more than being forced to wed a bastard picked by her father and watching someday as Locke, Duke of Strathearn, declared his love, life, and fidelity to some breathtaking creature who managed to snag his heart.

“‘Which never bore blossom since Adam was born?

And you shall be a true lover of mine…”

Only, now, seeing him ply his charm on a winsome beauty and realizing how wrong she’d been.

The handsome couple returned to watching the performance—only for a moment. This time, it was Locke who said something to Lady Emerald.

The hitch of Opal’s breath was as painful as loud, earning a concerned look from Flint.

“‘Now you have asked me questions three,

Parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme,…”

“He’s charming to everyone,” her brother comforted.

Opal couldn’t even bring herself to care she sat so obviously in her misery. A weighted pressure lay like a blanket upon her chest making it impossible to take air into her lungs.

“‘I hope you’ll answer as many for me,

And you shall be a true lover of mine…”

The enchanting lady at Locke’s side blushed.

Absolutely nothing could be worse than the torture of witnessing Locke bestow his affections elsewhere.

Locke and his lady shared another private, carefree smile that Opal sat as a miserable voyeur to. She felt bitter, insupportable jealousy crest like a wave that threatened to draw her under. For, seated here, witnessing how effortlessly Locke charmed another, she was reminded all over again of the futility of what she’d set out to do.

“He is just being polite,” Flint insisted on an urgent whisper.

“…Can you find me an acre of land,

Parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme,

Between the salt water and the sea-sand?

And you shall be a true lover of mine…”

It is over…

Her throat wobbled. “Stop it.”

“Can you plough it with a ram’s horn,

“I’m not just saying that because I’m your brother.”

“And sow it all over with one peppercorn…?”

Tears blinded her and she glared at Flint through the sheen.

“You are seeing what you want to see,” Opal hissed, ravaged inside, and uncaring about the stares she felt on them.

“And you are failing to see that which is as clear as the bloody nose on your face,” he whispered in like fury and annoyance.

“Because he chose to sit beside another,” more beautiful, more elegant, more graceful, more everything lady than Opal, “woman. Because at no time of the duke’s own volition does he seek me out, and the only reason he does is because I’ve requested his assistance.”

That managed to make her brother flinch.

Her victory didn’t make Opal feel any better—just the opposite.

Deflated, she sagged in her chair.

“Can you reap it with a sickle of leather,

Parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme…”

“Why are you so determined to make yourself a martyr?” Flint asked so quietly she barely hid him.

“…Where no water sprung, nor a drop of rain fell,

And then she shall be a true love of mine…”

Her brother’s unrelenting questioning broke her frayed self-control. “Is that really what you think I’m doing? Do you believe I want to feel this way?”

“Opal—”

Opal came to her feet just as the Duke of Savage’s extraordinarily skilled younger sister concluded her rendition of Scarborough Fair. The room took an unintended cue from Opal and paid the talented widow a lively round of applause.

Taking advantage of the distracted guests and her brother’s stunned state, Opal bolted.

The next singer’s voice grew distant and then disappeared altogether, and still, she continued at a breakneck speed.

Gasping for breath, Opal stumbled out the back entrance of Locke’s household and raced to the one place no one would venture on a cold, dark, night.