Page 10 of Better Not Bet a Bluestocking (Ladies of Opportunity #3)

Still in the drawing room

Half a dozen awkward seconds later

Robyn froze.

Bollocks .

Several more, even fouler curses paraded through his mind.

He knew that voice.

Of all the drawing rooms in all of London , she had to walk into his, just now.

“ I am correct in surmising Matilda and Regina have not returned with tea?” he whispered.

“ You are,” Georgine murmured, her eyes wide as she peered past him.

Bracing himself, Robyn glanced over his shoulder.

As he expected, Verbena Wynecott , attired in lavender from her garish feathered bonnet to her bombazine gown and spencer, clutched her black ledger to her ample bosom and gaped at him, aghast.

And if he weren’t mistaken, slightly titillated as well.

She rather resembled a beached bass, gasping for air, and her eyebrows, graying, wiry things, cavorted about her forehead like drunken caterpillars.

With considerable effort, he wrestled his grin into submission and schooled his face into a banal mien.

Mehetabel Twigg , Mrs . Wynecott’s long-suffering companion, as timid, thin, and dowdy as Mrs . Wynecott was intrusive, stout, and garish, hovered near her employer’s elbow.

Miss Twigg braved a shy peek through her eyelashes before slamming her focus to the floor.

Crimson skated up her cheeks as she fidgeted with her reticule’s strap.

“ I beg your pardon, Mr . Fitzlloyd .” Bichard pinned Mrs . Wynecott with a condescending glance. “ Madam would not listen when I explained you were not at home to callers.”

Mrs . Wynecott was so high in the instep, she was likely to trip over her own consequence. Besides , other than tackling the woman—and probably losing the wrestling match—what was Bichard to do?

“ You may go, Bichard .” Robyn dipped his chin. “ Please check on Miss Matilda and Miss Regina and the preparation of the tea tray.”

“ Very good, sir.” The butler nodded, and after glowering at the dame again, retreated.

“ Good afternoon, Mrs . Wynecott , Miss Twigg .” Robyn stood, and acting like it was perfectly normal to be found on his knees before a lady, brushed off his trousers. The dashed book would have to wait. “ How fortuitous. You are just in time for tea.”

Mrs . Wynecott always timed her arrival to partake in tea.

She set upon a bountiful tea service like a wolf on a Sunday lamb.

“ Matilda should return any moment with the tray.” Robyn adjusted his coat sleeve, taking a moment to half-turn and wink at Georgine before facing Mrs . Wynecott again. “ I believe she mentioned Cook baked fresh jam tarts.”

Mrs . Wynecott couldn’t quite conceal her little “ O ” of delight, and Miss Twigg blinked her owlish eyes as if she could not quite believe her ears.

When was the last time the poor woman was permitted such a treat?

Recovering from her momentary excitement about the tarts, Mrs . Wynecott directed her buggy-eyed gaze at Georgine . She peered down her substantial nose before speaking in her haughtiest and most disapproving tone, though avid curiosity glittered in her eyes. “ I do not believe we are acquainted.”

Blast and damn .

To suggest Mrs . Wynecott was a chinwag of the worst sort was an exaggerated kindness. She could concoct a scandal from a sneeze and a sideways glance.

There was no help for it, however.

Robyn forced a congenial smile as he made the introductions. “ Mrs . Verbena Wynecott , may I introduce Miss Georgine Thackerly , our house guest? Miss Thackerly , this is Mrs . Wynecott , and her companion, Miss Mehetabel Twigg .”

Not quite the proper thing as far as introductions went, but they would suffice.

Miss Twigg darted an apprehensive glance at her employer but forged ahead. “ My friends call me Hetty .”

Saints be praised.

Had Miss Twigg grown a backbone at last?

“ Sounds like a hen pecking.” Mrs . Wynecott’s unkind comment brought another furious blush to Miss Twigg’s cheeks.

“ It is a pleasure to make your acquaintance, Hetty ,” Georgine murmured kindly, discarding protocol and acknowledging the companion before her employer.

Bully for her.

She’d just declared herself Miss Twigg’s friend, and from the grateful look Miss Twigg bestowed upon Georgine , she had earned lifelong devotion.

Georgine curved her mouth into a gracious smile as she carefully pushed her hair off her injured shoulder. “ And your acquaintance, too, Mrs . Wynecott .”

Georgine would not have said that if she knew Mrs . Wynecott . The matron’s mind made a full chamber pot seem pleasant, and her tongue wagged faster than a racehorse ran.

“ Hmph .” Mrs . Wynecott sniffed before narrowing her eyes and prying. “ How exactly are you related to the Fitzlloyds ?”

Angling her head, Georgine offered another sweet smile, but a jot of annoyance sparked in her irises.

“ We are not relations, just friends.” She gestured toward her injured shoulder. “ I am recovering from a gunshot wound.”

Polite , but to the point.

“ Gunshot ? ” Mrs . Wynecott’s beetle-bug eyes grew impossibly rounder as she stared unabashedly at Georgine’s sling.

No doubt the snoopy old biddy was dying to ask the details, but even she wasn’t that brazen.

“ And you chose to convalesce here, Miss Thackerly ?”

And that tidbit would gallop through the ton faster than a husband-hunting debutante chasing an eligible duke.

“ I had no choice. I was shot in the garden.” Georgine’s smile became as brittle as dried leaves. “ My physician insists that I would have died had I been moved. Therefore , the Fitzlloyds graciously opened their home to me and my sister as I recover.”

Take that, Mrs . Wynecott .

“ But , my dear.” Mrs . Wynecott tutted, affecting false camaraderie. “ Your reputation…” Her tone became conspiratorial. “ Surely , you must have a care what others might think—the conclusions they may draw.”

Mrs . Wynecott didn’t fool Robyn .

She practically frothed in anticipation of spreading this on dit .

“ Which is why we are not at home to callers.” Robyn let his point sink home, but as always, Mrs . Wynecott paid no mind to anyone but herself.

Like a schooner in full wind, she sailed to the settee.

As she and Miss Twigg settled onto the cushions, the decades-old piece of furniture groaned in protest. The portly woman leveled a superior look at her slender companion. “ Perhaps you should abstain from dainties for a time, Miss Twigg .”

Miss Twigg’s jaw sagged as she sent a not-so-covert, incredulous glance toward Miss Wynecott’s ample girth, the generous rolls straining against the fabric.

Robyn couldn’t prevent his bark of laughter, which he disguised as a cough by pressing his hand to his mouth and hacking dramatically. “ Pardon me. Happens every spring. Must be something in bloom. Think it might be the dogwoods.”

He coughed again, just for effect.

Georgine suddenly found a pillow’s silk fringe utterly fascinating.

Robyn swore her lips twitched as she too wrestled to keep her mirth in check.

“ What I mean to say, Miss Thackerly ,” Mrs .

Wynecott leaned forward and waved a hand up and down toward Georgine .

“ You are in a state of dishabille, and Mr . Fitzlloyd was practically lying in your lap. Even I , who takes the greatest care not to jump to assumptions, must admit I was taken aback. The scene I came upon smacked of scandalous impropriety.”

She elevated a caterpillar eyebrow. “ One might mistake you for… paramours .”

Her last word came forth as a singsong hiss.

Only someone with a tosspot for a brain .

Georgine tilted her head and delivered another of her sweet smiles, something Robyn had learned meant she was about to send a dart to target. “ Fama , malum qua non aliud velocius ullum .”

And we have a bullseye.

She had quoted from Virgil’s Aeneid .

Robyn wanted to applaud.

Furrowing her broad forehead, Mrs . Wynecott looked to Robyn , then Georgine , and finally to Miss Twigg as if she weren’t positive if she had just been insulted, but suspected she had been.

Evidently , Mrs . Wynecott did not speak Latin .

“ It is a quote from Aeneid by Virgil , Mrs . Wynecott . ‘ Rumor —an evil than which no other is more swift. ’” Miss Twigg lifted her chin and met her curmudgeon of an employer’s gaze head-on. “ It means gossip or hearsay becomes more exaggerated, distorted, or sensational the more it spreads.”

Yes indeed, the mouse had found her squeak—and rather a sharp one, at that.

“ I know what it means, Miss Twigg .” Mrs . Wynecott inhaled an affronted breath, her chins quivering in outrage. “ I did not come here to be insulted.”

She stood, the epitome of offended snootiness, and pressed her ledger to her chest.

“ I regret to inform you, Mr . Fitzlloyd , that St . Winifred’s Charity Garden and Fancy Fair does not have volunteer opportunities for either you or your sister this year.”

Praise God and all the saints .

She leveled a blistering glare at Georgine .

“ Nor your houseguest . If that is what you choose to call her.” She gave a disdainful sniff. “ Though the evidence suggests something far more improper.”

“ My attire reveals far less of my form than does yours, Mrs . Wynecott .” Georgine regarded the infuriated woman unflinchingly. “ Perhaps you should have the seams let out—several inches.”

Miss Twigg smiled, but quickly subdued her humor, lest her overbearing employer notice.

All pretense of geniality gone, Mrs . Wynecott pointed and wagged a thick finger between Robyn and Georgine .

“ A Christian fundraiser cannot be associated with immoral and dissolute conduct.” She speared Robyn a self-righteous glare. “ Have you no thought for your sister’s reputation, sir? To carry on with your mistress under the same roof?”

Devil take it.

Too bloody far .

He shot Georgine a swift glance.

She appeared composed, but he saw the hurt shining in her blue eyes.

“ How unfortunate.” Knee cocked, Robyn placed a hand on his hip. “ I am equally penitent that I shall not be donating to the charity this year. Or in the future.”