Page 41 of One Forbidden Kiss with the Laird (The Cinderella Shepherd Sisters #2)

CHAPTER ONE

T here was probably nothing wrong. Nothing wrong at all. And, even if there was, Miss Daphne Smith was almost certain it wasn’t her fault.

But she wouldn’t know until she opened the door.

The trouble was, the act of opening the door would bring her closer to the problem, whatever it was.

That was why tendrils of panic were curling around her heart, why her stays were so painfully tight, why spots were flickering in the corners of her vision, dancing and dark.

Daphne took what she had intended to be a long, deep breath, and only succeeded in feeling stifled, her corset suffocating. The door of the Pike’s study remained resolutely shut. As it would—Daphne had made no move to open it.

This is ridiculous , she tried to tell herself in the privacy of her own mind—the only place where she felt comfortable to voice her thoughts. The very idea of opening her mouth and sharing them with the world… No .

And now, on a perfectly ordinary Thursday afternoon, she was expected to stay calm when summoned—by a footman no less—to the Pike’s study?

Miss Pike. She really must remember to call the woman by her proper name.

Daphne swallowed. Her mouth was dry, the action scraping painfully across her throat. Still, her fingers did not leave her side.

The door opened.

‘What are you doing out there, Miss Smith?’ snapped Miss Pike. ‘I sent for you ten minutes ago. Come in.’

Though it was tempting to fold gently onto the carpet and feign a faint, Daphne found herself completely unable to do so. She was shy, yes, but she was not ridiculous.

‘My apologies, Miss Pike,’ she murmured as she stepped past the irate proprietress of the Wallflower Academy and into the small room.

What she wanted to say was, Ten minutes is typically insufficient time to traverse from the croquet lawn to your study, Miss Pike, as you well know!

But those were inside thoughts—what she thought but was not permitted to say.

Daphne swallowed hard, trying to put out of her mind the towering governess who had terrified her as a child.

Inside thoughts. Inside thoughts. No one wants to hear your true opinion, Daphne Smith…

It was many months since she had last been in here.

This was not a room that many of the wallflowers currently in residence at the Wallflower Academy wished to enter.

Doing so typically meant that their proprietress, who had taken on the status of some sort of god while living here, was displeased.

To have earned Miss Pike’s displeasure was to have transgressed—although Daphne had to admit that sometimes it could be something as simple as having an un-darned hem or an opinion about… well…about anything.

The Pike was not wholly supportive of opinions. Namely, other people’s…

Daphne knew her cheeks were reddening as Miss Pike slammed the door behind them, and equally knew there was nothing she could do about it. She could also do little to stem the flow of Miss Pike’s tirade.

‘I don’t know, Miss Smith—you have been a resident with us for so long, I would have thought by now you would have gained at least the very basic understanding…’

Daphne rather supposed she would. Because it was true; she had been at the Wallflower Academy an awfully long time. Painfully long.

I have only been a resident with you so long, Miss Pike, because my father is ashamed of me.

Inside thoughts. Mustn’t let out the inside thoughts.

‘Descended as you are from one of this nation’s most prominent families…’

Doing her utmost not to wince, Daphne tried not to think about what her father would have said at Miss Pike’s description: ‘one of the nation’s most prominent families’.

Yes. That was what made having an illegitimate daughter so difficult for her father.

‘Done my best, really I have, but to be quite frank with you, Miss Smith, you have never given me much to work with.’

Heat blossomed over Daphne’s face at Miss Pike’s words. Yes, she was a wallflower—a true one, unlike so many of the other ladies sent to the Wallflower Academy by their families when unwanted, too awkward to keep around.

She was shy—a word that Miss Pike detested and had come to forbid, though the pronouncement could not alter Daphne’s character. Even Daphne could not do such a thing, try as she had when she had first arrived.

‘And so I was delighted to receive your father’s letter!’

Daphne’s eyes sharpened and she focused on the older woman who had settled in the seat on the opposite side of the impressive desk. ‘I beg your pardon?’

‘Your father’s letter,’ repeated Miss Pike, gesturing at a piece of paper lying on her desk. ‘I presume he wrote to you also?’

Daphne swallowed hard before replying.

Well, yes, he did write to her. Once a year, near her birthday—never actually getting the date right, but the month was always correct. Almost always…

Inside thoughts.

‘Yes,’ she said slowly, mentally scanning each word before she uttered it to ensure she was, technically, telling the truth. ‘Yes, my father writes to me.’

Miss Pike beamed—an expression with which she had rarely treated Daphne during the years they had known each other. ‘Then let me be the first to say…congratulations!’

Daphne blinked.

The room was silent, save for the longcase clock that merrily ticked just off-key. The words Miss Pike had uttered echoed around Daphne’s mind and she desperately attempted to understand them.

Congratulations? For what?

‘I…’ Say something, Daphne, say something. ‘I…’

Congratulations? Mind whirling, desperately attempting to understand what on earth the Pike could be referring to, Daphne could only think of two possibilities, each as unlikely as each other.

Perhaps—and it was a very doubtful perhaps—her stepmother was with child.

It would be unusual; her stepmother had a child already grown to full manhood.

He had, in fact, married one of Daphne’s close friends.

Still, it was not impossible. She’d experienced plenty of inside thoughts about that, though thankfully none had slipped from her tongue.

Or perhaps… No, her father would not do such a thing…

‘Ah, here he is!’ Miss Pike rose with a pretty curtsey as the door opened.

Turning, Daphne saw her father. She examined him, just for a moment.

How often did one get to look at the Earl of Norbury up close?

He looked…older. That was hardly surprising; it was nigh on six months since she had last seen him, and he was of that age now where a hard year could roughen one’s skin quite drastically.

The summer months had come and gone, and she had not seen him.

The leaves were just starting to golden, and now here he was.

‘Daphne,’ said the Earl of Norbury with a smart nod.

Daphne knew there was little she could do to quell the heat that would rise through her chest and across her neck to her cheeks, so she did nothing to avoid it. Curtseying low to her father, as befitted his rank and station, she allowed the chatter to wash over her.

‘Most exciting, my lord. I must congratulate you…’

‘Impressive, I must say so myself, though I knew I would be successful…’

Daphne listened closely, as was her habit, but could distinguish little in the way of clues within their speech. Why were they to be congratulated? Why had she been summoned to the Pike’s room?

‘And I suppose it is Daphne we must celebrate,’ her father said with a broad smile.

William Prendergast, Earl of Norbury, was not an unkind man. Daphne knew this, as she knew that the earth spun round the sun. With both, warmth changed over the seasons.

‘Celebrate?’ she repeated, hating how quiet her voice was but finding no inclination within herself to strengthen it.

‘Yes, for your… Does she not know?’ said Miss Pike, turning to Daphne’s father.

The Earl of Norbury drew himself up as though about to announce a success on the field of battle—and for a shimmering moment, just before the words left his mouth, Daphne knew. She knew what he was going to say. She just couldn’t believe it.

‘Daphne, my girl,’ he said proudly. ‘You are getting married.’

And that was when Daphne’s mind entirely ceased to work.

Married. Married . Married?

Her—married—at a wedding. Gaining a husband, being married…

‘No,’ Daphne breathed.

No one was listening. Miss Pike was delighting over the fact that the Wallflower Academy would have another wedding to celebrate, her father was congratulating himself on the impressive connections of the groom, and Daphne…

Daphne merely stood there, unable to understand what had happened.

Married? She was a wallflower, not a wife.

She stuttered and stammered in the presence of those she did not know.

She coloured and blushed at the merest look from a gentleman—any man!

She hated attention, dreaded entertaining and had once accidentally trodden on a man’s foot so heavily that he had been forced to retire not only from the dancing, but from the ball itself.

Sylvia had said the man had been forced to have his shoe cut away from his foot.

An unbidden smile crept across Daphne’s face. Sylvia really was most ridiculous. The smile disappeared almost as soon as it had arrived. Sylvia was gone now, married, like Daphne’s two other friends. She was alone. Though, by the sound of it, she would not be alone for long…

‘Three or four weeks, that is all that is required,’ Miss Pike was saying. ‘I will assist in any way I can.’

‘Married?’

It was only when her father and the Pike both turned that Daphne realised she had spoken aloud. Cheeks flaming red, she said awkwardly, ‘I mean…married?’

‘You are the daughter of an earl,’ her father said stiffly. ‘Did you expect to find your own suitor, my child? I am your father, and I am a peer of the realm. I have arranged your marriage.’