Page 8 of Where Have All the Scoundrels Gone (Dukes in Disguise #2)

Chapter Eight

Hours later, Bess’s heart shook in her chest when she remembered how close she’d come to revealing that her entire family was gone, along with the boy she’d loved, and that she’d only met the Lively ladies a year ago.

They were supposed to be her relatives! She was meant to be a modest widow, like most chaperones; she couldn’t afford to say anything that might cause Ashbourn to dig deeper.

Bess wasn’t cut out for this cloak and dagger nonsense.

The deception was beginning to weigh on her; several times while out and about with Lucy, Bess had felt an itchy, twitchy sensation on the back of her neck. As if someone was watching her.

But every time she’d looked, there’d been no one paying her any mind, that she could see. She could only assume it was her guilty conscience prickling at her.

Now here she was in this evening gown she never would’ve chosen for herself, trimmed and primped and decorated like the hot water crust pastry lid of a picnic pie.

“Bess, stop fidgeting. You look lovely,” Lucy said. Her blue eyes were wide in the dim interior of the carriage. “Though I admit I’m surprised you changed your mind about the gowns.”

Trying to set a good example, Bess dutifully said, “It was very kind of the duke to think of me and to take any trouble over my appearance. I should not have made such a fuss over a generous gesture.”

“Oh, Bess. You are entitled to your feelings, you know.”

Entitled to have them, perhaps. But not to act on them. Bess gave Lucy a determined smile.

“Well, in that case, I feel like a…like a very grand lady in this gown! Though it is a bit of a strange color.”

She had chosen to wear this one, in fact, because it was brown. And because the neckline wasn’t too low nor the skirts too clingy about the legs, like the dressed of some young ladies she’d seen where you could almost make out the shape of their limbs beneath the diaphanous silk.

Bess had thought she’d be able to fade into the background in a dress of nice, unassuming brown—but once she put it on, she’d realized her mistake.

First off, the neckline wasn’t low, but it was wide, skimming straight across the tops of her breasts to two narrow bands of cloth that draped her upper arms and bared her shoulders completely.

Cascading folds of the same brown fabric attached to the backs of those minuscule sleeves and trailed down to the floor, floating as she walked. The whole dress seemed to float when she moved, in fact, because the tricky fabric that had looked like plain brown muslin in the box turned out to be something much lighter and finer, gossamer smooth and shot through with some sort of thread that made it shimmer in the candlelight.

Bess had turned to survey herself in the looking glass—and oh, the luxury of it, a full-length glass when at home she made do with a handheld mirror that was too small to show her entire face at once—and she’d gasped in dismay.

Though she’d never had a fitting, the dress seemed to have been painted onto her. The fit in the bodice was exquisite, cupping her breasts so lovingly, she doubted she even needed her half-corset.

The silky material skimmed tightly to just above her natural waist, then fell like a gleaming bronze waterfall to the floor. And the way the color of the dress brought out the different shades of gold, russet, and chocolate in her eyes…

“I can’t wear this,” she’d said at once, panic rising in her breast, but they'd spent so long getting Lucy dressed that there was no time to change. Jenkins had tossed shawls about their shoulders and bundled them down the stairs and out the front door to the waiting carriage before Bess could even catch her breath.

And then they were in the carriage, and the footman was closing the door and making a sign to the groom to drive on.

“Wait!” Bess had cried. “What about the duke?”

“His Grace left half an hour ago,” the footman informed her. “He will meet you at the ball.”

Then there they were, two women on their way to a ball that neither of them wished to attend, with no escort.

“I’d rather wear brown than all these pastels,” Lucy was saying, “You’re lucky you don't have to dress like a wide-eyed miss advertising her virgin purity to all the world.”

Bess’s lips quirked but she managed not to smile. It would be easy to dismiss Lucy’s complaints, which made her sound a bit like a spoiled child. But Bess thought it wasn’t the cut of Lucy’s gown that had her in such a state.

“Tonight will be the first time you’ll see your London friends, won’t it?” Bess asked.

“I haven’t any friends in London.” Lucy looked out the window, crossing her arms over the very high waist of her pale blue gown.

“Every one of my so-called friends was perfectly happy to cut our acquaintance when we lost Father and…everything. If they speak to me tonight, I’ll know they are only pretending friendship because they hope to be introduced to my brother, the duke.” Lucy glanced back, her intense blue eyes burning in the darkness. “They’re all so frivolous and ignorant, obsessed with hair ribbons and the latest tittle-tattle and who’s courting whom.”

“That is the world they live in.” And if it sounded like a boring world devoid of purpose and meaning to Bess, well, she was only a visitor. She’d never be welcomed there at all if anyone found out she was only a lowborn woman who worked for a living as a cook in a coaching inn.

Not for the first time, Bess wondered if they were doing the right thing, attempting to shove Lucy back into a mold that perhaps no longer fit her.

“But they know nothing of the real world,” Lucy cried. “Most of them have never left London except to visit their country estates.”

“I’m not saying that you must rekindle your friendships, Lucy, and I do understand why it might be hard to trust that their intentions are true. But consider that time has passed. They may have matured since you went away. You certainly have grown up a lot in the time I’ve known you.”

“I’ve lived over a busy coaching inn for more than a year! Of course I’ve matured. I’ve seen some things!”

“Aye, that you have,” Bess agreed peaceably. “Especially once your sister convinced all the toffs that Five Mile House was the most fashionable place to stop on the way from London to Bath.”

“She did have some help with that, you know.” Lucy had a younger sister’s dislike of giving her elder sister too much credit. “For one thing, people kept coming back, and telling their friends about Five Mile House, because of your wonderful cooking!”

“That’s kind of you to say.” Bess missed her kitchen at Five Mile House with a sudden, visceral ache. The heat of her coal oven, the yeasty smell of the bread dough in the kneading trough, the satisfying hustle and bustle of supper time when the farmers stopped in for pint on their way home to mingle with the shopkeepers’ families coming in for a bit of stew and fresh bread, and the weary travelers in their dust-smudged finery on their way to take the waters and sample the delights of Bath.

“And of course, there’s The Gentle Rogue,” Lucy continued. Her voice went a little low and caressing, as it always did when she discussed her favorite hero of the news rags.

“That highwayman did not turn Five Mile House into a successful business,” Bess said sternly. She had no patience with the way the newspapers romanticized a man who held up mail coaches and private carriages at gunpoint. “He’s nothing more than a common thief, and a dangerous one, at that.”

“How can you say so?” Lucy cried. “He’s much more than a thief! He loves music—multiple accounts from witnesses speak of his beautiful singing voice, because he will sometimes hum a lively tune?—”

“While he pilfers their belongings.”

“They say he dresses and speaks like a perfect gentleman?—”

“Which only proves he’s no need to be haring about the countryside, taking ladies’ jewelry and...other things.”

The rumor was that the Gentle Rogue liked to steal a kiss or two along with whatever bauble a lady was willing to part with. It was a rumor Lucy herself had started when she penned her first anonymous piece for a broadsheet—but it had now been corroborated by multiple eye witnesses.

Evidently The Gentle Rogue read his own press.

“He's never hurt anyone,” Lucy passionately defended her idol. “And I’m convinced within myself that he doesn't keep the money or the trinkets he takes—I believe he gives them to the poor, like Robin Hood!”

Before Bess could be drawn into the same argument Lucy had instigated with her sister many times, the carriage came to a stop.

“Oh, Lucy,” Bess clutched her charge's hand. “Please, please promise me not to talk about The Gentle Rogue this evening. He is not a proper topic of conversation.”

And moreover, Lucy’s opinions on the gentleman highwayman were not the sort to endear her to the rest of the Beau Monde.

“Of course he isn't proper,” Lucy grumbled. “None of the interesting topics are. Yes, yes, all right. Don't worry, Bess. I won't waste this chance. I know how much everyone is sacrificing in order for me to be here.”

The brave little lift of Lucy's chin broke Bess's heart, a bit. “Oh, Lucy. It's all for you. So that you can take your rightful place, the place you were born to, if you want it.”

“I don't want it,” Lucy said decisively, gathering her skirts as the tiger jumped down from his perch behind the box to open the door for them. “But I know no one believes me, so let's just get this over with, shall we?”

It wasn’t hard to believe Lucy didn’t care about her place in society—but the chance to meet a gentleman she could fall in love with and wed? Surely most women wanted that. Or had Bess simply assumed Lucy must want that since, well…Bess did?

Beyond love and companionship, there was practicality to consider. As the duke had already demonstrated, he had no legal obligation to care for Lucy. And Lucy had no inheritance, no dowry, no income. If she didn’t make a good match, of course Gemma and Hal would always take care of her—but she would become a dependent.

As Bess had been when her parents and Davy died.

Depending on the kindness and generosity of others for her livelihood. For her home. For her life.

No. Much better for Lucy to make her debut, find a husband, and settle down. And tonight was the culmination of all their efforts in that direction.

Bess followed her young charge out of the carriage, nimbly avoiding the piles of refuse and horse manure that littered the streets just before the gates of the enormous red brick mansion squatting at the northeast corner of Berkeley Square.

The place was lit like a bonfire, tall windows pouring light out into the streets and gilding the white columns that bordered the entry. Bess's gaze took in the thronged walkway leading to the wide steps up to the front door, which was thrown open to welcome the evening’s revelers.

No one appeared to take much notice of them as they made their way up the steps and into the foyer of the house, but Bess felt the cold prickle of nervous sweat at her hairline. What if their names weren’t on the guest list? What if the stooped butler she could see standing at the end of the hallway, directing the flow of milling guests, wouldn’t let them pass? What if the Duke of Ashbourn wasn’t there to greet them?

Drat the man, how could he have left them to navigate this without him?

Bess did not allow herself to examine the buzz of anticipation she experienced at the thought of seeing the duke...of him seeing her in this improbably, unreasonably dazzling gown. A gown that fit her as though she’d been melted and poured into it because he’d given such perfect measurements to the dressmaker.

He’d looked at her, studied her, enough to know the exact proportions of her body.

And tonight, he would see her as he’d desired to see her—displaying the fine plumage of a lady. What would he think? What would he say? How would he look, when he saw her?

If she thought about it too much, it felt as if she’d swallowed a bit of honeycomb with the bees still inside.

Without fully intending it, she concocted a breathless image of herself paused at the top of the staircase, one hand resting delicately upon the balustrade, as all eyes below turned to regard her with admiration. And Ashbourn would lock eyes with her across the room and then?—

Then what? She flushed, embarrassed at her own silly fantasies.

You’re being ridiculous , she lectured herself. He is a duke. You are a nobody—worse than a nobody, a servant! This is a man who cannot forgive his stepmother, all these years later, for the unforgivable crime of being his nursemaid before she married his father.

But he was also a man Bess had witnessed struggling to do the right thing, a man of deep feeling, though he seemed not to know it.

They reached the butler, an elderly white man with an impressive set of muttonchops, who looked them up and down with a gimlet gaze that said he would not hesitate to expel anyone not on his guest list.

Bess gulped. But when she gave him their names, his supercilious expression magically melted into a restrained smile of welcome. “Ah yes, her ladyship is expecting you. Right this way, my lady, I will see that you are announced properly.”

“Oh, that’s not necessary,” Lucy tried to protest, but the butler was having none of it. He whisked them past the line of guests waiting to be received by the hostess, who was stationed at the top of a short flight of red-carpeted stairs leading down to the ballroom.

Bess caught her breath at the sight of the dancers whirling about the floor, the men in stark black and white contrasting with the ladies in their colorful finery. The strains of a waltz floated down from the band of musicians playing from a balcony overlooking the ballroom.

A particularly throbbing chord from the violins tinkled the crystal teardrops suspended from the blazing chandelier. Sprays of lilac and clusters of wisteria burst from huge vases dotted about the room, adding their heady sweetness to the night breeze floating in from the French doors, which were thrown open to the terrace overlooking the back garden.

So enchanting was the scene, Bess barely noticed as the butler bowed to a lady with a towering pompadour of salt-white hair peppered with tiny gems that twinkled blood red when she inclined her regal head. The gems matched the deep red silk of Lady Devensham’s evening gown, trimmed with extravagant inches of blond lace and embroidered round the lower third of the skirts with a fruit and flower motif that included roses, apples, and something Bess had never seen in real life but thought from her reading might be a pomegranate.

“Lady Lucy Lively,” the butler intoned, “and chaperone.”

Lady Devensham’s sharp eyes narrowed on Bess for only an instant before passing on to Lucy. She smiled in a way that reminded Bess of a cat who’d tipped over the milk jug.

“Lady Lucy,” their hostess cried, reaching out with both hands to clasp Lucy’s hands and pull her forward for a brief kiss to her cheek. “How delightful! Your dear brother told us to expect you, but he neglected to mention how lovely you’ve grown!”

Bess felt some of the tension melt from her shoulders. He was here. He hadn’t abandoned them.

“You are too kind, your ladyship,” Lucy managed not to sound like she was gritting her teeth. Bess was impressed. “Thank you so much for the invitation tonight.”

“I’ll wager you are longing to dance holes in your slippers,” Lady Devensham dimpled. “Just like my Anne. Oh look, there she is now!”

The smug pride in the mama’s voice should have been a clue to Bess, but somehow she was blindsided to see the couple that revolved decorously past.

The girl was young, no more than Lucy’s age or perhaps even a year younger. Her cheeks had not lost the plump roundness of childhood, though her figure, clad in pearly white satin, was that of a woman grown. And the man gazing down at her as though she was the only woman in the room...was the Duke of Ashbourn.

He didn’t see Bess. He never even looked up.

Good , Bess told herself firmly, looking down to fumble with her shawl and reticule as an excuse to hide her burning eyes. Put your silly fantasies to rest and focus on what is important. Tonight is Lucy’s time to shine.

And who could say? Maybe if Bess kept her wits about her, she might find a bit of the adventure she’d been looking for, too.