An Unconventional Affair: Forever Yours Series Page 12

  The second waltz for the night started, and the hand she placed atop his shoulders trembled. This was a declaration. She felt wrapped in an invisible warmth. “People...everyone is looking at us,” she croaked, able to feel her palm sweating through her gloves.

  “Let them look,” he said, peering down at her, his eyes somber and glowing with a tender look that made her feel flustered...and dare she hoped, happy!

  “You have danced with me for three dances,” she whispered, still unable to credit his actions. “You’ve made a statement tonight and the news of your outrageousness will be all about town tomorrow. Then in the papers!”

  “Let it spread,” he said spinning her in a graceful arc. “I want the whole of England to know.”

  Her heart pounded so fiercely she feared fainting was a possibility. “Know what?” she asked so softly it was a wonder he heard.

  He spun her in several sweeping arches before bringing her back closely.

  “I want everyone to know it is you who I choose.”

  The earth fell from beneath her feet and her hands tightened on his. Amalie stumbled, and he caught her, twirling into the waltz effortlessly.

  “I confess the moment I met you, Amalie, you’ve had all my heart.”

  She was enthralled by what she saw in his gaze and her heart pounded an erratic rhythm.

  “I want everyone to know it is you who is most important to me. I want you and everyone to know I have never been ashamed of being seen with you. I want them to know I love you.”

  Her world shattered at her feet at his declaration. This time she faltered, uncaring they had come to a complete stop in the center of the grand ballroom. “You love me?”

  He cupped her cheeks and a delicious shock ran through her.

  “I have been agonizingly in love with you, my Amalie, for years. The years without you, there have been a void in my heart that expanded and filled with joy and hope the moment I saw you again. That is why I so eagerly consented for us to be lovers. I needed you in my life and any excuse would do. I hope you can forgive my idiocy and consent to be my wife.”

  “The scandal—”

  “Hang the scandal, the gossips, and those who believe we need their approval. You entered society knowing they would still judge you, but you did so fiercely, bravely, unflinchingly. Walk beside me, always, in the same manner, and I promise I will do the same.”

  Tears spilled down her cheeks, and uncaring they were there she laughed waterily. “Yes, I’ll marry you! I love you with my entire heart, Max!”

  He smiled and swept her back into the dance until the last strain of the orchestra died away. And then to simply be outrageous, with the consent and approval of their hostess, he made the announcement that, Lady Amalie Weatherston had agreed to marry him.

  That night a few debutantes fainted, and Amalie could only assume it was theatrics at losing the season most eligible bachelor. His friends and few other notable lords with their charming wives offered sincere congratulations, while some still whispered behind their fans and turned their noses into the air.

  Nothing dimmed Amalie’s joy, and when he had outrageously demanded a fourth and a fifth dance, she had laughingly and joyously walked into his arms.

  Six months later...

  Christmas Eve

  Max’s family had revealed themselves to be warm, caring, and a pleasure to be a part of. Once he had boldly declared himself in front of the ton, the scandal which had erupted had been heartbreaking. Everything which had died down years ago had resurface. The newssheet headlines had once again screamed of the wanton lady who had caused her husband’s death with her shameful manners.

  Her husband hadn’t thought it his family’s business as to what happened then, but she had called a family meeting, which included all his family, and her parents. There she had explained that she had run from her home to escape being attack and hurt. His family had been appalled, but they had rallied in their support.

  They had closed their ranks around her, and while their connections were not the most powerful, the obvious show of support had influenced society. The newssheet headline had shockingly one day speculated that perhaps she had been running from a vile despoiler and had bravely saved herself. She had been lauded as heroic and an example for many young ladies who might find themselves in such a situation what was frightfully common when dealing with libertines and rakes. Amalie suspected someone from the family had used their connections with the owner of that newssheet, but everyone had been secretive.

  Though the tide had shifted, there were still those who turned their noses when they saw her and her earl together. What affected those prigs the most was how uncaring Amalie and Max was about their opinions. Many declared them to be a darling couple of the ton and was envious of their love match. And she was living her most joyous and happiest life with her husband.

  They skated on the iced over lake some distance away from the rest of the family. Everyone had gathered in Hertfordshire for Christmas. The palatial country home was grand and beautiful. Though his aunt had offered to move to Bath with her daughter to grant the newlyweds privacy, Amalie had refused. Cardis Park was more than large enough for everyone to reside there, and his aunt had graciously relinquished the duties of the lady of the house to Amalie. Hundreds of lanterns lit along the snowy embankment creating an ethereal glow on the ice. They came to a stop, and he wrapped his hand around her waist from behind.

  “Max?”

  “Hmm,” he murmured, pressing a kiss to her nape.

  “I...I am with child.”

  He went so still she feared he did not breathe.

  “Are you certain?”

  She turned in the cage of his arms. “It is very early yet, but I am certain.”

  He cupped her cheeks and kissed her lovingly. “I love you, my Amalie.” Then her mouth was on his, being thoroughly, sweetly ravished.

  “I love you, too,” she said, breaking their kiss to lean her head on his shoulders, never imagining her life could be this full and happy.

  * * *

  Thank you for reading An Unconventional Affair, novella nine in my Forever Yours series! I do plan to continue this series with at least six more novellas with characters you have met over the course of the series.

  I would like to introduce you to another series of mine, The Sinful Wallflowers! These stories are full length, all over 90,000 words and will feature six friends as they embark on their perilous journey to find love.

  If you keep reading, you will find the first three chapters of MY DARLING DUKE, to introduce you to this new series of my heart. If you have not read MY DARLING DUKE yet, and you enjoy the preview, I hope you will grab a copy and indulge in Kitty and Alexander’s wonderful romance!

  Love,

  Stacy

  * * *

  MY DARLING DUKE

  Chapter One

  Brampton Manor

  Hertfordshire

  “We will have to be wicked, improper, and terribly scandalous.”

  Those words fell trembling from the lips of Lady Maryann Fitzwilliam, a young lady who wouldn’t know what it meant to be scandalous if it slapped her across the face at the crest of each dawn.

  It was a concept wholly improbable to the Honourable Katherine Iphigenia Danvers—Kitty to her friends and family—but nevertheless she felt effortlessly captivated. Or perhaps the sinful plan burning within her heart—the one she had prayed for, asking for a sign—was being validated.

  It has to be. Ladies who were regulated to the status of wallflowers and spinsters were never wicked…and most assuredly never terribly scandalous.

  “Wicked!” all four other young ladies present at their intrepid meeting chorused.

  There was a breathless pause, the only sound in the drawing room the strains of the orchestra filtering through the closed doors as they played from the grand ballroom several doors away.

  “Yes,” replied Maryann empathically, her gaze piercing her audience with its bright resolve.
She stood and sauntered to the center of the room, the hem of her elegantly draped icy blue gown swishing over the Aubusson carpet. How delightful Maryann appeared this evening, yet Kitty knew she had not yet been asked to the dance floor.

  Maryann folded her arms beneath her bosom and captured all their attention with a steely gaze. “I am not content with my lot. I cannot believe any of you is happy with your situation. We must be daring and take what we need instead of waiting, wasting away on the shelves our family and society have placed us on. We are all over two and twenty, we’re not getting any younger, and our prospects grow dimmer each year. What have we to lose?”

  “I daresay you may be correct, Maryann,” chimed in Lady Ophelia Darby, another member of their society, jokingly named the Sinful Wallflowers. Only they hadn’t done anything sinful, except for the time they had emptied a bottle of Ophelia’s father’s finest whiskey among them, giggling and hiccupping like loons in the night. Ophelia was their most illustrious member, being the daughter of a marquess, albeit without a dowry. Her deep golden-brown eyes were filled with trepidation—and a glimmer of excitement, if Kitty was not mistaken.

  “I’ve been out since I was eighteen, and each season is growing more painful than the last,” Ophelia said.

  There were several nods, which seemingly granted Maryann more courage, for her shoulders squared, a sparkle lit in her hazel eyes, and determination settled across every line of her willowy frame. “We all want to experience something other than the humdrum that is our lives.”

  More enthusiastic nods followed.

  “We all want families,” continued Maryann. “Don’t we? Or even just a moment where we are more than what society tells us to be?”

  There was another aching, breathless pause as all six members of their private club sat on the edge of their padded chairs, a charged excitement and the sense of something different happening at tonight’s impromptu meeting enveloping the room.

  “We want love,” murmured Miss Charlotte Nelson, a flush rising in her cheeks. Everyone knew she was painfully, desperately in love with the Marquess of Sands, and he had not deigned to notice her.

  They were all overlooked, of course. Kitty and her friends were rarely asked to dance at balls, or called upon by gentlemen, or asked to ride in Hyde Park, or even to afternoon teas by the diamonds of each season.

  “We want love, even passion, and we’ve all endured a few seasons. We are wallflowers with little prospect of ever attaining a well-connected match,” Maryann said fiercely.

  The nods turned into longing sighs.

  Impatience burned along Kitty’s nerves, and a sense of something new and wonderful hovered, if only she could reach for it.

  Kitty and her friends had been withering away in the ton, season by season, with no chances of improving their prospects. They were all fairly attractive but could not be considered great beauties, nor were they especially accomplished, having little useful connections and less dowries to inspire any real serious matrimonial attachments. They were generally ignored by those young gentlemen in society who were looking for a bride.

  Yet a lingering desire to wed and have their own families resided in each of their hearts. Or perhaps, they wanted only to feel what it was like to drop their handkerchief in front of a gentleman who would pick it up, ask them to dance, and send them flowers the next day.

  “How marvelous if we should all be guilty of doing something wicked, just for once,” Kitty said softly, drawing five pairs of eyes to settle on her person. A wild idea had overtaken her good sense, borne of desperation. It was dredged from a place beyond logic or reason.

  Kitty knew who the desires in her heart were for, though they were not traditional desires—Alexander Masters, the reclusive Duke of Thornton. He was the solution to turning around her family fortunes…

  Well, Kitty thought convincing society she was the fiancée of a man she had never met was the solution.

  In their world, success depended on who one knew, how powerful and prestigious those connections were. Vouchers for Almacks, invitations to balls, the opera, and the theater were all provided on the strength of how well known in society one was. And Kitty desperately needed that power to secure suitable matches for her sisters.

  She couldn’t abide the notion of her three darling sisters—Anna, Henrietta, and Judith—withering away as Kitty had done because of their poor connections and nonexistent wealth.

  The patronage of a duke would undoubtedly open the most eminent doors to her family. Their desperate plight had already seen Anna working as a lady’s companion and having to fend off the unwanted advances of a lecherous scoundrel. The country cottage they had been relegated to after Papa’s heir had claimed his estate was in dire need of repairs. Mama’s widow’s portion allowed only for the hiring of a cook and the barest appearance of gentility—and Kitty, being the eldest, was expected to secure a well-connected match.

  Kitty stood, smoothing away the imaginary wrinkles of her rose-colored gown. Tonight, she had worn her most elegant dress, and not one gentleman had been kind enough to ask her to dance. There were too many more ladies with appealing dowries in attendance at Countess Musgrove’s ball. “It is time for us to do more than wait for someone to gain the courage and ask to court us. Not when we are so inferior in our connections and ranks.”

  Her friends’ curious eyes rested on Kitty’s face, capturing every nuance of her expression, perhaps analyzing the fierce determination in her tone.

  “We can no longer afford to fade into the ballroom walls. We need to be more than wallflowers.”

  Thank heavens. This meeting had revealed itself to be a validation of her prayers. Kitty had honestly thought she’d have to hide the wicked leanings in her heart, the only solution she had envisioned for getting out of the genteel poverty in which she, her three younger sisters, and her mother lived.

  Miss Emma Prendergast wrinkled her nose, her dark gray eyes unusually somber, quite at odds with her cheerful mannerisms and humorous charm. “I am three and twenty and have had four seasons because of the generosity of my godmother. I have never been thought of as more than a wallflower,” she said wistfully, the ache for more evident on her face.

  “We have been biddable and dutiful daughters and sisters. And that has gotten us nowhere,” Maryann continued.

  Everyone stood, and the excitement that filled the air was electric. “We must commit to pool our resources together and help one another to be more. We have never…none of us, ever been sinful, have we?”

  Wicked…sinful…and not at all proper.

  Those murmurs slipped from her friends’ lips, and a breathless, tense silence blanketed the private parlor.

  After that, everything became a blur as Kitty and her friends laughed and plotted. How delightfully improper it all was, and she ardently prayed they would have the courage to act upon their hearts’ desires and not falter.

  Sometime later, her friends dispersed back into the ballroom, anticipating that perhaps tonight would be the night their fortunes started to change. Tonight, they would all start being wicked…and bold.

  Kitty turned to face Maryann, her dearest friend. “You never mentioned when we rode in the park earlier that we would have such a rousing conversation.”

  Maryann smiled, the prettiness of her features rendered beautiful with that curve of her lips. If only the beaux of society could see beyond the spectacles perched atop her elegant nose and her intelligent humor. It did not bode well for the young bucks of the ton if they were not attracted to her wit and vivacity.

  “Papa has accepted an offer from Lord Stamford. He informed me this morning, and I cannot bear the notion.”

  Kitty gasped and hurried to her friend, clasping her hands between her own. “Say it isn’t so! Why, he is older than your papa!”

  Maryann’s eyes twinkled with surprising humor. “I know…but I have a plan.”

  Kitty stilled. “A wicked one?”

  “Oh, Kitty, a most diabolically wick
ed plan, and it involves Nicolas Ives.”

  Shock tore through her. “The earl everyone calls London’s most notorious scoundrel for his unforgivable debaucheries?”

  Some undefinable emotion pierced Maryann’s eyes before she lowered her lids. “The very one,” she murmured, a flush coloring her cheeks.

  Kitty stepped back, picked up her reticule, opened it, and withdrew a clipping of a newspaper article. She cleared her throat nervously. “I have a plan, too.”

  The wicked notion was so audacious, so scandalous, she hadn’t the heart to put it into words until now. “One I am mad and reckless to even think of. I prayed, Maryann… I prayed for days, wondering if I am on the right path, and then tonight you confirmed everything I have been thinking. There is more to life, isn’t there? And we cannot let society, our fathers, or our brothers decide it all for us.”

  Maryann hurried to the door and turned the lock, ensuring no one could come upon them. “What mad plans do you have?”

  Kitty thrust the paper at her. “I believe I’ve found a solution to my family’s problems.”

  Pushing her glasses atop her nose, her friend scanned the gossip sheet. “What is it?”

  “My father always said everything in the world, every tier to climb, is not about how skilled one is but about who you know.” Familiar grief welled in her heart, and she pushed it aside. Her papa had died four years past, and the sting of losing him was ever present, especially given how much harder life had become.

  “Papa always said connections are the currency of our world and are the only way to survive.” She lifted her chin. “Maryann, please read the passage I’ve circled.”

  Her friend cleared her throat delicately, squinted, and read silently.