The Wedding Challenge (21 page)

Callie might have termed them friends, but now she was not sure that either of them would have said the same thing. On the other hand, she was positive that they did not dislike each other. Until tonight, Francesca had never made a genuinely slighting comment toward or about Sinclair that Callie could remember, and she was certain that whenever Francesca’s name came up in conversation, her brother always listened with interest. At nearly any ball that they both attended, Sinclair would always dance a waltz with Francesca. With another man, that might not have indicated anything, but Callie knew that her brother was not much given to dancing.

But what did any of this mean?

Still puzzling over the matter, Callie walked back inside and down the hallway to the smaller sitting room, where she suspected her friend would have returned. Her instincts were right, for Francesca was seated upon the couch. Unusually for her, she held a needlepoint frame in her lap.

As Callie entered, Francesca glanced up at her and smiled, then returned her attention to her needlework. “You and the duke have resolved the problem?” she asked lightly.

“Yes.” Callie paused, then asked, “Why did you not tell me that Lord Bromwell disliked my brother so?”

Pink tinged the other woman’s cheeks, and Francesca glanced at Callie, then away. “I didn’t—I was not sure that Lord Bromwell disliked Rochford, or how much he disliked him. I thought that certainly he might…because of…of the duke and, um…” She trailed off uncertainly.

“And Lady Daphne?” Callie supplied.

Francesca’s astonished gaze flew to Callie’s face. “He told you?”

Callie shrugged. “There was little way around it. He knew I would not let him slide out of explaining to me why he was so strongly opposed to my seeing Lord Bromwell. Why he was so frightened of what Lord Bromwell might intend regarding me. And once he told me about Bromwell’s issuing him a challenge—”

“What!” Francesca’s needlepoint dropped, unnoticed, from her hand and slid onto the floor. “He challenged Sinclair to a duel?”

“Yes. Did you not know?”

Francesca shook her head so hard that her golden ringlets bounced about wildly. “No! He must have been mad! Everyone knows what a dead shot Rochford is.”

“He was too angry to think, I suspect,” Callie replied. “Sinclair said he was only seventeen or eighteen, and he thought…well, he believed that Sinclair had played the cad with his sister, seducing and abandoning her. That is what he accused him of, though of course Sinclair did not put it quite so bluntly.”

Francesca let out a short, wordless sound of disbelief. “As if anyone would have to seduce Lady Daphne!”

“Bromwell loves his sister very much. I have heard him talk of her. I feel sure he did not realize the sort of person that his sister was. He was young and away at school.”

“Of course. And no doubt Daphne told him that she had been wronged. She was hoping to force your brother’s hand, I am sure. She wanted very much to be the Duchess of Rochford.”

“Clearly she did not know Sinclair well enough,” Callie commented.

A brief smile touched Francesca’s lips. “No. I suppose she did not, after all. Rochford does not respond well to being pressed.” She shook her head. “What happened? Did Rochford tell you? Surely he did not fight the boy.”

“No, of course not. But he said that he regrets the way he handled it. He was scornful, apparently. He thinks he hurt Lord Bromwell’s pride. Brom—that is, Bromwell—must have nursed a grudge against him all these years. And when he had the chance to inflict a little revenge upon Sinclair, he seized it.” Callie shrugged. “He wooed the duke’s sister, then unceremoniously left her, exposing her to the
ton’s
gossip.”

“Oh, Callie, I am so sorry.” Francesca reached out to take her friend’s hand, and Callie saw that her blue eyes were swimming with tears. “I had no idea that he carried such a grudge against the duke. I never heard about the challenge. I was…busy with my first Season, and Lord Haughston had just asked me to marry him. I was so wrapped up in my own concerns that I suppose I did not listen to all the gossip.” Francesca saw no need to add that she had, at that time, been doing her best to avoid any mention of anything to do with the Duke of Rochford.

“I was a little suspicious of Lord Bromwell at first,” Francesca went on. “But mostly because he was Lady Swithington’s brother, and I thought he might be like her. Greedy, ambitious, licentious. I was suspicious of his reasons for courting you because I thought he might harbor some resentment against Rochford, but I did not feel I could speak to you about your brother and Bromwell’s sister. It did not seem appropriate. And I had no idea of the strength of Bromwell’s feelings. Or that he would seek vengeance upon the duke through you. I am terribly sorry. I should not have let him come to call here. I should have kept a closer eye on him.”

Callie smiled and squeezed her friend’s hand comfortingly. “You are very sweet, but I do not think there was anything you could have done. I knew that Sinclair did not like him, did not want me to be around him. If anyone is at fault, it is I—for being headstrong and obstinate, refusing to take my brother’s advice. I was foolish—and too ready to believe that Lord Bromwell cared for me.”

“He is despicable,” Francesca declared. “To set out to break your heart! I promise you—I will plot some quite devious and painful social downfall for him.”

Callie laughed, as she knew Francesca had meant her to. “No, indeed, ’tis not so awful. He did not break my heart. I told you when I first came here that I am not a romantic. I did not fall dreadfully in love with him. As I told Sinclair, the worst I have suffered is a little trifling embarrassment. Why, it is not even the full Season yet. Half the people I know are not even here, and in a few weeks there will be something much more interesting to gossip about than me and my little fall from pride.”

Francesca still looked troubled, but she let the matter drop. Callie was grateful. She knew that her words were not entirely truthful, and it was hard to keep up a pretense of good cheer.

She did believe that the gossip about her would die down quickly enough, and though she did not like the fact that people were talking about her, she could bear it without much difficulty. But she had lied about the heartache that she felt. The truth was that her heart had been sore without Brom. It had not been only her pride that had been hurt.

She had not fallen in love with him. She reminded herself of that fact frequently. But she could not deny that her days were far duller without him in them. She missed talking to him and seeing his face. She missed his smile, his laugh, the way his presence filled a room. The other night, when she had seen him across the room, her heart had leapt in her chest. The problem was, she thought, she was lonely without him, and unhappy. Every morning when she woke up she would feel again for a moment as she used to, and then she would remember that Brom was missing from her life, and a quiet sadness would settle upon her.

However, she was determined that the world, at least, should not see that she was unhappy. Gritting her teeth, she went about her usual social routine. A Lilles, after all, had to keep up appearances.

Therefore, as the days wore on she paid calls or received visitors every afternoon, and she accompanied Francesca to parties, smiling and chatting with friends and acquaintances as if she did not have a care in the world. And if there were nights when she cried herself to sleep, or mornings when she wished that she did not have to get out of bed, she did not let on.

One evening, at the theater, Sally Pemberton, a rather sharp-faced blond girl, came in with her mother to visit them in their box, and once the requisite amount of small talk had passed, she said archly, “’Tis odd, is it not, how rarely one sees Lord Bromwell these days.”

“Really?” Callie glanced at her. “I am afraid I had not noticed.”

“Not noticed! But, my dear, the man was practically in your pocket, was he not? Every party, every dinner. Why, the way he danced attendance on you, I vow I quite expected to hear a happy announcement very soon. And now…” She shrugged. “Well, one cannot help but wonder what has happened.”

“I have learned that it is a fool’s game to take a young gentleman seriously—either in what he says or in what he does. It is precisely because of a young man’s fickleness that a woman is always wise to keep a firm grip upon her heart.” Callie smiled serenely at Miss Pemberton.

And if she had to curl her hand into a fist in her lap, fingernails digging into her palm, to keep any emotion from showing in her face, or if she cried into her pillow again that night…well, at least the Miss Pembertons of the world did not know it.

Francesca, she felt sure, suspected that Callie’s nights were restless; she could hardly have missed the mornings when Callie came down to breakfast with eyelids still swollen from tears or smudged with faint blue beneath them from lack of sleep. But, tactfully, Francesca refrained from comment.

Callie knew, too, that Francesca turned down a number of invitations, choosing only enough to make it clear that Callie was not sitting home nursing a broken heart. Her friend also, Callie noticed, remained by her side through most of any party, quick to steer the conversation in a new direction if it entered troubling waters, or to skewer with a few well-chosen words any person with the audacity to repeat whatever gossip still circulated about Callie and Lord Bromwell. For that, if for no other reason, Callie thought, Francesca would always have a special place in her heart.

She did not see Bromwell at any of the parties she attended. She thought he might have left London. He had only been visiting, after all; he obviously preferred living on his estate. But she heard his name now and then at parties, and Sir Lucien told Francesca that Bromwell had been seen frequently at Cribb’s Parlour, a drinking establishment favored by the “fancy,” as gentlemen with a keen interest in the sport of pugilism were known. He had also, according to Francesca’s friend, spent several afternoons at Jackson’s Saloon, where he had been given the honor of stripping to the waist and sparring with Gentleman Jackson himself.

Callie could not help but wonder if Bromwell was staying in London so that he could see for himself what sort of damage he had inflicted on Rochford’s sister. This thought served to stiffen her spine and send her to one or two parties that she had been reluctant to attend for fear she might run into him.

More and more members of the
ton
were arriving in London almost daily, it seemed, and Callie knew that it would not be many more weeks before the Season was well under way. The number of invitations they received each day was rapidly growing, and they were spending more and more evenings at one party or another.

She thought of the months ahead and the exhausting whirl of parties and calls, and she quailed inside. She was not sure she could stand living through this spring and into June, going to a constant round of social engagements, when all the while she felt somehow both leaden and empty inside. As for her original plan of using the Season to find a husband—well, that idea carried no importance for her any longer. Looking back on it, she wondered why she had ever thought that she wanted to marry, much less spend the time and effort it would require to actively seek out a likely prospect for the endeavor.

She thought with longing of going to Marcastle to stay with Sinclair—or, even better, to Dancy Park. She could spend her days riding about the estate or taking long tramps through the countryside. There were friends to visit there—Dominic and Constance. Everything would be quiet and calm, and there would be no prying eyes searching her face for signs of sorrow or embarrassment. She would not have to worry about what she would do if she saw Lord Bromwell walk into a party.

But she knew that she could not leave yet. It was too soon, and gossiping tongues would stir. No one left at the height of the Season except with good reason, and everyone would be certain that her reason was a broken heart. She would have to stay at least another two months now, until May, she decided, and she almost wept at the thought.

“I thought we would attend Lady Whittington’s musicale tonight,” Francesca announced one afternoon.

Callie barely suppressed a groan.

“Yes, I know,” Francesca commiserated. “They are dead bores, usually.”

“Usually?”

“Well, always. However, they have one distinct advantage. They do not last past ten o’clock, ever, and one also does not have to converse most of the time. You can pretend to be listening to the wretched music.”

“If one is adept at acting,” Callie agreed. “But you are right. Having to be out only two hours is a very welcome thing.”

So with somewhat less reluctance than she usually felt, Callie dressed for the evening, letting her maid spend a few extra minutes taming and arranging her curls, and she and Francesca went to the musicale. Francesca, as usual, arranged it so that they swept in later than most of the crowd; such behavior was always marked down as simply the way Lady Haughston was, but Callie was well aware of the fact that it greatly reduced the time that she would have to spend keeping up her pose of cheerful indifference to Lord Bromwell’s absence.

They met Lady Manwaring and her sister, Mrs. Beltenham, just inside the foyer, and they strolled into the music room together, pausing to look about for seats. Callie’s gaze went to the west wall of the room, opposite the windows, and her heart skittered in her chest.