“Good day, Lady Fitz.”
Her gait was as neat as her person, her blue skirts barely swishing as she turned down the corridor. By habit he listened as her footsteps receded, the cadence and lightness of her footfalls almost as familiar to him as the rhythm of his own breaths.
When he could hear her no more, he pulled Isabelle’s note out of the inside pocket of his day coat and read it again.
My Dearest Fitz,
(Am I too forward in the salutation itself? No matter, I have never been the least reticent and I certainly won’t change now.)
Thank you for the lovely house you have arranged for myself and the children. They adore the garden, tucked away from sight. I am particularly fond of the bright, cheerful parlor, which overlooks the green square just across the street.
Such a long time it has been since I last saw you, a few more days ought not to matter very much. Yet I find myself extraordinarily impatient to meet again, even though the house is clearly not yet ready to receive callers. Will you come tomorrow?
Yours,
Isabelle
The letter was most cordial, and her signature the warmest element of all. He had thought of her as Isabelle for many years, but had only ever addressed her as Miss Pelham or—in his recent correspondence—Mrs. Englewood. For her to close her letter with her given name was an unmistakable invitation to further intimacy.
Isabelle. The first girl he’d kissed. The only one he’d ever loved.
He tucked away the note and opened his newspaper again. A maid came to take away Lady Fitz’s plate.
A thought occurred to him. “Bring me the plate.”
The maid looked at him uncomprehendingly.
“The plate in your hand.”
His wife had left behind some scrambled eggs, which was most unlike her: One served oneself at breakfast and she never took more than she could eat. To the maid’s surprise, he picked up a piece of the scrambled eggs with his fork.
And would not have been able to swallow it without the help of his coffee. He knew she liked her eggs salted, but this was less scrambled egg than scrambled salt. He’d have to speak to her about it next time he saw her: This much salt in the diet must be injurious to the health.
As unthinkable as it had been eight years ago, they’d become good friends. And friends watched out for one another.
Millie met Helena, Fitz’s twin, as the latter came out of her room. The twins did not look alike. Fitz, with his black hair and blue eyes, bore a much greater resemblance to their elder sister Venetia. Helena, on the other hand, had inherited their maternal grandmother’s auburn hair and green eyes.
This morning Helena was in a hunter green velvet jacket and a matching skirt. Between the lapels of the jacket, the front pleats of her white shirtwaist were as crisp as morning air. A cameo brooch at her throat, featuring not a woman’s profile in ivory, but an onyx Roman eagle, completed her ensemble.
Venetia was considered the great beauty of the family, but Helena was lovely in her own right, not to mention confident, capable—and more devious than any of them had suspected.
At the beginning of the year, Fitz’s best friend, Lord Hastings, had found out that Helena was having a clandestine affair with Mr. Andrew Martin. Mr. Martin was a nice young man and Millie did not doubt he adored Helena as much as she adored him. The problem was that he’d adored Helena since they first met years ago, but never had the courage to defy his mother and the long-standing family expectation to marry his third cousin.
Millie understood the force of first love—she herself firmly remained in the grip of her own. But Mr. Martin was a married man and Helena, by taking up with him, had placed her reputation in grave peril. Millie and Venetia had whisked Helena to the other side of the Atlantic as soon as they could, in the hope that by distancing Helena from Mr. Martin, she might come to her senses.
The American trip had not been entirely wasted—a series of events begun there had culminated in Venetia’s unexpected but deliriously happy marriage to the Duke of Lexington. But unfortunately, in Helena’s case, absence only made her heart grow fonder of Mr. Martin.
Helena was both of age and financially independent; her family could not coerce her to give up Mr. Martin. But since January, they’d kept a constant eye on her. Helena never went anywhere without either Venetia, Millie, or her new maid Susie, hired expressly for this purpose, keeping her company.