Mistress of Sins (Dredthorne Hall #3) - Hazel Hunter Page 0,4
customary clarity. “Was that your motive for telling me of his lordship’s return?”
“I truly meant only to tease you,” her friend said, grimacing. “I should have thought better of it. When the Duke of Bedford refused to dance with me during my first season, I thought it should break my heart. Papa so wished for me to become engaged to him.”
Although she had received innumerable offers, Catherine remained unmarried, which had always puzzled Jennet. “Surely there have been others who might please your father.”
“Those who have satisfied him were gentlemen I found very disagreeable, and those I have favored he disdained.” She shrugged. “Truly, I rather like my situation. I am invited to all the balls and gatherings. I can travel where I like, and see my friends whenever I choose. I will inherit all this someday. Why marry at all?”
Jennet tucked her needle into the velvet, and rubbed her throbbing finger against her palm. “You do not yearn for love, or children?”
“I know too much about men to fall in love,” Catherine said. “Child-bearing seems a vastly dreary business.” Her nose wrinkled. “I consider myself blessed whenever I see Bedford now. The years since have stolen most of His Grace’s hair, and bestowed on him the look of a petulant dormouse.”
“Yet he would have made you a Duchess, my dear,” Eleanor Tindall said as she came into the library. As petite as her daughter, the lady wore a sumptuous gown of dark blue velvet with gleaming insets of golden brocade. “Good afternoon, dear Jennet. I hope you will stay for luncheon.”
“Thank you, ma’am, but I think I must go home.” Jennet tucked her mask into her reticule. “Thank you for helping me to avert all possible disaster, Catherine. I will call for you on the night of the masquerade at dusk.”
“I will have the gown sent to Reed Park tomorrow,” her friend said as she walked with her to the front entry. When Jennet murmured her thanks and kissed her cheek Catherine took hold of her hands. “Do not permit the specter of the past to spoil our fun. What is in the past is dead. He is nothing to you now.”
“You are quite right.” She forced a smile and then went to the rig.
On the drive back to Reed Park Jennet reined in the horse at a crossing, and then turned onto another, seldom-used road that led in the opposite direction. Soon she crossed fresh wheel ruts left by the recent passage of heavily-laden carts, and passed a meadow of withering grasses glinting with drops of melting frost.
The afternoon sun felt hot on the back of her neck as she approached another turn, this one onto a drive leading up to an imposing country manor. The house, clad in dark stone and roofed in charcoal slate, had double-hung sash windows and a fan panel over the front door, in which had been placed panes of black and white glass cut and fitted to resemble a crescent moon in a star-studded night sky. White stone and severely-trimmed evergreens hemmed the outer walls, and flanked the stone carriage house to one side.
He had hated the house, Jennet recalled, and yet it remained unchanged.
The lodge is a nightmare to the eye. When my father dies I will paint it apricot and scarlet, and have the gardeners fill the lawns with daisies and dandelions. Then you may make a wish each time you walk outside, while I fashion flower crowns for you to wear every day.
How many such fanciful notions had they shared during their engagement? For a moment Jennet felt the pain of her loss again, as if the man she had adored had died rather than deserted her. This was to have been her home, their home, which he had promised they would fill with laughter and children. Margaret would have come often to visit her grandchildren. They would have had their friends over for dinners and parties and holiday gatherings, and watched their sons and daughters grow, and lived the life of anyone’s dreams.
“You fool,” Jennet whispered as she stared at Gerard Lodge. Whether she addressed its master or herself, she could not say.
As she tugged on the reins to turn the rig around, Jennet felt hollow yet resolute. Should Baron Greystone choose to attend the masquerade, like the other guests he would be in costume. That would likely avert any possibility of an unhappy encounter. She could enjoy the evening with Catherine and their friends without worry.
And if