of country and leave well enough alone.”
Eliza leaned down to pick up the baby. “You mustn’t worry, darling. Poppy proclaimed Donovan much too handsome to marry...but he’s not too handsome for you, is he?”
Hollis nearly choked. “Don’t be absurd, Eliza.”
“Why is it absurd? Everyone suspects what I think must be true. Isn’t it true?” she asked with a sly look at her sister.
Hollis could feel the heat rising in her. “No, it’s not true. That’s not...” She paused to draw a breath to steady herself. These were the moments she hated keeping Donovan’s secret. “Donovan esteems someone else.”
“Oh.” Eliza sounded very surprised. “I didn’t... But that... I mean, he seems so devoted to you.”
“He is devoted to me because he is a very loyal man. But he’s not in love with me.”
Eliza buried her face in Cecelia’s neck, kissed her cheek, and put her on the floor again. “Then he’s a fool.”
That was the sort of remark any loyal sister would make. But she almost sounded disappointed. “Oh dear,” Hollis murmured.
“What?” Eliza asked.
“I’ve become the relation everyone frets about, haven’t I?”
Eliza laughed, but it sounded forced.
“I have! I say too much, I involve myself in things that everyone says I ought not to do, I’ve bubbled up—”
“Hollis!”
“But I never thought you’d fret about me, Eliza.”
Eliza’s face fell. “I didn’t say any of those things—you did. All I want is for you to be happy. Is that so wrong?”
“No, of course not. But being married for the sake of marriage would not make me happy. Donovan would not make me happy.”
“Then what would make you happy?” Eliza asked.
A very good question. She wanted a happy marriage. But she didn’t think she wanted this. She wanted something simpler. Unfortunately, when one was sister to a future queen, simple wasn’t a ready alternative, unless one was prepared to enter a convent. “Not Donovan,” Hollis said.
Eliza pursed her lips. “Then I’ll never say another word about it. But what would make you happy? You’ve been widowed more than four years now—you can’t live with Percy’s ghost forever.”
Hollis laughed at that. “But I do live with it. He’s everywhere in my house.”
Eliza turned back to the mirror. “Then perhaps you ought to remove him or yourself from your house. I loved Percy like a brother, but I don’t think even he would want you to spin like a top.”
Hollis wasn’t spinning like a top...or maybe she was. Lately she’d felt as if she’d been spinning around and looking for anything to give her meaning.
But there was more to it. For the first time since his death, there was someone other than Percy to think about. Someone who was in many ways just as ill-suited to her as Donovan, and just as unattainable. But when she thought of his amber eyes, or the way he spoke English so perfectly with a deep accent, or how she tingled when he intently watched her lips when she spoke, or how she imagined his broad hands on her body... Well, maybe she was spinning a little.
When they’d finished dressing, Eliza studied Hollis. “I have just the thing.” She went into an adjoining dressing room and returned with a necklace. An enormous ruby was attached to a larger, circular gold chain. Below the ruby, three smaller rubies, separated by diamonds, dangled.
“It’s beautiful,” Hollis said as Eliza put it on her.
“The biggest stone was a brooch originally,” Eliza said. “King Tomsin presented it to Queen Verity two hundred years ago as an anniversary gift. He pinned it on her himself. The very next day she was found dead in her bed. Some say it was poisoned.”
“Eliza!”
“Pay that no heed,” Eliza said breezily “What else could they say about it? It’s not poisoned now, I assure you—I wore it myself to a state supper.”
Hollis admired the ruby in the mirror. “I’ve never in my life seen anything so beautiful.”
“You must have it,” Eliza said. “A gift from me. It suits you with your black hair and that dress. You look voluptuous.”
“Ladies?”
The duke had entered, all smiles. Cecelia began to gurgle at the sight of him, and he scooped her up, holding her high overhead, and cooed to her.
“Look, darling, I gave this necklace to Hollis. Doesn’t it suit her?”
“Gave it? I can’t keep this,” Hollis insisted.
“Je, it suits her very well. And, of course, you must keep it, Hollis. My wife has made it so.” He winked at her. “You are both ravishing, if I may say,” he added, although he was