Undressed with the Marquess (Lost Lords of London #3) - Christi Caldwell Page 0,87

is . . . horrendous.”

“And they are amongst the kinder ones,” Lady Kinsley stated as fact, examining a violet ribbon.

Those women were amongst the kinder ones? Temperance sighed. This was what she had to face before she managed to secure the funds.

Kinsley spoke, jolting Temperance from those uncomfortable musings. “You didn’t ask whether there was any truth to what they were saying . . . about . . .” Her sister-in-law’s round cheeks pinkened. “About what they were saying regarding me and . . . a scoundrel.”

Temperance tested a bolt of satin that had been forgotten on the table. “It isn’t my place to ask you those personal pieces. And certainly not because I’d overheard some horrific women talking about you.” She glanced toward the gaggle of gossips. Finding them blatantly staring, Temperance favored them with a glare.

The young women immediately jerked their attention up and everywhere, hastily averting their gazes.

“Welllll done,” Kinsley said sotto voce. “Are you certain you’re not of the nobility? You have the look—”

“I’m quite certain,” Temperance interrupted with a little laugh.

“Kinsley, Temperance.”

They looked to where the duchess motioned to them at the front of the modiste’s. Grateful to put this place, and these women, behind her, Temperance fell into step beside Lady Kinsley, following her out.

When the carriage rocked into motion, to give herself a distraction from the sway of Dare’s conveyance, Temperance considered the passing scene.

When she’d agreed to join Dare and assist him in helping his sister, Temperance had been single-minded in her purpose—get the young lady married, secure, and then in turn, secure the funds Dare had promised.

Only . . .

What about Kinsley? What did she want?

They were questions she’d not allowed herself to contemplate. Now . . . she did. Really considered it. Did Temperance wish to push the younger woman toward marriage? Temperance, who’d had her heart broken by life and love . . . How could she have failed to consider what the other woman’s fate would be?

You put Chance first because he is your brother . . .

And yet, did the ends justify the means?

This time, as the carriage swayed and her stomach lurched, it wasn’t strictly the conveyance responsible for that unease. She didn’t want to think of Kinsley as a young woman. She was a means to an end. Or that was what she had been. Until Temperance had joined her in the dress shop and seen how she was treated. And then they had talked.

And now, everything was confused in her mind.

She squeezed her eyes shut. But if she wants to marry . . . surely that is different. Just because Temperance’s heart had been broken, that didn’t mean the same fate awaited Dare’s sister. Why . . . perhaps she might be like Gwynn and find that beautiful rarest of loves.

And . . . and why did it also feel like Temperance had just tried to convince herself?

She gave thanks when the trip ended and the door was flung open, and fresh air spilled inside.

While the duchess climbed out, Temperance took a moment to discreetly wipe the sweat at her brow. She found Dare’s sister staring at her, and abruptly let her hand fall back to her lap. Unlike the cold, angry gaze that had met her on the journey to the modiste’s, there was now . . . a softening.

“You get sick in carriages,” the other woman remarked.

Pinching her cheeks, Temperance breathed slowly through her nose and exhaled out her mouth. “I take it my reaction was obvious?”

“Well, not at first,” Lady Kinsley admitted. The other woman glanced about, then spoke in a conspiratorial whisper. “I get sick on boats.”

“Boats,” Temperance echoed dumbly. With that revelation, once more Dare’s sister unwittingly forced her to see the woman . . . and not the assignment.

Kinsley nodded, and for the first time since she’d met the girl, there was a realization of a different sort for Temperance: just how young, just how innocent she in fact was. “My family would retire to the country every summer, and there would be boat races and everyone loved it, but it was sheer misery for me.”

“I’ve . . . never been on one.” She’d done . . . so little. Just like so many children who were raised and died in the Rookeries. She’d seen so little and experienced even less.

“If you hate carriages, you’ll hate boats even more,” Kinsley said as they descended from the carriage. “On the journey to the modiste’s, I believed you were nervous