least you do not have your mother’s face. Rounder than a saucer of tea is not an attractive shape. Esme and Cassandra, however…they shall need more help, I fear. The finest dresses to distract from the rest of them.” Auntie Agatha raised a brow, making an expansive gesture that was somehow elegant and rude all at once. “Why do you not wear more ivory, my dear? Daffodil makes everyone look sallow, yourself included.”
“Yellow is a cheerful color,” Felicity dared to argue, for it put her in mind of happier days and summer sun, flowers blooming in spring.
The promise of renewal.
Hope, which was becoming increasingly fleeting for Felicity with each day that passed.
“A color cannot be cheerful, dearest,” Auntie Agatha dismissed. “Besides, cheer is a dreadful state, best reserved for the simple-minded and babes. The rest of us know what we are in for. Wear the jaconet muslin trimmed with Vandyke lace, if you please. It is most becoming.”
A rare compliment from Auntie Agatha.
“And a lady who is desperate must be as fetching as possible,” her aunt added.
As usual, the compliment was wrapped in an insult. Felicity ought to have known.
“Am I not fetching enough?” she asked. “I had no end of suitors in London.”
“Two seasons, and you turned them all away. Even a diamond of the first water must choose from her beaux, lest they start defecting. Do you think the farmer wishes to chase about the cow for two years before he can milk it?” Auntie Agatha asked, her tone queenly.
“Forgive me for thinking myself the better of a milk cow,” she said.
“Never mind the analogy, dearest.” Auntie Agatha thumped her cane on the floor. “Reward. That is the promise you have to dangle before all gentlemen. Marriage to you is a great reward, and you must show them it is such. If you wait too long, you shall end up a spinster, and goodness knows what shall become of your sisters. It is your duty to them, to your father, to yourself, to make a good match.”
A good match.
Felicity sighed aloud this time rather than only in her mind. She was reluctant to ask what Auntie Agatha’s notion of a good match would be. For some reason, Blade Winter rose in her mind. Auntie Agatha would be properly horrified to discover she had consorted with such a man. As it was, she had been scarcely able to conceal her disgust over the common stock, as she had phrased it, of some of the guests in attendance.
You will not know them, she had added for good measure. Speak only to the gentlemen in attendance.
By which she had meant the lords, of course.
But that was the trouble. Felicity wanted to know the common stock. Or rather, one of them in particular.
“Lord Foy is in attendance,” Auntie Agatha went on. “And there is Lord Denton as well. Excellent prospects, the both of them, despite the latter having been jilted by the Duke of Linross’s daughter. Flighty chits, the both of them.”
Felicity scratched Miss Wilhelmina’s soft head, her aunt’s recommendations droning on.
His half sister, Lady Aylesford, held the infant toward him as if conveying to him the world’s greatest prize. If there was one creature Blade disliked more than cats, it was babies.
He stared at the chubby cheeks, the soft skin, the white cap and swaddling. “No.”
“Go on,” she said. “Lady Gwendolyn shan’t bite. You are her uncle, you know.”
Christ, he supposed he was. As he stared at the miniature person still being offered, something unexpected slid through him.
Emotion?
Tenderness?
“Uncle,” he said stupidly.
The child looked delicate. He was a rough man. His hands were only accustomed to gentleness when skimming the lush curves of a woman’s body. Did not Lady Aylesford realize he could drop the thing?
“Yes, Uncle Blade,” said his spoony half sister, smiling at him. “Hold her, if you please. Though you must tell me your real Christian name. No one is called Blade.”
“I am.” He made no move to accept the child, but he had to admit Lady Gwendolyn was rather…sweet-looking. She cooed and made a sound of contentment, then stuffed her fist into her little mouth and sucked on it.
“I refuse to believe it,” Lady Aylesford continued if he had not spoken. “Do hold out your arms, you silly man. Settle yourself on the settee like so. Excellent.”
Blade found himself seated on the furniture in question, arms positioned to welcome the babe. Suddenly, his niece—half niece—was a soft, warm weight in his arms.
It was…astonishing.
Her blue eyes blinked up at