needn’t remind me.’ He was the reason she’d already devoted too much time to preparing for dinner. Her inability to find an appropriate dress reminded her of the many times she’d stood before this mirror six years ago, feeling heavy and uncomfortable in all her country finery and inherited jewels, the reflection staring back at her one of a young lady who used to turn down dances for fear that she would step on toes and embarrass herself. Every evening before dinner, she would try on all her dresses, lamenting to Mary about her inability to look like a refined London lady. She’d once thought this was the key to securing Hugh’s heart. Instead, the way into his affection had been through more pounds and political influence than her family had possessed.
‘I think you should consider yourself very lucky,’ Anne said, drawing Clara back to the conversation.
‘Lucky? I am far from lucky.’ If she were lucky, then Hugh wouldn’t be here and she wouldn’t feel the need to prove herself to the likes of him or Lady Fulton. She had changed a great deal since the last time she’d been here—now the trick was proving it to everyone else, including herself at times.
‘Of course you are. If you forgive him, then there are no barriers to anything happening between the two of you this Christmas.’
Clara gaped at her sister-in-law, unable to believe the words that had just come out of her mouth while Clara was standing in her shift and chemise of all things. Clara stepped into her green dress, yanked it up and stuck her arms in the sleeves. ‘Life in the country has become quite dull if you’re suggesting something between me and Lord Delamare, a man who is nothing more than a fortune hunter who’d go through my money faster than he does actresses in London.’
‘He isn’t as bad as you and so many others think,’ Anne responded with surprising seriousness, having seen and heard a great deal more of Hugh than Clara had when she’d followed Adam to London every Season. But while she’d been discreet with her tales of him, others had not and a very different picture of him had emerged for Clara.
When Hugh had been a student at the Reverend’s school with Adam he hadn’t been so bad, but it wasn’t the case any more as she sadly knew from experience. During Hugh’s many visits to Winsome when she was a girl, he’d seemed so friendly, straightforward and predictable, enjoying riding and hunting like any young gentleman, but the candlelight had never caught in his eyes or his smile been as wide or charming as it had during that Christmas week. Some time between their meeting in the sitting room on the first day and the snowball fight in the garden, Hugh had stopped being simply her elder brother’s friend and had become very much more.
It wasn’t until the morning that he’d told her he would marry another that he’d suddenly become someone Clara didn’t recognise. After that disastrous Christmas, Adam and others had tried to convince her that Hugh wasn’t the rake Clara believed him to be. Hugh’s behaviour in London had proven them all wrong, making her brother’s continued faith in his old friend perplexing. Adam had always had their father’s gift of seeing the best in even the worst people. It was a trait she didn’t often share and Clara wondered what Hugh hid from Adam and Anne to keep them so enamoured of him. ‘What about the duel he fought? Only a true wastrel resorts to that kind of theatrics to resolve a dispute.’
‘You know how men are when it comes to their honour. Even the best of them can lose their heads at times.’
‘He isn’t the best of them, as proven by the tale of him and Miss Palmer at the theatre, the one that was in all the London papers that Lady Bellworth was kind enough to send us as if I’d wanted to hear news of Hugh, good or bad.’
‘According to Adam, the story is quite overblown. I think once you speak with him at dinner you’ll see that he isn’t the rake those rumours make him out to be.’
‘I doubt it.’ Clara peered at Anne while Mary did up the back buttons, amazed, after her earlier show of concern downstairs, that she would be this cavalier about Clara and Hugh. ‘Even if he is, I don’t care. I learned the hard way about him once before. It’s all I need to know about his character.’
She viewed herself in the mirror, silently admitting that the green dress did suit her better. Good. It would make her diamond and emerald necklace stand out and help banish the old self-consciousness nipping at her. While Hugh’s rejection had wounded her burgeoning confidence years ago, Alfred had made her certain of it, but he was gone and it was up to her to maintain her belief in herself.
She glanced at the door to her room and at the shiny knob reflecting the firelight. Just on the other side of it was where she and Alfred had truly met for the first time, on that Christmas morning after she’d come upstairs from meeting Hugh for the last time.
She’d struggled to remain composed until she’d been able to reach this side of the door and cry, but Alfred had been there to help soothe her broken heart...
* * *
‘Lady Exton, are you well?’
Genuine concern and not just the nicety of manners had driven Lord Kingston’s question. It had been there in his blue eyes with their faint lines at the corners.
He was older than her—thirty-five, perhaps—with dark hair touched with grey at the temples and the regal air of his class. He stood straight and tall, his strong features making him more debonair than a man like Lord Westbook, but there was a kindness about him that called to Clara.
‘Since the passing of my parents I sometimes find the holidays difficult to endure.’
If she’d known him better she might have wailed on his shoulder, as she wished she could still do with her mother who would have rushed to comfort her. But her mother was no longer there to offer her love or wisdom or even the strength to face the other guests.
All day today she’d have to sit beside everyone in church and across the table at dinner and pretend to be cheerful while her heart continued to break. Everyone had seen her and Hugh walking and playing cards and spending almost every moment they could in one another’s company. His having left and her looking more like it was All Hallows’ Eve than Christmas morning would make it obvious to everyone what had happened.
Hugh hadn’t just trifled with her and jilted her, he’d done it in the most public way imaginable, making the pain even more deep.
‘I understand. It was a great many years before I could enjoy Christmas after my wife passed. I assure you, Lady Exton, it does get easier with time.’
‘Does it?’ she whispered.
Her mother would have seen Hugh for the fortune hunter he really was and she would have warned Clara off him as she had the other fortune hunters in London. The lack of her mother’s love and guidance further tarnished an already clouded morning.
He reached into the pocket of his coat and took out a white handkerchief and handed it to her. ‘It does.’
She took his handkerchief and dabbed at her eyes, embarrassed for almost losing her poise. ‘I’m sorry to cast a shadow over the merry day.’
‘Don’t be. A pretty young lady like you is allowed to be sad from time to time. If you weren’t, one would think you didn’t have a heart. May I escort you down to breakfast?’
He’d held out his arm to her, the tenderness in his eyes difficult to abandon for the cold emptiness of her room. There’d been enough of those sorts of mornings in the last two years, between her father’s death and then her mother’s passing. That Christmas
