didn’t even think it was worth trying to disguise the fact.
Aunt Mathilda arranged the flowers on the windowsill and looked at them approvingly.
‘I’m sure you’ll be receiving many more bouquets, my dear, and hopefully a few gentlemen callers this afternoon.’
Lizzie saw Harriet’s eyes narrow at the idea of her receiving a call from an eligible gentleman, but Lizzie tried to ignore it. She wasn’t sure why Harriet disliked her so much on first sight, but she wasn’t going to provoke the situation.
‘I’m sure you’re glad you were sufficiently recovered from your illness to make your début now,’ Harriet said snidely.
Lizzie had tried to feign an illness to delay her coming out, hoping that Aunt Mathilda might let her stay hidden in her house until Amelia returned. She’d complained of a headache, fever and light-headedness, and had even gone as far as to hold the teapot to her cheeks before Aunt Mathilda came to check on her, but the older woman had sat down beside her, taken her hand and told her not to worry. She had seen through Lizzie’s ruse and put it down to Lizzie feeling nervous about making her début, so Lizzie had found herself hustled into her beautiful dress and into the carriage before she could even begin to think of another excuse to delay.
The door to the drawing room opened quietly and the butler, an elderly man with an unflappable demeanour, stepped inside.
‘The Earl of Burwell to see Miss Amelia Eastway,’ Tippings announced.
Immediately all three women stiffened. Certainly they had been expecting calls from gentlemen of the ton, but an earl was in quite another league.
Aunt Mathilda quickly crossed the room to Lizzie’s side.
‘You know the Earl of Burwell?’ she asked, her face drained of colour.
Even Harriet looked a little impressed.
Lizzie couldn’t answer. Had she met the Earl of Burwell? If so, he hadn’t stuck in her mind and she rather thought an earl should do.
Unless, of course, he was her mystery gentleman. Lizzie suddenly felt sick. Had she been kissed by an earl in the Prestons’ garden? Surely not. Surely that was something a girl would know. He’d seemed so nice, so normal, not earl-like at all. She felt her face flush at the idea of him seeing her in the light of day and wondered if she had time to escape. Maybe feign a swoon.
The door opened once again and a man stepped inside. Out of habit Lizzie found herself standing and dropping into a little bob of a curtsy as a greeting. Only then did she have the courage to raise up her eyes and look at the man she might or might not have kissed the night before.
Her mouth fell open and her eyes widened. Whomever she had expected to be standing in front of her it wasn’t this man.
‘You,’ she said before she could stop her mouth forming the words.
Lizzie could see this man was equally as surprised.
A thousand thoughts ran through Lizzie’s mind at once, not a single one coherent or helpful. Aunt Mathilda looked between Lizzie and the earl, but ever the polite hostess she invited him to sit without any further enquiry.
‘It is delightful to see you again, Miss Eastway,’ the earl said, sounding rather too composed for Lizzie’s liking.
The pieces started to fall into place and Lizzie wondered how she had not recognised his voice the night before. The Earl of Burwell was certainly her mystery gentleman, but it was not the first time they’d met. He was also the gentleman who had saved Lizzie from nearly being trampled to death by his horse, the man who had dismissed her with a single glance.
Lizzie wanted to curl up and disappear. She wondered how disappointed he was when he saw her, when he realised last night was not the first time they’d set eyes on each other.
‘It’s a beautiful afternoon,’ Aunt Mathilda said, trying to break some of the tension in the room.
‘It is indeed,’ the earl said.
‘How did you and Miss Eastway meet?’ Harriet asked and Lizzie remembered the smirk on her cousin’s face as she had witnessed Lizzie’s humiliation on her arrival to London.
The Earl of Burwell turned to face Harriet and looked at her appraisingly. His gaze was superior and a little haughty, and Lizzie was surprised Harriet didn’t squirm under the intensity of it.
‘We were formally introduced last night,’ he said eventually. ‘And I enjoyed our conversation so much I decided I wanted to see Miss Eastway again today.’
Although Lizzie knew that wasn’t quite the whole truth she was glad he’d silenced Harriet’s mocking before it had started.
‘How absolutely delightful,’ Aunt Mathilda said. ‘Now, Harriet, why don’t I show you that thing I was talking about earlier?’
Harriet looked blank but allowed her mother to usher her out of the room. Aunt Mathilda pulled the door behind her but left a chink between the wood and the frame for propriety’s sake.
Lizzie knew she would have to turn and face the earl, but she was finding it hard to summon the courage. She didn’t want to see the disappointment on his face, she didn’t want to hear him utter some made-up excuse to escape as soon as possible. For she knew he would be disappointed. Last night he hadn’t known who she was, she was sure of that. He hadn’t realised she was the woman who had caused so much havoc in the street just a week before. That woman he had dismissed without a second look, but last night he had treated her as though she were the most desirable woman on earth.
Lizzie’s heart started to sink. Maybe it had all been engineered, maybe her perfect fairy-tale moment had actually been nothing more than a fortune hunter making a naïve young girl feel attractive. She glanced briefly at the earl. He didn’t look like a fortune hunter, but she knew they came in all shapes and sizes.
‘I should apologise for last night,’ he said as he caught Lizzie’s eye.
She waited for him to actually apologise, but he was not forthcoming.
‘But I find myself unable to regret my actions.’
‘Why?’ The word was out before Lizzie could stop it. She berated herself immediately. She needed to get control of her tongue.
‘Why?’ he asked, raising an eyebrow.
‘Why did you kiss me?’ she whispered.
He regarded her silently for a minute, then looked away. She wondered if he were concocting a lie, trying to find something flattering to say.
‘It was rather magical last night, wasn’t it?’ he said eventually. ‘The warm summer’s evening, the faint echo of the music from the ballroom. Then a charming young woman comes and crashes into me and I just couldn’t resist.’
Lizzie found herself nodding. It had been rather magical. Not the part where she’d fallen down the stairs, or winded him so badly he hadn’t been able to breathe for a few moments, but afterwards. The caring way he’d helped her up, the feel of his touch on her skin and the moments they’d spent sitting on the bench side by side.
Then
