WIP Wednesdays

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The social setting on WIP Wednesday

 

For once, I’m setting a novel largely in Society, with my heroine–at least in the first quarter of the novel–a 17-year-old debutante. (In the second and larger part, she will be a 32-year-old widow.)

So I’ve been exploring a ballroom and social engagements setting through the eyes of a very young woman. And boy, as every Regency reader knows, there were some bad girls in those Regency ballrooms. My excerpt covers an encounter Regina had with three of them. If you’re an author, please share an excerpt in the comments showing how one of your characters gets on when out socialising.

It was good that she had a good memory for faces and names, for every outing introduced her to new acquaintances, and she soon gathered a bevy of regular admirers. Mama was over the moon, but Regina did not believe that any of them were serious in their pursuit. Somehow, admiring Miss Kingsley had become the fashion.

Making friends of the other ladies proved to be more difficult. Here, her looks and her wealth apparently counted against her. The other reigning beauties treated her like an interloper, and less favoured ladies regarded her with the same cautious distance as they applied to the beauties.

That changed one day when she overheard Miss Wharton and her two bosom friends in the ladies retiring room one evening, attempting to cow another girl. Regina was behind the screen when they entered, three of them clearly on the heels of the other.

“Please, leave me alone.” Regina didn’t recognise that voice, but she did recognise Miss Fairchild’s falsely sweet coo.

“Oh, girls, Miss Millgirl wants us to leave her alone.”

Regina had not met Miss Miller, but she recognised the name, even skewed to be an insult. The pretty girl’s mother had come from a middle class family whose considerable fortune was founded on mill ownership. She had secured one of the marital prizes of twenty years ago and some in Society had not forgiven the trespass.

Miss Wharton hissed. “Go home and we shall leave you alone. You stink of the shop, and we do not plan to put up with you. These are our ballrooms, our suitors. Just because your mother was lucky enough to trap a gentleman, doesn’t mean we are going to let you do so.” The horrid cow.

“Is this because I danced with Lord Spenhurst?” asked Miss Miller.

Miss Plumfield screeched, “You will not do so again.” The sound of fabric ripping brought Regina hurrying out from behind the privacy screen.

All three of them were tearing at Miss Miller’s clothing and hair, while she batted at them, begging them to leave her alone.

Regina caught Miss Plumfield’s raised hand. “I cannot abide bullies,” she announced.

“This is none of your business, Miss Kingsley,” Miss Wharton insisted. “If you interfere, you’ll get the same treatment.”

“Yes,” Miss Fairchild agreed. “Get out of here while you still can.”

“What has happened to the maid?” Regina wondered.

A smug twitch of Miss Wharton’s lips gave her the clue.

“You bribed her to leave, did you? You did not want a witness. Unfortunate for you that I was already here. Come, Miss Miller. Let us go and find our hostess. I am sure she will be interested to know how her guests behave when not under the eye of their chaperones.”

Miss Wharton swung her hand to slap Regina’s face. Regina stepped back. “I would not do that if I were you.” Regina’s mother would have stopped her excursions with the village children much earlier had she known they had taught her to swim, to climb trees, and—most relevant in this situation—to fight.

Slapping would have been regarded by her tutors as a girlie thing to do. If Miss Wharton tried it again, Regina would let her, Regina decided. A red mark on her cheek would be her defence after she punched Miss Wharton in the belly.

Some of this calculation must have shown in her eyes, for Miss Wharton did not repeat the attempt.

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Flaws and idiosyncrasies in WIP Wednesday

 

Characters can’t be perfect, or there isn’t any story, but the flaws and idiosyncrasies that make them human need to be believable, and possibly endearing. This week, I’m sharing a piece from one of my current works in progress, called either Catch the Wind or One Hour in Freedom, in which my hero and heroine are trying to enter a building without being seen. If you have a passage to share that shows a character’s flaws, please include it in the comments.

Matt’s eye caught movement on a rooftop overlooking the street they were on. “Stop!” he commanded, drawing her under the awning of a shop. She followed his gaze, then turned worried eyes to him.

“The building opposite is the one that belongs to my cousin.”

“Then we had better find out who those people are and what they are looking for,” Matt replied. “First, though, is there a back way into the warehouse?”

He knew she would know. Ellie would never have left her daughter in a place she had not thoroughly scouted. Undoubtedly, she knew every path in and out of all the buildings for streets around.

Her mischievous smile confirmed his assessment, though it didn’t touch the worry in her eyes. “Not exactly. Are you still uneasy about heights?”

She tugged on his hand, and he followed her back the way they had come, but only until they could no longer see the observers on the roof.

Across the road and down a little alley between buildings, so narrow that the top levels cut out the daylight. When someone came towards them, Matt had to drop back so they could pass single file, and even then, both they and the other person had to press themselves against the buildings.

Ellie stopped a few yards further on and watched the passerby. He was outlined against the light at the mouth of the alley and then gone. He hadn’t looked back.

As soon as he was out of sight, Ellie opened a door onto a narrow stairwell. Matt followed her inside with a sinking feeling. They were several buildings from Ellie’s cousin’s warehouse, and there were at least two alleys between them and their destination.

Sure enough, they came out on the roof, several floors higher than the observers across the road.

“I am not afraid of heights,” Matt declared. Heights scared him witless.

Ellie had pulled out a plank half buried in rubbish just behind the parapet. Oh, God.

“Help me with this?” she asked.

He took one end of the plank, then helped her push it out until it sat across the alley to the next building.

He thought he was maintaining a stolid expression, but perhaps not, for Ellie took a good look at him and said, “If you want to meet me in the street in thirty minutes, I can do this.”

“I’m coming with you,” Matt insisted, as his gut urged him to let her go on her own.

She didn’t argue, but leapt up on the parapet and ran lightly across the plank to the next roof.

Matt climbed up a little more slowly. Don’t look down. Don’t look down. It’s only two or three paces. You can do this.

Five steps, to be precise, though none of them were long enough to be called a pace. His feet felt like lead and his hips and knees didn’t want to bend. He reached the other roof and jumped from the parapet, his legs nearly buckling as they suddenly loosened. Sweat rolled from his brow and he was shaking all over. He braced himself. There was at least one more alley to cross.

“Next?” He asked, with a fair assumption of calm.

“Two more crosses,” Ellie told him. “The next building is lower, so we need to go down several floors.” She led the way into another stairwell, and then along a hall and through a huge echoing storage place that was currently empty. On the far side of the room, she stopped at a window that was just a rectangular hole in the wall, the glass and frame long gone.

“The alley is much narrower, so it is just a step from one window to another,” she said, and she took that step and dropped before his eyes. He darted forward in a futile effort to catch her, but she halted before he reached the hole.

There she was, perched on a narrow ledge, busy pushing up a sash window. She was right. Once the window was up, all he had to do was step across. It wasn’t even a long step, but every particle of his body was conscious of the drop below.

He took a deep breath and let it out, then took the step.

Two alleys crossed, and he had not shamed himself in front of Ellie. She knew, of course, that he had some difficulty. He hoped she had no idea how much. He hoped he could nerve himself to make the last cross.

 

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Second chances on WIP Wednesday

Second-chance love is a great trope, whether with the original lover or with someone new. One of my current works-in-progress has my protagonists coming back together after an explosive parting years earlier. These two fell in love when they were adolescents running wild in the streets of London. They fell into bed when they met again in Spain during the war, and parted when each believes the other a traitor. Five more years on, he is a Surveyor for the Thames River Police, and she is an assassin sent to kill him.

If you have a second chance love on the go, please share an excerpt in the comments.

Rather than stay awake until the early hours of the morning, Matt had feinted going out to dinner, and his pursuer turned quarry had taken the bait. He’d subdue the man, find out what he wanted and who sent him, hand him over to the local constables, and still have an early night.

The light glinted on a pair of weapons in the intruder’s belt and suddenly Matt knew why he had been dogged all evening by the sense he was missing something obvious. He knew who was breaking into his room, even in dim light when all he could see was her back. Who else carried short daggers with three blades in a trident? His subconscious had seen past her male disguise. Probably even the disguise as the veiled widow.

Once, he would have said his heart would recognise her anywhere. Apparently, that was still true, which was why he had long since stopped listening to the unreliable organ.

She bent to his door, a lock pick at the ready.

“No need, Elektra,” he told her. “It is unlocked.”

He had to give her credit. She did not start, nor show any other outward sign of alarm. Perhaps she froze for a brief second, but nothing more. “Matthias. It has been a long time.”

“If you have come to finish what you started in Spain, I suggest you turn around and leave. And keep going.” He was annoyed at the bitterness in his voice. His feelings for Ellie—any feelings, including the hatred he had nurtured since her betrayal—were a weakness. She was a vicious she-wolf, and would tear into any weakness without mercy.

“I made a mistake in Spain,” Ellie told him. “I trusted the wrong person. I have regretted it ever since. I am not here to attack you, Matthias.”

An apology? Did she think that would make things right between them? “Whatever your errand, you have wasted your time. We have nothing to say to one another.” No point in letting fly with all the accusations he could mount against her.

After their last confrontation—after she had sworn she was only following orders and then disappeared into the night never to return—he had set out to prove her innocence of the accusations against her, only to find her treachery confirmed at every turn.

If he let go of the volcano of words stored up inside him, he knew he would not stop. It would be no wiser to begin a verbal battle than to let free the physical desire that had sprung to full life as soon as he had seen her. Hatred and lust could apparently coexist, but he would as soon touch a viper. “Leave, Elektra.”

Instead, she opened his bedchamber door and stepped inside.

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Weddings on WIP Wednesday

About a third of the way through one of my current works in progress, my heroine and hero marry. It is a marriage of convenience–her wealth for his protection. She has a cousin who wants to control her finances; he has inherited a bankrupt estate and some rapacious relatives.

So a lot more to go, but I hope I get some of the challenges they face into wedding scene. The first half was in a post last month on the wedding bouquet. Here’s the second. Please let me know what you yjoml in the comments. And if you’re an author, I’d love you to share a wedding of your own.

She had attended weddings in Greenmount, and was familiar with the ceremony, but it was different as a bride. The admonitions, the solemn declarations, the vows, that moment when Peter placed his ring on her finger—every word resonated with some deep and previously unsuspected romanticism in her soul.

From this day forth, she and Peter were bound together, the bond between them as deep as the links of blood, no longer individuals from two different families but a couple in a family of their own. In sickness or in health, for richer, for poorer, they repeated after the vicar.

Ariel’s mind echoed the phrasing: in happiness or in misery, in love or in hate. She had seen both conditions in the families that lived in Greenmount.  Marriage was for a lifetime. As she stood before the vicar, gazing at Peter with her hands in his, hope swelled. She had been prepared for a cold alliance, a marriage of convenience. With Peter, she could dream of so much more. Kindness, respect, even friendship. And perhaps children.

The vicar pronounced them husband and wife, and called on them to sign the record of the marriage, then said, with a flourish, “Ladies and gentlemen, I give you Lord and Lady Ransome.”

Peter tucked Arial’s hand in his arm, and turned them both so that they faced their witnesses. Clara was wiping her eyes with a handkerchief. Miss Pettigrew smiled as if she was personally responsible for the wedding, and proud to have pulled it off. Angelica and Violet were so happy they bounced. And Mr Richards, who truly was responsible for the wedding, beamed broadly.

Behind the small group of chairs, the servants stood silently, every one of them with smiles on their faces and several with tears in their eyes.

Then Captain Forsythe broke the spell of stillness in the room by grabbing Peter’s free hand and shaking it. “Congratulations, Peter. I am so happy for you.”

The two girls hurried forward to speak to Peter, and Captain Forsythe turned to Ariel. “I’ve always thought Peter was a lucky devil, Lady Ransome, and winning you for a bride proves it.”

Arial thanked him, though she was inclined to think the luck was on her side. She held out her arms to the girls, and received an enthusiastic hug from Violet and a shy one from Angelica. Then Clara was there, laughing and crying, and Miss Pettigrew with modest good wishes for the happy couple.

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Villains on WIP Wednesday

I’ve been having fun with the last surviving villain from the group of them that have hounded my Haverfords, Redepennings, and Winshires through a dozen books. My WIP excerpt today is from Paradise at Last, the last novella in Paradise Triptych, which I plan to publish in March. My Duchess of Haverford puts her trust in the wrong employee. Please share an excerpt that includes your villain. Just pop it in the comments.

“How could you, Marigold?” Eleanor asked her former secretary. Not that she had fired the treacherous female, but conspiring with a criminal to disable her servants and abduct Eleanor herself was surely tantamount to a resignation.

“I am merely seeking a better position, Your Grace,” Marigold sneered. “One your money will buy me.”

“Us,” said her collaborator. “You will buy us a future, Ellie. Do your friends call you Ellie? Your son took everything I have and you owe me. My first idea was to kill you, Haverford’s wife, and all three of his sisters. Let him feel what I felt when he took everything away from me.”

He slipped his arms around Marigold from behind and fondled both her breasts. She tipped her head back, and he bent to kiss and then lick her neck, which made the girl groan.

Marigold surrendered utterly to the sensual spell the boy wove, but he was watching Eleanor the whole time, his eyes cold and alert.

She gave no reaction—to his words, or to his behaviour.

One of his hands crept down Marigold’s body to the cleft between her legs. Eleanor steeled herself to show nothing.

Marigold’s words stopped his hand. “But you have me, now, Kit. And when we get our money, we will be able to run far away. We will have everything, you and I.”

Kit nuzzled her neck again, before letting her go. “Everything,” he said. Including my revenge. You should be grateful, Your Grace. Marigold’s idea was much better than mine. Have you written the letter, darling?”

Marigold nodded. “Ten thousand pounds, in gold. It will take them a while to get that much, Kit. Could we not settle for less?”

He rounded on his accomplice, snarling. “I am already settling! They owe me their lives!” He took a deep breath and let it out slowly then visibly forced a conciliatory smile. “We will give them time, darling. I have it all planned. You have done a wonderful job, and no one will know where we have gone.”

He turned his attention back to Eleanor, his smile gone. “Now. I can untie you, and you can walk out of here yourself, keeping your mouth shut, and climbing into the carriage like a good little dowager duchess. I will have a gun and a knife on you at all times. I warn you not to make any fuss! I really did like my first plan.”

He sighed. “But I have promised Marigold not to hurt you as long as you behave, so if you cannot give me your solemn promise that you will not attempt to escape or to attract attention, I will just have to knock you out, gag you, and take you out the back door rolled up in a sheet.” His smile was stretching of the teeth without an iota of humour.

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First kiss on Work-in-progress Wednesday

I’m working on three works in progress at the moment. I thought I’d finish the short (now long short) story today, but not quite. I still need to finish with a kiss. I’ve written their first kiss, though, and here it is. Share yours in the excerpt? (Fictional if you’re an author, or feel free to share a real life one, if you like.

They finished their evening quietly, listening as Mr Barker read from the first chapters of the Gospel according to Luke. After that, it was time for bed. Zahrah and Simon said goodnight to Mr and Mrs Barker at the foot of the stairs, as the older couple’s bedchamber was on the main floor.

Upstairs was under the eaves, with the box room and two little bed chambers. Zahrah paused with her hand on her door handle, reluctant to see the evening end.

Simon was looking up. She followed his gaze with her eyes. A bunch of mistletoe hung from the ceiling. That wasn’t there earlier today. Was it?

Simon looked a question at her. With the sense that she was about to take a leap into the dark, Zahrah stepped up to him and looped her arms around his neck. Now what? She had experience of men attempting to steal a kiss, but none of freely giving and receiving one.

Simon bent his head, going slowly, and softly laid his lips upon hers. She felt the tingle run through her body. She pressed closer, and he deepened the kiss, covering her lips with his own, one hand firmly on her back.

Zahrah’s thoughts scattered. She lost track of her surroundings and everything else except the sensation of Simon’s lips, his tongue sliding across hers, his firm hand anchoring her to his body, his other hand gently caressing one breast.

When he broke the kiss, she stared at him, dazed. He looked no less befuddled.

She leaned towards him again and he pressed a light kiss to the corner of her mouth. “I hope this means you are open to my courtship,” he murmured. “Or do I need to apologise?”

“Don’t you dare apologise,” she scolded. She was recovering a few of her wits. “Courtship, Simon?”

Anxiety flickered in his eyes. “If I do not presume. If you could imagine marrying a tradesman of little fortune and murky birth.”

“Very easily.” If the tradesman in question was Simon. “Yes.”

His anxiety melted into the beginnings of a smile. “You can imagine?”

“Yes, you may court me. But first, kiss me again.”

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Up and Rolling in Two 22

I’m trying to keep all my balls in the air while maintaining a work-life balance

Happy New Year! It has been a couple of peculiar years in a row. A global pandemic is not necessarily the best time to sell our home of 20 years, move to another town, buy a new house, and do a complete renovation inside and out. By the time I published To Tame the Wild Rake in September, I was weary to the bone. The plot elves hung on for a few weeks to see a novella finished for the next Bluestocking Belles (with Friends) anthology, and then packed up to begin an early holiday.

How did your 2021 end? And how has it started?

For me, the holiday is over. We saw the last tradesman finish his work just before Christmas. Since then, we’ve almost finished all of the tasks we’d set out to do ourselves, but the pressure is off and we can set our own pace. On the story front, the plot elves are back and so am I.

I’m starting back into my regular blogging schedule, so check back here on Monday’s for Tea with Duchess of Haverford, on Wednesdays for an excerpt from one of my works in progress, on Fridays for snippets from my research and on Sundays for my news or book news from other authors. Do check out my I love guest authors page if you’d like to appear on my blog or in my newsletter.

I have three works-in-progress on the go, and I’ve others lined up to pick from when I finish any of those. I’m signed up for several more anthologies, and also for some stories in series with other authors. And I’ve started a new series of my own (more about that later).

Paradise at Last, which suffered when the plot elves decamped, is one of those works. I hope to have it finished and ready for ARC within the next week. Here’s a sneak peek. The scene is between Eleanor and her son, just before Christmas in 1815.

She owed her son an apology. She had already acknowledged her wrong-doing to Cherry, and been forgiven. But how could she tell her son of her remorse when he avoided her, and spoke to her only with distant politeness?

She would have to ask him for a private audience, but before she nerved herself to do so, he made the request himself. She followed him to the library, and allowed him to close the door behind them.

“Haverford, I have apologised for interfering between you and Cherry, but I would like to do so again. I have known all along that I was wrong to go privately to Cherry as I did. You are adults, and I should have said what I thought to both of you and trusted you to make your own decision. I am truly sorry for the distress I caused you.”

Haverford opened his mouth, but before he could speak, Eleanor put up a hand to stop him. “I have a second apology to make, Haverford. Watching you and Cherry together in the past week shows me that I was wrong again—wrong to believe that your love for Cherry was less deep than hers for you. Wrong to think that you would fall out of love once you had achieved your prize. All I ever wanted was for both of you to be happy. You are perfect for one another, and I shudder to think how close I came to preventing that happiness.”

For a moment, Haverford said nothing, his mouth hanging slightly open as if the words he’d planned to say had dissolved on his tongue. Then he gave a slight shake of his head. “Thank you, Mama.”

“I will never interfere again,” Eleanor promised. Perhaps that was a bit rash. “At least, I will try my very best.”

Haverford’s smile was small, but it reached his eyes. “I shall not ask such a sacrifice, Mama. Both Cherry and her mother have pointed out what a marvelous gift you have for interfering, as you call it. All I ask is that you consult us first on any plans you have that involve us and that you promise not to proceed without our agreement.”

Eleanor’s eyes were wet. She blinked to clear them. “I can promise that,” she agreed.

His smile broadened. “Come on, Mama. We have a house to decorate.”

He offered her his hand to help her rise, and his elbow to escort her back to the ballroom, just in time to see a footman moving a ladder away from the arched doorway. A kissing ball hung in the middle of the arch. Cherry stood looking up at it, and she glanced their way and smiled to see them together.

Haverford put his arm around Eleanor, reached up for a mistletoe berry, and pressed a gentle kiss to her cheek. “I love you, Mama,” he told her. “Merry Christmas.”

And it was.

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Emotions on WIP Wednesday

Make ’em laugh, make ’em cry, make ’em wait, says the old advice to aspiring writers. I’ve done the last with my story about Eleanor, Duchess of Haverford. I’m having a go at the first two. Here’s a bit. What do you think? And what do you want to share?

Ah yes. Of course. It should have occurred to her, but it had not. She had been about to ascend to the traditional chambers of the Duchess of Haverford—an entire suite of rooms that mirrored and were adjacent to the duke’s suite.

Another reminder that she was no longer the mistress of this house and the other houses of the ducal estates. She climbed the stairs with her heart sinking, turned into the family wing, and stopped at the indicated door.

Tears welled in her eyes. The suite had been fully refurbished. She saw new wallpaper and drapes in her favourite colours, the comfortable chairs that had sat for years either side of her fireplace looking as fresh as the day they were purchased, now each side of her new fireplace. Above it was the same painting of her two sons as little boys that had been over her mantle since the day the painter delivered it.

She drifted around the room, touching one familiar item after another, and stopping to examine the new pieces that someone had selected with care and an eye to her comfort. A warm throw rug in soft fur. A replacement for the old footstool that had always been just a little too low.

And, yes, the fireplace chairs had been recovered, but the original fabric had been copied exactly.

Following her dresser through the door into her new bedchamber and beyond into her dressing room, she found the same touch, redolent of love in every detail. Her study, too, on the other side of the sitting room, was perfect—almost a duplicate of the one she had created in the duchess’s quarters, with her delicate desk, all her books in glass-doored bookshelves, and her own comfortable reading chair. The one addition was delightful: a window seat from which she could look over the formal gardens enclosed in the u-shaped formed by the main house and the two large wings that stretched towards the river.

It must have been Charlotte. For the first time in months, Eleanor allowed the hope that she had been forgiven to unfurl in her heart.

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The Rival on WIP Wednesday

In romances, some of the tension often comes from a would-be or imagined or actual rival for the affections of the main characters. This week, I’m inviting author who wishes to share an excerpt about a rival. Mine is from Paradise At Last, and James has no idea.

The usual chattering flock of maidens hovered in his vicinity, trying to attract his attention. In the thirty-three months since he ascended to his title, he’d lost count of the number of ladies who happened to swoon or trip or collapse just as he passed close enough to catch them. Sometimes, he fantasised about speeding up in time to let them crash to the floor behind him. So far, he had resisted the temptation.

At least the marriageable females could be defeated by icy civility. Not so the bored matrons and dashing widows looking for less respectable liaisons. They found it incredible that a widower who was also a wealthy duke might survive without someone to warm his bed, and therefore assumed he was extremely discrete, which made an affair with him even more to be desired.

He was not looking for a mistress. It was the truth, whether they believed it or not. As a young man, he had been unusual among his wild friends in needing an emotional connection before he could consider physical intimacy. Since experiencing the heights of bliss and the joys of partnership with Mahzad, his beloved wife, he had even less interest in mindless coupling.

Nor did he need a wife. He had his heir; his eldest son who wife was carrying their second child. In all the years since Mahzad’s death, he had considered joining his life with only one other. With Eleanor, whom he had lost once again.

Mrs Turner was approaching, a predatory gleam in her eye. James was pretty sure it was her who had groped his bottom when they stood side by side in the reception line. She stopped when greeted by a friend, and James took the opportunity to step sideways behind a group who were earnestly discussing, of all things, the most fashionable colour to use for evening turbans.

“Avoiding an ambush, Duke?” He knew that amused contralto, and turned to smile at the speaker as she slipped a hand onto his elbow.

“Mrs Kellwood. How are you this evening?” The widow had become a friend in the past few months—a safe lady to spend time with at events such as this. She had, initially, suggested a more intimate relationship, but had readily accepted his refusal.

“I survive, my dear, but would be the better for a stroll on the terrace, if you would be kind enough to oblige me.”

James offered his arm, wondering if she was about to overstep the boundaries of friendship, but she made no attempt to press close or to lean on his arm. Still, he stiffened when she admitted, “I have an ulterior motive, Duke. I will tell you all about it when we are out of the crowd.”

But all she was after was a listening ear. “My son is insisting I invest in this mining venture, Duke, and — I don’t know. I can see nothing wrong with it, but I just have a feeling…” She shrugged. “Am I being foolish? Do you know anything about diamond mining in the Cape Colony?

James’s guilt at having ascribed to her, even briefly, the marital or lustful motives of so many other females had him offering to read the prospectus and ask a few quiet questions among his contacts.

“But you are so busy!” she exclaimed. “I do not like to bother.”

“It is no bother,” he assured her. “Send it over.”

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Animal companions on WIP Wednesday

This week’s excerpt from Lord Cuckoo Comes Home could also be called “courting with monkey”. It’s from my next novella for the Bluestocking Belles. If you have an animal companion in one of your stories, please add an excerpt in the comments.

Chloe took his hand and allowed him to aid her balance as she climbed up to the seat. “I hope you don’t mind, Lord Dom. I had to leave Rosario at home this morning while I was at Lady Seahaven’s writing thank-you letters, since the schoolroom party were not home to entertain her. Aunt Swithin promised to take her out and let her play in the garden, but she forgot, so the poor beast was shut in her cage from the time I left until I got home.”

Lord Dom went around to his side of the curricle, took his own seat, and held out his hand for Rosario to shake, distracting the monkey from her focus on the boy with the horses. “You are very welcome, Sister Rosario.” He grinned at Chloe. “She adds a certain air of adventure to our outings, do you not think?”

Chloe blushed at the sly reference to Rosario’s escapades. Earlier in the week, she had climbed a tree in Tower Gardens and refused to come down until Lord Dom had borrowed a ladder from the gardeners’ shed, whereupon she had climbed down the other side of the tree. If Emma and Merry had not cornered her, she would have been up another before Chloe could have reached her.

Two days ago, she had stolen an ice from a passing waiter, tasted it, then thrown it with unerring accuracy at the back of the waiter’s retreating head. Lord Dom had soothed the man’s irritation with a large gratuity.

Then there was the concert, where Rosario conceived a passion for the brooch on the hat of the dowager in the next row, and reached out to snatch it when Chloe became lost in the music. Had it not been for Lord Dom’s quick action—the monkey’s hand was within an inch of the target when he jerked her back by her leash—the ensuing apologies for Rosario’s complaints would have been for a much worse offence.

“I will keep tight hold of her today,” Chloe promised.

“Or I will,” Lord Dom agreed. His smile warmed away her embarrassment. “She does not mean to cause mischief, I know. We will endeavor to keep her out of trouble, you and I.”