Mistletoe'd! Page 6

  “Mr. Brent does not seem like such a man,” Vivian said faintly, her view of him turned upside down, tumbling away from the image she had built, all her growing affections now in peril of destruction.

  “Be careful, my dear,” Mrs. Twitchen said. “My husband and I are in agreement. We don’t want to see you hurt, or what chances you have at making a respectable match ruined.”

  “Thank you,” Vivian said.

  She spent the remainder of the afternoon staring out the window at nothing. And eating gingerbread.

  Chapter Six

  December 28

  The Feast of the Holy Innocents

  The great hall at Haverton rang with the excited shouts and laughter of children. The puppet show had just finished, and now the thirty or so children were going at the sweets and the games. Adults milled among them, imposing the barest sense of order.

  “It’s a Sudley tradition on Innocents’ Day,” Penelope said, standing beside Vivian as they observed the chaos. “I remember coming here as a child, myself. All the children of the parish are invited, no matter who their parents might be. Mama never liked me playing with the common children, but it didn’t bother me overmuch that they were present, and really, it was easy enough to stay away from them.”

  Watching the children, Vivian thought they showed far less snobbishness than Penelope. The well-and poorly dressed played games and ran around with the same shrieking joy, and those who stuck to their own kind seemed to do so only because they were known friends.

  Her eye lit upon Richard keeping an eye on William, who was trying to play with boys larger than himself. Her heart contracted, and she felt suddenly wistful, wondering what it would have been like to grow up protected by such a loving hand. She had never met a man like Richard Brent, who was so closely involved in the rearing of his children.

  Mrs. Twitchen had tried to warn her away from him, and the tale of the jilting preyed upon her mind, adding its weight to the mistress and the children as things she would have to accept, but she had to believe that once she heard Richard’s side, he would prove to have had good reason for his actions.

  Surely there must have been good reason? She could not have been so wrong about him, could she?

  The tables of sweets beckoned to her, and she excused herself from Penelope and wound her way toward them.

  Three or four women guarded the tables, ensuring that greedy fingers did not wreak havoc. They talked among themselves, and nodded their greetings to Vivian as she looked over the goods on offer.

  “They’re darlings, but it’s a bit of a madhouse, don’t you think?” someone said beside her.

  She turned to see Lady Sudley. “It’s a lovely idea,” she said, feeling a little shy.

  “And no doubt every child will go home sick from overeating and excitement.” And then to Sara Brent, who had appeared at her side, reaching for a jam tart, “Sara! Little elf, what are you up to?”

  “Papa said I could have some,” Sara said, her hand hovering over the prize.

  “Did he? Well, I suppose that’s all right then,” Lady Sudley consented. “Miss Ambrose, this is Sara Brent.”

  “Hello, Miss Brent,” Vivian said, waggling her fingers at the girl.

  Sara said nothing.

  “Sara, Miss Ambrose is going to watch after you for a bit. Do be good for her,” Lady Sudley said. And then to Vivian: “You don’t mind, do you? There is so much for me to oversee. …” She trailed off, looking at Vivian expectantly.

  “No, not at all,” Vivian agreed.

  “Splendid,” Lady Sudley said, and with that the woman glided off.

  Sara looked up at her, then grabbed the jam tart and took a bite.

  “Is it good?” Vivian asked. If it had been anyone’s child but Richard’s, she would have been at ease, for it would not have mattered if they did or did not like each other. But with this child it did matter, and in consequence she was tense.

  Sara nodded.

  “Then maybe I’ll have one.” She picked up one of the small plates and put a tart on it. It looked small and alone on the plate. She put another beside it.

  Sara watched her with interest.

  “What about those things with the sugar on them, do they look good to you?”

  Sara chewed her tart and nodded again.

  “I think so, too.” She added one to her plate. “The bits with the sausage?”

  Sara made a face.

  “No, no good, I agree. Who wants sausage when they can have… lemon!”

  “I like marchpane,” Sara said.

  “So do I! Oh, marchpane is an excellent choice. Will you choose a piece for me?”

  Sara complied. “The little cakes are pretty.”

  “So they are,” Vivian said. “Which do you think is prettiest?”

  They went down the length of two tables, Vivian grabbing a second plate to hold all the treats that Sara chose. The overseeing women gave her questioning looks that she tried to ignore.

  “Are you going to eat all that?” Sara asked her in amazement when both small plates were piled high.

  “Yes, I believe I will.”

  “Papa won’t let me eat so many.”

  “I’m a big girl, and I can eat as many as I wish, but maybe I need some help. Would you like to help me?”

  Sara nodded and followed her over to some empty chairs. There the girl soon began directing Vivian in which to eat when, and nibbled two or three treats herself.

  The plates were nearly empty, and she and the little girl, she thought, were on fine and comfortable terms when Richard found them.

  “Papa! Miss A’brose ate this many!” Sara said, holding her two hands out, the fingers spread. “She ate more than Stinky!”

  “Stinky?” Vivian asked.

  “Our old greedy dog at my house in Wiltshire,” Richard explained.

  “Stinky ate my supper, and he ate Willie’s pudding, and he runs around the floor going snort snort snort,” Sara said, imitating the grunting dog. “He’ll eat anything, even green meat—”

  “I think Miss Ambrose understands,” Richard interrupted, biting his lip.

  “Cook yells at Stinky. He goes to the kitchen and steals things. He’s a very bad dog. He eats horse poo.”

  “Oh. Ah. I see,” Vivian said.

  “Then he licks my face,” Sara said. “Ewww!”

  “But you love Stinky, don’t you?” Richard asked his daughter.

  “He smells bad. Can we go home now, Papa?”

  “Soon, sweeting. In another week.”

  “I’m going to go play now,” Sara said, and slid off her chair.

  “Excuse yourself,” Richard reminded the girl.

  “Your pardon,” Sara said to Vivian, then the child gave her a quick curtsy and ran off.

  “Horse poo?” Vivian said faintly. She had thought she and Sara were getting along so well, and here the girl had been wondering if she would eat horse manure off the ground, given the chance.

  “She’s really very fond of Stinky,” Richard said. He sat down beside her, and reached for the one remaining tart on her plate. “May I?”

  “Please.” She doubted she would ever be able to eat in public again. And maybe that was for the best.

  She felt the questions she needed to ask in the back of her throat, waiting to come out, but couldn’t bring herself to do so just yet. Instead she watched the children as Richard ate the tart. “Sara seems a very bright child,” she said into the brief silence.

  “She is, and cheerful. She has enough willful mischief in her that I will have a head of white hair before she is grown and wed.”

  “And William?”

  “He is quieter, more subdued. He’ll spend his time reading dreary philosophy, I imagine, and have to be pushed to court a girl.”

  “He’s a handsome little boy. I think he will set hearts aflutter, if he is brooding and introspective as a man. The young ladies will be unable to resist.”

  “Poor little fellow.”


  “You don’t think he would enjoy the attention?” she asked.

  “Perhaps. He might surprise me.” Richard was quiet for a long moment, his gaze on the playing children. “There are times my heart almost breaks, thinking of them growing up, and suffering the pains the world has to offer. Their hurts now are so small, and so easily soothed compared to what they will endure when they are older.”

  “They will have you to help them,” she said, lightly touching his arm and drawing his attention. “And while their hurts may grow greater, so will their strength.”

  He laid his hand over hers, on his forearm. “You had to quickly grow strong, didn’t you? When your parents were killed.”

  She dropped her eyes, not eager to share that pain that she thought deeply buried, but which at times like this could emerge as easily as if it were just beneath the surface. “That was more than any child should be asked to bear.” She made herself smile, and met his eyes again. “But I survived.”

  He lifted her hand off his arm, raised it to his lips, and, heedless of the roomful of people, let his lips graze her knuckles before releasing her. “And you are beautiful in your strength,” he said. The look he gave her seemed to say a million things, all of them new to her and oh so wonderful.

  She clasped her hands together in her lap to keep them from trembling, and felt her cheeks and neck heat with embarrassment.

  She was falling in love with this man. The realization hit her fully, and it scared her.

  She had no experience with romantic love, but she felt herself teetering on its brink, and with her fall would go any last vestige of sense or practical hesitation. She did not want to ask about the woman he had jilted—she wanted to assume the best of him—but if she was wrong it might be her own heart that would be crushed in reward for her ignorance.

  For as she felt her heart opening to love, she felt how very fragile and defenseless it was. She had only herself to guard and protect it.

  “I need to ask you a personal question, Richard,” she said. Children still shrieked and played a few feet from them, and she welcomed their presence as a damper against whatever reaction he might have.

  “Anything.”

  Mrs. Twitchen appeared, forestalling the question. “Vivian, dear, here you are,” she said.

  Richard stood, bowing in greeting. “Mrs. Twitchen, a pleasure to see you.”

  “Good day, Mr. Brent. You will excuse me if I take my cousin away from you? I fear we must be going.”

  “Might I have a few moments?” Vivian asked.

  “I’m afraid not, my dear,” Mrs. Twitchen said, and her expression said she would not be dissuaded. “We really must go.”

  Vivian had been wrong in thinking she had only herself to guard her heart. Mrs. Twitchen stood before them as resolute as an armored knight, waiting to carry her to safety.

  And so, unsatisfied by her lack of answers, yet touched by Mrs. Twitchen’s concern, Vivian made her good-byes.

  Chapter Seven

  December 31 New Year’s Eve

  It had been three days since she had seen Richard, and her body yearned for him as if he were her other half. She had never before understood what people meant when they said such things, but now she did. It was shocking, but she felt ripped in two, and as if she could not rest until he was with her again. His clever words, his gentleness with his children, his honesty—all these things played in her mind and far outstripped all the bad things that had been said about him. She loved him.

  Worse, she did not know if he felt the same way. For an hour after leaving Haverton Hall on Innocents’ Day she would have said yes, he did. Yes, he was beginning to care for her as she did for him. But then the doubts had crept in, carried by the unasked, and therefore unanswered, question about the jilted fiancée. Perhaps that girl, too, had thought that he was falling in love with her, and had been surprised to find herself discarded.

  Oh, dreaded time apart, that let her mind form horrid futures as often as happy ones! She had doubts and fears and hopes, and no one with whom to discuss them except Penelope, who listened avidly but was too inexperienced herself to have worthwhile advice to offer. The girl’s unexpected sympathy was welcome, but did little to soothe.

  What could she do? Would she dare to try to catch Mr. Brent in a compromising position to force him to marry her? She supposed that it wouldn’t force anything. He had reneged on a promise of marriage before Still, if they just had time together, Vivian was certain the union would work. She was sure that she could love Mr. Brent’s children. That would be easy, as easy as loving Richard himself.

  The mirror was revealing the effects of her anxiety: one week in the Twitchen household, and already the hollows and bony protuberances of her face and figure were beginning to soften. She was eating herself to calmness.

  “What are you doing, hiding away over here?” Penelope asked, pulling back the curtain that half hid her where she sat in the window seat, looking out at the night and eating a dish of cheese and spiced nuts she had put together as a post-dessert dessert.

  “Just thinking.”

  “Come out of there. People are arriving, and Mama will be playing the piano for dancing.”

  “Has Mr. Brent…?” she asked, perking up.

  “Not yet. I assume he will be here soon, though, and you don’t want him to find you with your teeth full of cheese.”

  Vivian self-consciously put a fingernail to the groove between her front teeth.

  “Emily is here, too. You remember, the vicar’s daughter. She wants to do fortune-telling for our future husbands.”

  “I thought you did that with her on Christmas Eve.”

  “It didn’t work. Come with us; maybe it will work with you there.”

  “All right.” Vivian gave in, emerging from her hideaway. Penelope and her silly friend were not the company she desired, but they were better than sitting and stewing in her own thoughts. After all, she wouldn’t want Richard to arrive and think she had been waiting for him like a girl with nothing else to occupy her mind. It was New Year’s Eve!

  *

  The church bells rang out midnight, and the countryside echoed with clanging pans, bells, shouts, and the blasts of guns. It was the first day of the new year, the Eighth Day of Christmas, and the Feast of the Circumcision, and the celebration was all around. Richard waited in the darkness down the drive from Copley Grange, watching as the guests went back inside as the sounds faded away.

  The door was closed, and then a minute later it opened again and was left ajar, warm yellow candlelight spilling out into the blue-black winter night. He knew that in back a door had been opened and shut, letting the old year out, and now the front door was letting in the new.

  And he would be the man who did First Footing at Copley Grange. The first visitor through the door in the new year, if a dark-haired male, would bring good luck to the house, according to the superstition. He double-checked his satchel with its required gifts, and headed up the drive.

  A smiling maid closed the door behind him when he entered, and he made his way to the drawing room.

  “Hurrah!” the cheer went up when he stepped inside. The enthusiastic greeting surprised him, and he felt a flush of surprised embarrassment. It had been so long since he had felt truly welcome in any home but his sister’s, he had forgotten what it felt like.

  He grinned and gave a courtly bow. In stately manner he walked up to Captain Twitchen, standing by the fire, and drew out of his satchel the first of the gifts, a hunk of coal.

  “To keep your home warm,” he said, handing the captain the black lump.

  “Hear, hear!” the gathering cheered.

  Richard turned to Mrs. Twitchen and took out the next gift, a round loaf of bread. “To keep you fed.”

  Mrs. Twitchen curtsied and accepted, amid another cheer.

  “And lastly…” Richard said, putting his hand into the satchel and holding it there for a moment, building the suspense, although they all knew what was coming.
He pulled out the bottle of whiskey and held it high, then bowed again and presented it to Captain Twitchen. “For your happiness and your health throughout the new year!”

  The final presentation was met with a final cheer and a round of applause. Captain Twitchen slapped him on the back, then went to work opening the bottle and sharing the blessings with the male guests.

  Still feeling self-conscious in a way his usual bluntness never made him feel, Richard cast his eyes over the room, his gaze lighting upon Vivian. She was smiling, her eyes sparkling, her face aglow. He would like to think it was aglow for him. She was the reason he had persuaded himself to this display of good fellowship, in hopes of impressing her with his long-dormant social graces.

  Sara had not been able to stop talking about “Miss A’brose,” who had impressed her greatly with her sweet tooth. He himself had been content to let Sara prattle, his own thoughts on how close he had felt to Vivian as they sat and talked on Innocents’ Day.

  He had known Vivian for only a week, and yet his hopes were quickly growing that this Christmas he had been gifted with the wife he wanted. What did the shortness of the time matter, when you had found the one with whom you were meant to be?

  He made conversation with those near him, listening with half an ear as Captain Twitchen, the whiskey bottle turned over to another for distribution, jingled a purse of coins that he then gave to his wife. “Money for pins, my dear,” the captain said.

  Would that next year he himself had a wife to whom to give pin money, a wife who would laugh and thank him as Mrs. Twitchen thanked her husband now. Vivian.

  He moved through the guests, shaking hands and exchanging pleasantries until at last he found his way to her. She ducked her head, a blush on her cheeks, then looked quickly up at him, smiling.

  “When will you stop being shy with me upon greeting?” he asked, feeling his own heart pick up its pace, his growing attachment to her leaving his heart vulnerable to the slightest sign of rejection. To want was to risk being denied.

  “I could not say. You have surprised me tonight. I would never have expected you to be first through the door.”