Undoing of a Lady. Nicola Cornick

before and now she turned away from him with obvious reluctance in response to her cousin’s words:

      “Lady Elizabeth, may I introduce Lady Willoughby? Priscilla, this is Lady Elizabeth Scarlet.”

      “Oh, yes.” The beautiful Priscilla smiled, displaying perfect teeth. Her voice was perfectly modulated, her laugh a perfect little musical tinkle of sound. “How do you do, Lady Elizabeth? Nathaniel—” she turned to smile at Nat “—was telling me that he has known you since you were a child. What a cozy little village you have here!”

      Nathaniel, Lizzie thought, not Lord Waterhouse. Informal enough to indicate intimacy but not “Nat”, which was what all Nat’s platonic friends called him. Oh, no, Lady Willoughby had to be different.

      “How do you do, Lady Willoughby,” Lizzie said. “Have you known Lord Waterhouse since he was a child?”

      Lady Willoughby’s sapphire gaze hardened slightly and she laid one white hand on Nat’s sleeve, squeezing affectionately. “Oh gracious, we are old friends, are we not, Nathaniel? One might almost say old flames!” She gave her little tinkle of laughter again and leaned confidingly toward Lizzie. “Nathaniel and my late husband were great rivals for my hand in marriage.”

      “How close the three of you must have been,” Lizzie said. “I trust you made the right choice.” She was aware of Nat’s unwavering gaze on her and conscious too, of the fact that she was in danger of behaving very badly indeed. She could feel the wickedness, her hoyden tendencies, as Lady Willoughby would no doubt call them, building up inside her, seeking a release. But then, surely Nat would not care, would he? Not now that he had the lovely Priscilla, someone of his own age, an old friend, to play with.

      “Who knows,” Priscilla said, with a little toss of her perfectly manicured head, “that I may have a second chance anyway?”

      “A second chance, or a second choice,” Lizzie said sweetly. “Good evening, Lord Waterhouse. How do you do?”

      “I am very well, I thank you, Lady Elizabeth,” Nat said. He took her hand even though she had not offered it.

      “And how are you?” he asked. His gaze swept her face and she felt the hot color sting her cheeks as much from the look he gave her as the incendiary burn of his touch. His eyes held a spark of amusement far in their depths; he understood what she was doing with Priscilla, knew she was jealous just as she had been of Flora. She hated herself for giving so much away and she hated him for knowing. For the first time, she was grateful that he thought her to be no more than a spoiled brat who had never been denied the things she had wanted. It saved the further humiliation of him realizing that actually she was so deep in love with him that it ate at her like a canker to see him with someone else. There was a subtle difference there, but in it lay her salvation.

      “You were indisposed when I last called,” Nat said. “I trust you are better?”

      “Oh, ladies are always suffering from trifling indispositions,” Priscilla Willoughby said brightly. “It means nothing, does it, Lady Elizabeth? We only do it to appear more mysterious.”

      “I never trifle,” Lizzie said, removing her hand from Nat’s grip. “Excuse me. I will leave you to renew old acquaintance.”

      “I did not expect to find Lord Waterhouse here tonight,” Lizzie said as Lady Wheeler steered her on to greet the next group of friends.

      “He came because Priscilla invited him,” Lady Wheeler gushed. “They are such good friends. Is she not the most charming creature? They called her Perfect Priscilla when she was a debutante, you know, Lady Elizabeth, for she was considered so very beautiful and accomplished.”

       Perfect Priscilla.

      Lizzie ground her teeth. Why did that not surprise her? Perfectly hateful Priscilla.

      “Everyone was given a sobriquet like that in those days,” Lizzie said, “or so my mother told me.”

      Even Lady Wheeler was not too slow to take the meaning of that remark. She flushed quite red and excused herself.

      “It would be cleverer of you to befriend her, you know,” an amused masculine voice said in her ear, and Lizzie turned to see John, Viscount Jerrold, at her elbow, a lopsided smile creasing his good-natured features, his brown eyes bright with mirth. “You have no need to be envious,” he added. “You’re rich, ten years younger and a peerless beauty. Now—will you marry me?”

      Lizzie burst out laughing and her sore heart eased a little. Six months before Jerrold had proposed to her and she had turned him down, but it had not been the end of their flirtation. She had sometimes wondered if she had made a mistake in rejecting him. He made her laugh the way that Nat had once done in the days when their friendship had seemed easy and uncomplicated. But on the other hand she had never longed for John Jerrold’s touch the way she ached for Nat in every fiber of her being.

      “No, Johnny,” she said. “Not even your title can persuade me. You know I like you too well to wed you. I would be the worst wife in the world.”

      Jerrold’s smile widened. “You’re right, of course, Lizzie. You aren’t cut out to be a wife, mine least of all. But I had to ask.”

      “Why?” Lizzie sighed. “Are you poor, too? No money with that pretty title you’ve just inherited?”

      “None,” Jerrold agreed.

      “There’s a rich widow,” Lizzie said, nodding toward Priscilla Willoughby, whose little white hand seemed to have crept up Nat’s arm and was now resting on his lapel in a confiding gesture as she spoke in his ear. “Though she’s probably too proper to be good in bed.”

      “Oh, I don’t know,” Jerrold said, giving Lady Willoughby a thoughtful look. “Maybe she was called Perfect Priscilla for quite another reason. That gown of hers is not designed for modesty.”

      Lizzie smothered her laughter in her glass of wine. “Thank goodness you are here, Johnny,” she said. “I was blue-deviled tonight but now I can have some fun. I believe that you are just as badly behaved as I am.”

      “Worse,” Jerrold said. “You are only talk, Lizzie, but I…Well, I follow through.” His eyes narrowed on her face. “What is it? What have I said?”

      “Nothing,” Lizzie said hastily. She shivered, rubbing her gloved hands over her bare arms where the goose bumps showed. What was it that Nat had said to her on that secret night in the folly? That she did not have the nerve to carry through the droit de seigneur and seduce him? She had proved that false. She, with her bodice ripped apart and her skirts pulled up, spread open and wantonly giving herself to him with all the wildness that was in her nature…Oh, she had followed through, all the way, through and through. She shuddered. “Nothing,” she said again.

      Jerrold was watching her, a frown between his fair brows, and Lizzie turned away from that observant gaze and pointed rather randomly at Mary Wheeler. Tom had briefly left Mary’s side in order to cultivate her parents—clever Tom, Lizzie thought—and Mary was standing looking a little forlorn and gazing into her wineglass. “There is an heiress for you,” she said. “You would be doing her a favor if you snatched her from beneath my brother’s nose before he ruins her. See how Tom is conversing with Sir James and flattering his opinions? And how he is not neglecting to make discreet eyes at Lady Wheeler, too, so that she forgets she is a faded middle-aged woman and thinks herself beautiful again? That is all so that he may gain Mary’s money.”

      “Your brother,” Jerrold agreed, an edge to his voice, “could charm almost anyone into forgetting that he is a cad and a scoundrel and a deceiver.”

      “He has a talent for it,” Lizzie said. “I think he inherited his charm from our mother. She was accounted the most fascinating woman in England.”

      “What happened to her?” Jerrold asked.

      “She drank herself to death,” Lizzie said briefly. She did not want to think about Lady Scarlet.