Christmas Betrothals. Sophia James

      Laughter and warmth and a shining intensity that was bewitching! She saw love in the way their hands brushed close as he handed her the packet and in the breathless smile the woman gave back to him as she received her gift. Only them in the world, only the small circle of their joy and happiness, for the bliss between them was tangible to everyone that watched.

      Yearning overcame Lillian. Yearning for what she had just seen, the mistletoe a reminder of what she had never found and would probably never have. She glanced at John, who was castigating his sister for wasting her money on such frippery and a heavy sadness settled over her.

      Christmas with its hope and promise had a way of undermining rationality and logic, replacing it with this mistletoe magic and a great dollop of hunger for something completely untenable.

      ‘I do hope you are not swayed by my sister’s nonsense, too?’ John said, and with the shake of her head Lillian placed the brown packet in her bag and averted her eyes from the couple now walking on the other side of the street.

       Chapter Six

      Her cousin Daniel was in the library the next morning when she went down to find again the book on the Americas and he did not look pleased.

      ‘Lillian. It has been a while since we have talked.’ His face was marked by the underlying anger she had got used to seeing there.

      For the past few years Daniel had been away from England and the ease of conversation that they had at one time had was now replaced by distance. Some other more nebulous wildness was also evident.

      ‘Does my father know that you are here?’

      ‘Yes. He is just retrieving a document that my mother has asked me to find for her.’

      ‘I see.’

      He flipped at the pages of the book on America as it lay open on the table next to him. ‘It’s a big land. I was there on the east coast. Washington, mainly, and New York.’

      ‘Is that where you met Mr Clairmont?’

      He frowned and then realisation dawned. ‘Ah, you saw us the other night at the Lenningtons’.’

      ‘I met him in the street yesterday with Hawkhurst. He had the appearance of being in another fight and I thought perhaps—’ But he did not let her finish!

      ‘Stay away from him, Lillian, for he is trouble.’

      She nodded, and, pleased to hear her father’s footsteps in the hall, excused herself.

      John Wilcox-Rice arrived alone in the afternoon and he had brought her a bunch of winter cheer. Blooms that would sit well in her room and she thanked him.

      Today he was dressed in a dark blue frock coat, brown trousers and a waistcoat of lighter blue. His taste was impeccable, she thought, his Hessians well polished and fashionable.

      After her talk with her cousin that morning she was in a mood to just let life take her where it would. Thoughts of children and a home of her own were becoming more formed. Perhaps a life with John would be a lot more than tolerable? Her father liked him, her aunt liked him and she liked his sister very much. The young couple from yesterday came briefly to mind, but the time between then and now had dulled her sense of yearning, her more normal sensibleness taking precedence.

      So when he took her hand in his she did not pull away, but savoured the feeling of gentle warmth.

      ‘We have known each other for a passably long time, Lillian, and I think that if we gave it the chance …’

      When she nodded, he looked heartened.

      ‘I have asked your father if I could court you and he has given his permission. Now I need the same permission from you.’

      The warning from Daniel and the Countess of Horsham’s gossip welled in her mind.

      Stay away from Lucas Clairmont. Stay away from trouble.

      ‘It is six weeks until Christmas. Perhaps we could use this time to see if …?’ She could not finish. To see what? To see if she felt passion or fervour or frenzy?

      When he drew her up with him in response she stood, and when his lips glided across her own she did try to answer him back, did attempt to summon the hope of joy and benefit.

      But she felt nothing!

      The shock of it hit her and she pulled away, amazed at the singular smile of ardour on John’s face.

      ‘I will consider that as a troth, my love, and I will treasure the beauty of it for ever.’

      The sound of a maid coming with tea had him moving away and taking his place on a chair opposite her. Yet still he grinned.

      A gentleman, a nice man, a good man. And a man whose kisses made her feel nothing.

      She lay in bed that night and cried. Cried for her mother and her father and for herself, trapped as she was by rules and rituals and etiquette.

      John’s fragrant flowers were on the table beside her bed, but she missed the ugly single orange bloom. Missed its vigour and its irreverence and its unapologetic raw colour. Missed the company of the man who had given it to her.

      He had had a wife who had died quite recently according to the gossip. Lord, how had he dealt with that? Badly, by all accounts, as she thought of his gambling and his obvious lack of funds.

      Closing her eyes, she brought her hand to her mouth and kissed the back of it as John Wilcox-Rice had kissed her lips today. There was something wrong with the way that he had not moved, the static stillness of the action negating all the emotion that should have been within it.

      Lord, she had never in her life been kissed before and so she was hardly an expert, but a part of her brain refused to believe that that was all that it was, all that was whispered about and written of. No, there had to be more to it than what she had felt today, but with Christmas on its way and the honouring of a promise to find a spouse, she was running out of time to be able to truly discover just what it was.

      A new and more daring thought struck her suddenly.

      Perhaps she could find out? Perhaps if she invited Lucas Clairmont to call and offered him a sum of money for both his service and his silence, she might discover what she did not now know.

      To buy a single kiss!

      She smiled, imagining such a wild and dangerous scheme. Of course she could not do that! Lucas Clairmont was hardly a man to bargain with and any trust she might give him would be sorely misplaced. Or would it? He had melted into the background at the Lennington ball and she had heard no gossip of her conversation on the Belgrave Square balcony. Indeed, when she had seen him in the street yesterday he had barely acknowledged her. But was that from carefulness or just plain indifference?

      She moved her hand and slanted her lips, increasing the pressure in a way that felt right. A bloom of want wound thin in her stomach, the warm promise of it bringing to mind the dangerous American.

      Quickly she sat up, hard against the backboard of the bed, pulling the bedding about her shoulders to try to keep the cold at bay.

      This was her only chance to find out. She had been in society for nearly eight years and not once in all that time had she lain here imagining the things she did now about any man.

      Forty-two days until she would give a promise of eternal obedience and chastity to a man whose kisses left her with … nothing.

      Her teeth worried her top lip as she tried to imagine the conversation preceding the experiment. It hardly seemed loyal to tell him of her reaction to John’s kiss and her need to see if others would be the same, and yet if she did not he might think her wanton. A new thought struck her. Could men kiss well if they thought that they were being compared in some way? Would it not dampen a natural tendency?

      And how much should she pay him? Would he be offended by fifty pounds or thankful for it? Would he want a hundred