Page 9 of A Kiss Gone Wylde
His mother’s maid answered immediately. “Her ladyship is still abed, my lord.”
“Yes, well, we can’t all lay about until the afternoon, Somers. I need to speak with my mother… on an urgent matter,” he said. Without further negotiations, he simply grasped the door handle and pushed the door wide, scooting the minuscule woman with it. Somers was rather like a hummingbird—tiny, nervous and always flitting about.
“My lord!” The tiny woman squeaked in protest.
“Scoggins!” His mother called out from her bed, “Just let him have his head. He’s always been a willful, terrible boy—he will be the death of me.”
Brushing past the maid, Payne passed through his mother’s sitting room. He didn’t even spare a glance for the fashion plates for gowns she did not need that were strewn about or the hat boxes stacked up in the corner that had just been delivered by the milliner that very morning. He’d long ago given up trying to curb her spending. Though he supposed that would need to change since he would soon have a wife to provide for, as well.
“Good morning, mother,” he said as he stepped into her bedchamber. She was sitting up, her rather robust frame draped in some ridiculous confection of ruffles and bows. Her hair, underneath the voluminous lace trimmed, satin cap, was tied up in strips of cloths to give her the tight sausage curls she preferred. The overall effect was one of… well, excess. “What is that thing you are wearing?”
“It’s a bed jacket, dear. Madame Duchesne says they are all the rage again,” she explained. With one finger, she tapped her smooth and unlined cheek. “Greet your mother properly, rotten boy!”
With a roll of his eyes, Payne leaned forward and pressed a kiss to his mother’s cheek. “I have something very important to discuss with you, mother.”
“Is this about the milliner’s delivery, dear? I didn’t mean to order so many bonnets, but they were all so lovely that I simply could not resist!”
“It’s not about the bonnets, mother,” he said.
“The dressmaker?”
“No, mot—”
“The haberdasher, then! I knew it. That violet silk was so lovely and Madame Duchesne had nothing like it in her store. I knew the moment I saw it that I would need a gown made from it. It was terribly dear, but that lovely amethyst parure that your father gifted me—”
“I am betrothed,” he blurted out.
“For my birthday all those years ago! He gave lovely gifts even if he was a perfectly wretched husband…” she trailed off, blinking rapidly as the words he’d said just penetrated the shopping haze that was her constant state of being. “I beg your pardon?”
“I am betrothed, mother. Somewhat unexpectedly and somewhat scandalously, but there you have it.” He settled himself on the bench at the foot of her bed, his booted feet crossed at the ankle and his hands resting on his thighs. So far, it was going better than he had anticipated.
“I have been begging you for years to do your duty and marry! I have handpicked the loveliest young women in society to parade before you and you have turned up your nose at all of them! Yet you go to Vauxhall—”
“How did you know I went to Vauxhall?” He demanded.
His mother’s eyes widened slightly. “One of the servants told me.”
Except the only servants who knew his destination had been the coachman and Jenkins and neither of them would say anything. “Mother, have you set one of your spies on me, again?”
“Well, I wouldn’t have to spy if you’d tell me what you were doing! And now you’re betrothed to some adventuress. Just who is this young… woman? This scandalous hussy who has ensnared my son!”
“First of all, she is not a hussy. Second of all, the scandal was as much of my making as it was hers. Thirdly, she is the niece of Lady Marguerite Alliston… Her name is Miss Benedicta Wylde,” Payne explained.
His mother blinked. Slowly. And with every blink, her eyebrows lifted higher and higher, climbing towards her hairline. “Miss Benedicta Wylde… one of those wallflowers of Marguerite’s? Really, Payne! I’ve introduced you to countless young ladies of good fortune, good family, exquisite beauty and all of whom are masters at navigating society! Yet you choose a girl who hasn’t even been asked to dance since she came here from Bath!”
“I care nothing about society, I have a fortune of my own. As for Miss Wylde, her family is perfectly respectable. And while I cannot account for the taste of others, I find her to be perfectly lovely,” he countered.And she was. Perfectly lovely. And very disagreeable.Incredibly disagreeable.“It’s done and that is the end of it, mother. When you meet her, you will be kind… no. You likely will not be kind, but you will be gracious and, at the very least, appear welcoming. Is that clear?”
She closed her lips together in a tight mutinous line.
Nearing the end of his patience, which seemed to grow shorter with every moment in his mother’s presence, his tone was more firm when he asked again, “Is that clear, mother? If it is not, there is a dower house that can be prepared for you at a moment’s notice.”
Mightily offended, his mother raised the back of her wrist to her forehead and sank back against the pillows in a gesture that would not have been out of place on stage at Drury Lane. “The shock is just too much for me, Payne. I need to rest. Oh, however shall I survive this scandal? Scoggins! Scoggins!”
Immediately the maid entered, hovering near the door, all but vibrating with energy.
“Oh, Scoggins, bring my vinaigrette. I feel quite faint! My ungrateful son has no consideration for my delicate nature.”
She was as delicate as a draft horse and just as healthy. “Good day, Mother. I need to call on my betrothed and then we will likely promenade in the park. You are certainly welcome to join us if you can bestir yourself to do so.”
