Page 1 of A Widow for the Earl
CHAPTER ONE
“No one suspects it was actually me, Father,” Beatrice Johnson snapped, rolling her eyes. “Would you have preferred it if I had allowed him to impose himself on that poor girl? Iheardhim say he meant to steal a kiss, and she was terrified! Indeed, if that had been me, in that girl’s position, would you not want someone to intervene?”
No, of course you would not. You would not even notice my absence, or you would blame me, somehow.She held back the tirade, seeing no use in wasting the breath when her parents would not listen anyway.
“Ifyouwere where you were supposed to be, you would not have had to intervene,” her father, Henry Johnson, Viscount of Fetterton, replied. Missing the point entirely. “Respectable ladies do not wander alone in gardens at night. If this girl you speak of was in the gardens, then perhaps she brought it on herself.”
Beatrice had been trying to enjoy a breakfast of soft-boiled eggs and thin slices of toast but, at that, she nearly hurled one of the eggs right at her father’s head.
“She did no such thing,” she rasped, glaring at him. “She was overwhelmed by the ball, she sought some peace and quiet where she thought no one would disturb her, and that wretch saw a wicked opportunity. He is a prowler, Father. Everyone knows that. That young lady is guilty of nothing.”
“She left her chaperone,” Beatrice’s mother, Unity Johnson, pointed out with a patronizing tut. “An unmarried lady should never leave her chaperone.”
Beatrice shot her mother a withering look. “But what if a lady’s chaperone is forever leaving her? If I went wherever my chaperone went, I would spend every ball snooping through other people’s manors and gossiping with a bottle of pilfered brandy in the refreshment room.”
“Do not be obtuse, dear,” Unity replied, a phrase she used when she was either not listening or did not care to answer her daughter.
Beatrice sat back in her chair, tempted to throw an egg apiece toward the foreheads of her parents. She had lost her appetite, anyway, and she hated to waste perfectly soft-boiled eggs.
“I do not understand why this is even a concern of yours, or why we are still discussing it,” she said instead, for it had been three days since the ball. “There was no harm done. My name is notin any scandal sheets, no one believes it possible that I shoved Lord Albany into a pond and then outran him, no one is judging us unkindly. Indeed, it is very likely that I gained us some secret respect from the ladies, at least.”
It is not as if the two of you garner much respect.She bit the end off a piece of toast to prevent herself from saying that part out loud.
Still, she truly could not fathom why they were making such a fuss about what she had done at the Trowbridge Ball. She had not hurt anyone, only dented a despicable man’s pride and social position. Nor had she embarrassed the family name. Yes, she had attracted everyone’s attention, and the scream she had made when she had hurtled into the ballroom, pursued by the drenched, dirtied, pond adorned Lord Albany had been somewhat startling. But it had all been for a good cause.
“Respect?” Henry scoffed. “You think you gained anyone’s respect at that ball?”
Beatrice shrugged. “I thought I managed rather well.”
“Thisis why your antics are my concern, Beatrice,” her father shot back. “I am tired of you risking the reputation of our family with your wild japes and tricks.”
“They are not japes or tricks,” Beatrice interrupted sternly, for though she did not take much seriously, justice was one thing she took very seriously indeed. “They are punishments for those who would otherwise get away withtheirantics. They arelessons that certain gentlemen would not have learned without my… creative intervention.”
Her father’s eyes flared as he took up his cup of weak coffee, gulped down a mouthful, and slammed the cup back down into its saucer. “Look at you, sitting there as if you are some… some… righteous heroine!” he spat, shaking his head. “You are a silly little girl, that is what you are, and it is high time that you grew up! You are twenty, and I will not tolerate your foolish games anymore. You have been ungrateful to us for far too long, and what you did at the ball has only confirmed what I have long suspected—we have spoiled you, and now I must remedy that conceit.”
The moment the snort came out of Beatrice’s nose, she wished she could stuff it back where it came from. The sardonic smirk and raised eyebrow likely did not help matters, either, but what else was she to do in the face of such a ridiculous statement?
“You see! Conceited!” Henry barked, waving his hand at her. “How brazen you must be, to laugh in the face of your father. A father who has done nothing but give you everything you ask for, who has taken care of you, who has ensured you wanted for nothing.”
It was all too much, stoking the flames of a temper that did not often rear its head. Beatrice much preferred to get even than get mad, but there were, on occasion, exceptions.
“I should like to meet this father,” she said, her voice icily calm. “And yes, I might be twenty, but in those two decades, I cannotrecall a single kind word from either of you. I cannot recall a single incident of being ‘spoiled’ by you, unless you mean ‘spoiled’ as in left out to rot. Last year alone, you spent one month in this household, and that is not a rarity. I do not even mind that now, but I assure you, when I was a child, I minded very much.”
Her mother scoffed, deigning to raise her head from the morning scandal sheets. “Were we supposed to take achildwith us, to visit friends and on our journeys abroad? Come now, do not be so ridiculous. We tended to your every need. You had a governess and a nanny.”
“The nanny despised me, and the governess only came twice a week because you would not pay her more,” Beatrice argued. “I was alone for most of my childhood. Even when you were here, you ignored me.”
“One must ignore unruly children,” her father insisted, giving a nod as if he had just imparted a morsel of genius onto the breakfast table.
Unity did not respond, returning her attention to the scandal sheets. She did not listen to her husband, any more than she listened to Beatrice. Indeed, ordinarily, the married couple preferred not to be in the same room with each other, which was why it had been so strange to see them put on a united front of mutual fury after the events of the ball.
Beatrice trembled with rage, struggling to calm the rising ire. “I was not unruly; I was lonely!” Her voice grew spikes, as shehurled her barbed words toward her impassive mother. “And you cannot expect me not to wander where I please at balls when you brought me into society at fifteen, and left me by myself at every party, every gathering, every event. You refused to employ a chaperone, yet you refused to chaperone. That has not changed in five years.”
Her father narrowed his eyes at her. “Do not speak to your mother like that. I imagine you think you are saying something terribly important, but all you are doing is confirming that you are the spoiled creature you have shown yourself to be.” He shook his head with blatant distaste. “Such an ungrateful girl. Countless ladies would be glad to have their debut so young, yet nothing is ever good enough for you, is it?”
She had achieved a great many things in her twenty years, becoming self-reliant, educating herself in business and the secret accumulation of wealth, learning how to read people and how to gather information discreetly, to use later. But what she had never quite managed to learn was how not to feel her heart break when her father spoke to her as if she was dirt upon his shoe.
Even now, despite herself, despite everything, she would have savored even the smallest compliment or kind word from either of them.
