The Rake's Redemption. Georgina Devon

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СКАЧАТЬ light voice intruded. ‘You are ruining the evening. It is supposed to be about fun and excitement and the two of you make it seem awful.’

      Charles found he could not look away from Emma Stockton, no matter what the girl said. The woman seemed fit to explode. Colour mounted her high cheekbones and her grey eyes seemed lit from within. Suddenly, he had had enough of taunting her.

      He made a brief leg. ‘I will be about my business, ladies. I wish you a good evening—what is left of it.’

      He departed without a backward glance, glad to be away before Emma Stockton went up in flames. Even he, as selfish and hedonistic as he was and bent on entertaining himself during a dull Season in any way possible, didn’t want to be around for the fireworks he knew were to come.

      Emma felt Charles Hawthorne’s departure in spite of herself. It was as though the warmth had fled, leaving only her cold anger at him and her sister.

      ‘Amy, you know you should not be out here with a man of Charles Hawthorne’s ilk. Think of your reputation.’

      Amy defiantly met Emma’s gaze. ‘There is nothing wrong. The doors are open and—’ she half turned and swept her arm in an indication of the gardens below ‘—there are people walking on the paths. Nothing would have happened.’

      Emma wondered if she had ever been this headstrong and bent on achieving her own purpose no matter what the cost. She didn’t think so. From the first, she had realised someone needed to be responsible and help Mama. Her anger softened at the memory.

      ‘Amy,’ she said gently, ‘it is not a matter of anything happening. Exactly. It is a matter of propriety, and young girls don’t go outside alone with a man like Charles Hawthorne.’ Amy stood so they were eye to eye. ‘Well, we might have been brother-and sister-in-law. Surely that counts for something.’

      ‘Amy,’ Emma said reproachfully, ‘you know better than that. If I had married Lord Hawthorne, things would have been different. But I didn’t, so you can’t use that as an excuse. Society will forgive much in a man that it won’t forgive in a woman. Always remember that.’

      ‘Humph!’

      Amy made to flounce around her sister but Emma grabbed her sister’s arm and held tight. ‘You still haven’t told me what the two of you came out here to discuss.’

      Amy simultaneously tossed her head and tried to wriggle from Emma’s grasp. Emma let her go.

      ‘Nothing.’

      ‘Amy.’ Emma felt her patience shredding.

      ‘Oh, all right. There is a masquerade. I wanted him to escort me because I knew you wouldn’t.’

      Emma gasped in spite of herself. ‘You are the most brazen girl. You would have ruined yourself for a couple of hours of pleasure.’

      ‘No, I wouldn’t. I would have worn a mask. No one would even know who I was.’

      ‘So, is he taking you?’

      Amy half turned away, giving her sister a look from the corner of her eyes. ‘And if he is?’

      ‘Don’t goad me, Amy. I am not in the mood for it.’

      And she wasn’t. Already she found herself wanting to lock her sister in her room with only bread and water, but Amy wasn’t a child anymore even though she acted like one. Next, she wanted to land Charles Hawthorne what her brother Bertram would call a facer. But she would do neither.

      ‘You are never in the mood for fun, Emma. That is the problem with you.’

      Emma glared at Amy.

      ‘Oh, all right. No, he isn’t taking me.’ Her voice fell. ‘I was surprised. He is always game for anything.’

      Emma silently groaned at her sister’s naiveté. ‘And what if you had been recognised? He might be reckless, but he’s not stupid. Your reputation would be in shreds and someone might start thinking he should marry you—something I very much believe he has no intention of doing.’

      A flush spread across Amy’s fair face. ‘He certainly made that plain.’ She smoothed the fine white muslin of her gown, her eyes not meeting Emma’s. ‘But men change…if they want something badly enough.’

      ‘No, they don’t.’ Emma snapped the words, hearing the fatal misunderstanding so many of her sex seemed to have regarding men. ‘They don’t change.’

      ‘You don’t know that,’ Amy persisted. ‘Besides, Em, I am tired of this conversation. And he is not taking me to the masquerade. So, as far as you are concerned, things couldn’t be better.’

      Emma would have begged to differ, but knew it did no good to argue with Amy when she had her mind made up. All she could do was try her best to be an obstacle in the young girl’s reckless path. To lecture Amy would only make her sister try harder to achieve what she ought not.

       Chapter Two

       E mma alighted first from the hired carriage they rented when need dictated. They lived in a genteel yet shabby part of London. The walk to Lady Jersey’s ball would have been too far, even for women raised in the country. Delicate ballroom slippers were not made for long distances and wearing one’s half boots and carrying one’s slippers to a fancy ball was not done.

      Amy followed Emma. ‘Em, what engagements do we have tomorrow?’

      Emma turned to pay the coachman, who tipped his hat before driving away. She moved to the front door, pulling a key from her reticule. ‘I believe we are at home tomorrow afternoon, Amy. At night, we should have been at a rout at the Princess Lieven’s but it has been postponed until the next evening.’

      ‘Nothing tomorrow afternoon,’ Amy murmured.

      Amy’s voice held impatience and something else that Emma always dreaded. Excitement. She didn’t need Amy to say any more to know her sister had arranged or was planning something that would not be to anyone’s liking but Amy’s.

      ‘Why do you wish to know?’ Emma worked to keep the growing apprehension from her tone. Provoking Amy to further indiscretions was the last thing she needed to do.

      ‘Oh, nothing.’ Amy waved her gloved hand in an airy sweep. But there was a sparkle in her blue eyes that spoke of mischief.

      Rather than press the issue, Emma said, ‘Then you had best get some sleep.’

      A glance at Amy showed the young girl had missed Emma’s irony. Yes, Amy was definitely concocting something.

      Emma inserted the key in the lock and pushed open the door. No servants waited up for them. It wasn’t fair to ask their old butler, who did many other things now because they were short of staff, to wait up. Nor would she ask the housekeeper who now filled in as lady’s maid. They rose at dawn, so she would not ask them to stay up until dawn.

      Emma watched Amy trip blithely up the stairs, a bounce in the girl’s step that spoke of suppressed energy and excitement. Amy was enjoying her first Season immensely.

      Emma remembered her own and wished she had been as СКАЧАТЬ