Chapter 2

The hypocrisy of buying the best seats in a theater with the best view of the stage, then ignoring everyone upon that stage, frustrated Lady Ivy Amberton to no end. She wanted to enjoy the play, not listen to her sister-in-law’s complaints about her acquaintances in Society. But Ivy’s brother, the Earl of Haverford, never seemed to mind missing a performance as he absorbed his wife’s gossip.

Here, in the second act, one of the characters on stage spoke with vigor, while Fanny’s words interspersed with the dialogue of the actor.

“Oh, the devil! no man knows what to say at the time when one most wants to say it. I’ll go over it again?—”

“—if I have to hear Lady Bilton’s story of her pug one more time?—”

“—I beg pardon, but you know one can’t help these things.”

“—and the excess of stupidity ought not be brought up?—”

“—I find that talking clears the mind wonderfully.”

Ivy sat on the edge of her chair, leaning toward the box’s rail, and nearly went so far as to cup a hand around her ear, the better to hear what went on between the actors. But her hands were already full. One held the theater glasses her late father had gifted her when she had come out into Society, five years previous. He’d been delighted with the contraption, which he’d bought while they were together in Paris the summer before he died.

A “delightful way to see the world,” he had called them, amused with the simplicity of the idea. “Everyone will own one of these before long. Changeable Claude Glasses.”

They were simple, made only of wood, thin metal frames, and colored glass, but they accompanied her to every theatrical performance she had attended since she’d made her curtsy.

With a flick of her wrist, Ivy could change the lenses through from the normal spectacles of a theater-goer to rose-hued glass, then blue-tinted, then yellow-tinted, thus changing the way the world looked to better admire it anew. Each pair of lenses, framed in delicate wires, joined at the stick with an ingenious pivot mechanism. It was a simple matter to fold one set down along the handle to allow another to act as the primary pair.

Her other hand grasped the rail. She needed it there to keep balanced on the edge of her seat as she leaned forward, her gaze fixed intently on the stage below, completely absorbed in the performance before her.

Ivy’s hair fluttered slightly in the warm air, her neck arched as she stretched her head out over the edge of the theater box, and she felt as though she reached for something out of her grasp. The rest of the world had fallen away, leaving the performance to captivate her attention. Fanny’s complaints were not so loud now.

She wished one of her sisters had come. Juniper had a cold, though, and Betony didn’t care for the theater. That left Ivy with only the company of her half-brother and sister-in-law.

So rarely did she experience people and places to her taste, dependent as she was on her sister-in-law’s approval, that she was determined to savor every second of the play.

Caught up in the magic of the performance below, Ivy sensed rather than saw a movement from beneath their box. Glancing down, she saw a man in the box beneath hers, a handsome one at that, leaning on his rail. Looking up. His eyes fixed on her and an amused smile played at the corners of his mouth.

How long had he been staring? A flicker of embarrassment warmed her cheeks, the same as when Ivy’s sister-in-law or brother caught her doing something they deemed improper. But this man wasn’t her brother; he held no power over her actions.

Let him stare, even laugh if he chose.

A rebellious wave of defiance washed over her. She was here to enjoy the performance, to lose herself in the story, and she wasn’t about to let anyone else’s opinions stop her from doing that. With a toss of her head and a small smile, she returned her focus to the stage, more committed than before to enjoy every second of the performance, no matter who was watching.

Her grip on the rail slipped in her distraction and she tilted forward, far enough that her stomach dropped in fear of a fall.

A strong grip on her forearm steadied her, giving her a moment to grip the rail with both hands, steadying herself. When the hand holding her theater glasses hit the rail, the stem snapped in half. She watched, hopelessly, as the multi-hued spectacles fell down?—

Her brother pulled her back before she saw the fate of her father’s gift.

“Will you not sit in your chair as you should?” Lord Haverford whispered harshly in her ear. “You nearly pitched out of the box. People were staring.”

Her brother had hauled her backward, firmly placing her into her seat, but Ivy’s eyes remained on the broken stick in her hand.

That was all that remained of her theater glasses. Half a stick of polished wood, the end of it splintered and jagged. The gift from her father, gone.

“Honestly, Ivy,” he said, tone impatient in the semi-darkness of the box. “We cannot take you anywhere without you acting like an addlepated child. What are you trying to do? Leap to the stage from our box?”

“Everyone was looking at you,” his wife added, her fan fluttering in front of her face, resembling an agitated moth’s wing. “Gawking at the actors as though you’ve no manners. It is shameful.”

Ivy gripped her little stick tighter and turned her glare to her sister-in-law. For one glorious instant, she considered saying what she wished to say. “Better to look as though the play bores me, I suppose? Putting on a sour face, like yours? Gossiping about all my friends?”

She bit her tongue.

Though Ivy had achieved her majority at the age of one and twenty, she was as much at the mercy of her half-brother and his wife as she had been at seventeen, when her father had died. Now, at five and twenty years, she itched to leave their overly critical care and set up a household of her own.

Hopefully taking her two younger sisters with her. Juniper would reach her majority in a matter of weeks, but Betony was only nineteen. Still. Both were old enough to know their own minds, weren’t they?

The sisters’ late father had left their half-brother as executor of his will and as their guardian. This made him the man who held the purse strings, and he had ensured that the entire inheritance from their father was kept in trust until each of his half-sisters was either wed or he deemed them capable of setting up house for themselves.

Dependent on her brother and sister-in-law’s whims, Ivy swallowed her words and bowed her head, making herself the very picture of ladylike contrition.

“Please forgive me, Fanny. I didn’t realize I had drawn inappropriate attention.”

Fanny sniffed. “See that it doesn’t happen again. Be still, Ivy.”

Nodding her agreement, Ivy wrapped her hands around her fan and the stem of her lost theater glasses. She held her gloved, cream-colored hands grasped in her lap, staring at nothing.

She wouldn’t cry. She hadn’t cried in front of her two judgmental guardians in years. They only used her emotions against her. Once, her father had praised her for her passionate expressions, her exuberance and excitement for taking in the world around her.

“Watching you reminds me so much of your mother. She had a love for the world and everything in it that was honest and open.”He had said those very words to her the night of her first ball, which he had spared no expense to hold in her honor. She had laughed and danced all the night long, unashamed of enjoying the sparkle of the chandeliers and beauty of the music.

She had never been happier. Her father had been proud of her. He’d been certain she would take London by storm, be declared a diamond, the favorite of all.

And then he had died less than a fortnight later. An attack of the heart, his physician had said. Nothing could have prevented it. Except, perhaps, less excitement.

Ivy kept still and quiet, hardly hearing the actors until the orchestra played, the audience rose to applaud, and the curtains closed.

Act two had finished, and it was Fanny’s favorite part of attending the play. The part where her devoted friends, whom Ivy privately thought of as Fanny’s minions, would visit her box one by one to impart some salacious bit of gossip. The earl had already muttered an excuse to leave, slipping out before the first feather-bedecked lady stepped in, leaving Ivy to sit in her chair and act the part of a doll, saying nothing and posing prettily.

Precisely as they had trained her to do.

Teague hadn’t meantto look up. He couldn’t even give a reason why his gaze drifted from the stage. He had been enjoying the play, laughing as the disguised uncle spied on his nephews, when he’d glanced up. Then he’d seen her, thanks to the angle at which he sat in his box and she in hers.

A woman with delicate features, leaning forward and illuminated by the soft glow of the stage lights below. Her neck arched gracefully as she stretched her head out over the edge of the theater box, craning to catch a better view of the performance. A gust of cool air brushed by Teague as he leaned forward, surprised by the beauty hovering above him.

She didn’t see him at first. Her whole attention was focused on the stage as her lips parted in anticipation of a laugh, her eyes alight with excitement. The loose curls of her hair, shining amber in the lights, quivered slightly as she leaned further out, oblivious to everything but the play.

With a smile playing at the corners of her mouth, she was the picture of a woman caught up in the magic of the theater, lost in the spell of the performance before her.

Teague’s heart responded with an excited thump, recognizing in the unknown woman a kinship of sorts. Few people of his status came to the theater to watch what happened on the boards. Most were more interested in the other audience members and the dramas of scandal and gossip. This woman, enthralled as she was with the unfolding comedy, caught his attention. Few English ladies ever seemed to show their true feelings, preferring to feign boredom. This one…she was different.

She looked down. Her gaze met his and she froze, startled to find him watching her, as he realized he was wearing a ridiculous smile.

She smiled back. Then she lifted her chin, dismissing him, in favor of returning her attention to the actors and their speeches. Teague didn’t want to look away. What sort of gentleman stared at a woman he didn’t even know?

Then his heart lurched upward as his stomach dropped in fear. The woman’s whole body jolted, as though she’d lost her balance or been struck from behind. He rose at the very same instant she caught herself and something fell from her grasp.

He dove forward to catch it without thought, his hands closing over the object and his ribs protesting as they crashed against his box’s rail.

Sir Andrew, a baronet and friend to Teague, grasped Teague by the shoulders with a muttered oath and pulled him backward.

“What madness is this, Dunmore?” he demanded, calling Teague by his title. “If you wish to join the actors on stage, there are better routes!”

“Sit down, both of you,” Lady Josephine, wife to the baronet, said quietly. She also happened to be the Duke of Montfort’s eldest daughter, sister-in-law to Teague’s sister. An admirer of all forms of fiction and storytelling, from what he could gather. “Lord Dunmore, are you all right?”

He sat back in his chair and Sir Andrew did the same with a huff.

“I am well. The box above—” How did he explain the woman whose beauty had completely enchanted him? “—someone dropped this.” He held the object out in one hand and finally realized he had caught what appeared to be several pairs of spectacles affixed to one another, a broken handle explaining how their owner had lost her hold of them.

“Dear me.” Lady Josephine laid a hand over her heart. She kept her tone soft, mindful of the boxes around them. “That would have hurt, had it landed on someone’s head.”

Sir Andrew raised his eyebrows, impressed. “A heroic act, then. Well done, Dunmore. You see, Josie, our friend proves yet again that Irishmen are a welcome addition to Society.” He winced when his wife smacked his shoulder with her fan.

“Do stop teasing, Andrew. Someone will hear you and take you seriously. Lord Dunmore isn’t nearly well enough acquainted with your sense of humor to make it acceptable to jest in that way.”

“Apologies, Dunmore,” Andrew said quietly, rubbing where his wife’s fan struck. “I hadn’t realized my wife found it her duty to defend your honor. I meant nothing by it.”

“I am well aware, Sir Andrew.” Teague waved away the apology, not even hiding his smile at their antics. He’d spent enough time at the club with Sir Andrew to know the man’s jests were a sign of friendship. “Though Lady Josephine is welcome to continue wielding her fan on my behalf if it pleases her.”

The woman’s smile brightened and she saluted him with her fan, then turned her attention back to the stage. Sir Andrew settled more comfortably in his chair before he took his wife’s hand in his, watching her more often than he glanced at the stage.

The two were besotted with each other. Teague didn’t mind. They were good company and didn’t usually try to make conversation in the middle of an actor’s monologue.

He fiddled with the spectacles, folding and unfolding them, wondering if their loss would make it difficult for the lady above his box to enjoy the rest of the play. He’d seen people with telescopes before, watching plays through the long stems of jewel-crusted spyglasses. There were many women at that moment making use of lorgnettes, delicately made spectacles with dainty handles of ivory and silver.

This strange thing in his hands, though, was unlike any device he’d seen before, yet it was a simple construct. Hesitantly, he raised the rose-colored pair of glasses to his eyes. They worked exactly as he expected, bringing the objects and people upon the stage closer through their lenses and turning everything to the shade of a gentle blush.

A shame the handle had broken. The lady would likely be able to replace it, if she found someone willing to tinker with the unusual contraption.

Teague grinned to himself. He would have to return it to her, of course, and perhaps gain an introduction. Perhaps he could ask her if she was enjoying the play. The play he hadn’t paid any attention to since the moment he’d seen the woman.

Best to rectify that. The end of the second act drew near, and he’d have to hurry up the stairs immediately after, before the crowds of people filled the halls and made them impassible. He settled in, still only half aware of the story unfolding on stage. His thoughts were entirely upon the woman and what he would say as he returned her property.

As the curtain fell, Teague slipped from the box with a quick promise to return to Sir Andrew and Lady Josephine. He was upon the carpet in the corridor in seconds, darting into the main staircase to take it up another level. He had stepped onto the top landing when the doors opened and gentlemen and ladies poured out, the swell of their chatter breaking upon the quiet like surf upon a sandbar.

Teague had to slide between ladies fanning themselves and gentlemen complaining about the stuffiness of the evening. At last, he made it to the curtained doorway of the box above his own. The curtain had already been pushed aside, allowing him to enter.

He found two ladies inside, one a decade or more older than himself, and the other the woman who had dropped the dual telescopic device in his hand. They both looked up as he entered, but Teague’s gaze stayed upon the younger of the two.

He bowed. “I must beg your pardon, ladies, for this breach in etiquette. Baron Dunmore, at your service.” Why did his native Irish sound so thick on his tongue? There would be no doubt from whence he’d come, even after so few words. He made a greater effort to hide it with the next. “I have the privilege of enjoying the evening’s performance from the box beneath your own.”

The woman with a sour expression and tall purple feather in her hair narrowed her eyes at him. “My husband is not present, Lord Dunmore, to make appropriate introductions. If you have need of him, he may be found in the gentlemen’s parlor.”

The countess was exactly what he’d come to expect from English matrons when confronted with his Irish brogue.

“Ah.” He winced. “Thank you, madam. I had hoped we might forgo the usual method, given that I am here to return the property of the young lady.” He nodded to the woman who had remained silent. He realized the pink in her cheeks had disappeared, leaving her rather pale instead.

His breach in decorum hadn’t been all that terrible, surely.

“Ivy?” The woman’s eyebrows rose to the top of her forehead. “What property have you given this man? Do you know him?”

The woman stood quickly. “No, Fanny. We have never met. But he has my opera glasses. I dropped them a moment ago.”

Somewhat relieved, Teague managed to smile at her again and held the contraption out to her. “Indeed, miss.”

“Lady Ivy Amberton,” she corrected softly, dropping her gaze and bending in an abbreviated curtsy. “This is Lady Haverford, my brother’s wife.” Her tone was not what he had expected after seeing the open display of her emotions before. She sounded far more subdued than he’d imagined.

The countess stood, her lips puckered and eyes pinched. “How do you do.” She wasn’t truly asking, her tone flat, her eyes narrowed. Nothing about her stiffly held posture indicated an ounce of interest in him.

“Lady Haverford. It is a pleasure.” It wasn’t. Lord Haverford belonged to the party in opposition to Teague’s own, and he’d had several choice things to say about having the Irish in Parliament. Haverford proclaimed himself a traditionalist, a man who believed the past had achieved perfection. Any progress or reforms were challenging the natural order of things. “I have met Lord Haverford in Lords many times. He is highly respected by many.”

The many that Teague often caught himself wishing would all retire to their countryside homes and decide not to come back again.

“I cannot recall him making any mention of you,” the countess said, remaining in her chair. “Return Lady Ivy’s property, if that is why you came.”

He looked at the woman who had so captivated him with her enjoyment of the play and then her defiance at his watching her. How could she, lovely and enthusiastic as she was, be related to one of the most unpleasant and unmovable men in Society?

She leaned closer to him. “I apologize for my sister-in-law,” she said, her voice almost too low for him to hear amid the buzz of conversation in the theater below. “She isn’t fond of meeting strangers.”

“I can understand the discomfort.” He held the joined spectacles toward her. “Your property, Lady Ivy.”

“Thank you, Lord Dunmore.” Again, her softly spoken words confused him. She sounded as though she had been chastened, or that she feared raising her voice to even a normal speaking level. She took the device with both hands and held it against her stomach and when she raised her eyes to his, they were filled with gratitude. “Not many would have taken the trouble to return such a silly item. I wasn’t certain I would see them again.”

As he opened his mouth to respond, someone nudged Teague from behind. He stumbled a step forward and moved out of the doorway, making way for a woman in dark blue silks and smelling strongly of roses.

The woman barely glanced at him as she stormed across the floor and collapsed into the vacant chair beside the countess. “Here now, Lady Haverford, what think you of Mrs. Garrett’s eldest wedding a foreigner?”

The two of them immediately forgot everything else around them and fell into a passionate conversation about the private affairs of others. Teague stared at them in confusion.

Had he been dismissed without realizing it? Then he looked again at Lady Ivy, who still clasped her multi-colored spectacles to her midsection and stared at her sister-in-law with confusion.

Teague took a single step closer to the wall and the movement drew Lady Ivy’s attention. She glanced once more at her sister-in-law, then came closer to Teague, closer than she had a moment before to accept her property from his hand.

“I am sorry, Lord Dunmore.” She winced and Teague offered her a reassuring smile.

“Perhaps I ought to have waited to return your property, but I didn’t want to chance missing you.”

Lady Ivy’s brows drew together in apparent confusion.

“A lady who attends a play to actually watch the story unfold is as rare as a fairy in these parts.”

Her lips twitched. She had a sense of humor, then. That made her less like her brother already. “I suppose there are more fairies in Ireland, your lordship?”

“I am told there are.” He gestured subtly to her hands. “I have never seen anything like your spectacles, Lady Ivy. It would be a shame to lose something so unique.”

She nodded and looked down at the item in her hands, turning it over. “My father gifted them to me. They are a combination of a lorgnette and Claude glasses. To let a viewer enjoy many shades and notes of color.”

“A fascinating idea. I noted a slight magnification for each pair of lenses, too.”

“For those who are not as gifted with far-sightedness. Such as myself.” She glanced over her shoulder at the two gossiping women, then peered up again at him. She was half a head shorter than he, with the dark hair and dark eyes that made him think of rich earth, chocolate, coffee, and deep forests. His favorite things. “You were kind to return them to me with such haste, Lord Dunmore. Thank you. I will not forget it.”

He ought to say something. He knew he ought to. But not a single clever thing came to his mind, which was an oddity for him. The Season was nearly over. He’d be leaving soon. She likely would, too. Haverford’s holdings were in the southwest of England, while Teague would journey northeast to the Duke of Montfort’s estate.

He had run all the way up to her box without much of a plan. He’d wanted to meet her. Now that he had, there was nothing more to say. Not to an English noblewoman, even if she surprised him with her sweet openness. So unlike the other ladies he’d tried to speak to in English ballrooms and parlors.

Even if he’d wanted to, there wasn’t even time to ask which ball she would attend next, or if he might take her on a drive through the park. It was unlikely her brother would even allow such a thing, given how little Haverford and Teague had in common, politically or otherwise.

So he stepped back toward the open doorway. “It was a pleasure to meet you, Lady Ivy. I hope you enjoy the rest of the performance.” He bowed again. “Good evening.”

The gentle sadness in her eyes left him with an ache in his chest, as though he’d had the air forced from his lungs. Despite the flicker of interest that had sparked in his thoughts upon first sight of her, the timing was all wrong.

Perhaps she sensed it too, for the air between them hung heavy with unspoken words and unexplored possibilities. It was the sort of meeting that happened in the best of stories, he thought wistfully.

However, there wasn’t time for a second act . The curtain had already fallen on the London Season, and their paths were unlikely to cross again for months, if not an entire year.

A bittersweet smile appeared on her lovely face. “Good evening, Lord Dunmore. And good bye.”

He left the box and returned to his own, but he sat farther back. Away from the rail, denying himself a chance to look up on the slim chance that Lady Ivy would sit within his view. He watched the play to its end, departed with his friends, and looked over his shoulder only once as they left the theater.

His gaze immediately collided with Lady Ivy’s, though she descended the stairs to the ground floor and he had nearly walked out the doors into the night. In that brief moment, Teague wished he had seen her weeks, if not months, before that evening.

The crowd swept him out the door and, once in the warm night air, he heaved a sigh of regret.