Eugenia stared down at the proposed advertisement for the registry office that Susan had plunked down on the desk. Snowe’s . . . By Royal Warrant of Appointment was inked at the top, with a flourish.

Below that an artist had drawn her profile—with a halo of flourishes.

It wasn’t a terrible likeness, though her maid wouldn’t recognize that tight chignon. Eugenia touched her hair lightly, just to make sure that her loose curls hadn’t transformed into a head of snails, à la Medusa-turned-governess.

“Lady’s Magazine is requesting approval,” Susan said. “And the afternoon post has arrived.”

She put it on top of that morning’s post, still untouched.

At the bottom of the advertisement, under Eugenia’s portrait, an ecstatic mother was raising her hands heavenward. Oh, Rhapsody! My darling Daughter is betrothed to a Lord!

“Is that woman supposed to resemble Mrs. Giffton-Giles?” Eugenia asked. “Because I doubt she’ll enjoy discovering her likeness in print.”

“Certainly not! That lady represents all of our happy mothers.”

“At least those whose daughters married lords,” Eugenia corrected. “Won’t it foster unrealistic expectations?”

“Last season alone, girls in our charge became the new Lady Bartholomew, Lady Festers, and Lady Mothrose. Everyone knows that our governesses launch a girl better than anyone else can.”

Eugenia pushed the advertisement across the desk. “I suppose it will do.” She hated the use of her image, but the truth was that her standing as the widowed wife of a lord was the backbone of the registry office’s success.

Without warning, her heart gave a little jerk. How could she be a widow? Even after seven years, it still seemed impossible. Surely Andrew would stride through that door any moment—

“Genevieve Bell has agreed to go to the Duchess of Villiers, though they’ll have to wait a month since she’s in Bath with an elderly aunt,” Susan said, interrupting her train of thought. “Alithia Midge will join Mr. Reeve in Oxford, but only if he agrees to pay her a resettlement bonus every month until Michaelmas term begins and his brother leaves for Eton.”

“Excellent,” Eugenia said, pulling her thoughts back to the present.

“I’ll send a note by post asking that Mr. Reeve pay us a visit at his earliest opportunity,” Susan said. “Or would you prefer I send a messenger directly?”

“The latter,” Eugenia said. “Charge it to his account.”

Her remarkable attraction to Mr. Reeve was surely the result of exhaustion. That man merely walked in the room, a twinkle in his eye, and she had felt slightly dizzy.

It was only natural that she felt a bit unsteady at the thought of seeing him again. She would be calm, cool, and professional.

“Right,” Susan said. “It’s time for a sherry.” She headed to the other side of the room. In the last few years, the two of them had fallen into the habit of sharing a glass of wine at the end of the day.

It wasn’t always easy to determine which governess to send to which household, as well as contending with imploring letters sent by those governesses a week later, asking for advice. Any of them could handle a routinely wet bed, but a boy who takes to pissing on the walls, for example?

Snowe’s—in other words, Susan and Eugenia—had to weigh in with advice. (In that case, it took two glasses of sherry to decide that one nursery wall should be temporarily sacrificed until bribery lured the boy to a chamber pot.)

“I’ve been thinking,” Susan said, once they were both settled in front of the open French doors facing the back garden, “how odd it is that the two of us are such good friends.”

“I don’t find it odd in the least,” Eugenia replied.

“My father was a gentleman, but you—you’re nobility.”

Eugenia shrugged. “You forget that my father is Lord Strange, or he was before being made the Marquis of Broadham. He certainly lived up to his original title.”

“Well, you and I are friends, and that gives us the right to tell each other home truths, because that’s what friends do.”

“I’m not interested in hearing any,” Eugenia said instantly. Nor did she need to hear any. Everyone told her one truth over and over. Likely Susan had moved into the enemy camp.

They all wanted her to forget her husband, to forget Andrew.

“Let him go,” her stepmother, Harriet, had said when she’d last visited London, as if Andrew were waiting around the corner, and it was up to Eugenia to send him off to a warmer climate on holiday.

“You needn’t waste your breath,” Eugenia added. “I know what you’re going to say. My father and stepmother have done nothing but throw men at me for the last six years. Sometimes I think Harriet opens their house in London for one reason only: to introduce me to a new flock of prospective husbands.”

“She means well. Surely you don’t want to live alone for the rest of your life?” Susan sipped her sherry. “Is this the bottle that Mrs. Selfridge sent us? The touch of apple is lovely.”

“Quite likely,” Eugenia said, uninterested. Happy clients were always sending them tokens of their appreciation. “I enjoy living alone.”

“It’s lonely.”

“As a matter of fact, it’s not.”

Susan gave her a squinty look. “Don’t try to tell me that you have a lover of whom I’m unaware, because I happen to know that you are in this office every moment that you’re not in bed.”

“Perhaps I have a companion in my bed,” Eugenia said daringly. The wine had gone to her head and she felt pleasantly giddy.

Susan snorted. “I won’t even dignify that with a reply. You’ve attended only two or three events this season.”

“Everyone I dance with grumbles about their children,” Eugenia admitted. “The only man I could fancy is the Duke of Villiers, and he’s my father’s age. Not to mention happily married.”

“His Grace is enormously fanciable,” Susan agreed. “Every time I dance with him, I almost dissolve into a puddle on the ballroom floor.”

“Now I think on it,” Eugenia said, “Villiers must be glad that Sally fell in love with the vicar. He complained that his daughters were so spoiled that they’d need a ride on a flying pig to get to the stables to exercise their ponies.”

“Nonsense,” Susan said. “His Grace affects that sardonic look and can’t bring himself to say that he’s wildly grateful to Sally. I wish I could meet a man like Villiers, but one who was twenty years younger.”

“Find someone more cheerful,” Eugenia suggested. “Andrew used to make me laugh, but I cannot imagine Villiers telling his wife a bawdy joke, can you?”

“Absolutely not. But who would care, if he looked at her the way Villiers looks at his duchess, as if he’d lay down his life for her?”

Eugenia sighed. “Andrew used to look at me that way.” And he laid down his life for mine, she added silently.

“I am sorry he died, Eugenia, but do you really mean to be alone for the rest of your life in memory of your husband’s soulful glances and his facility with rude puns?”

“It is taking me a long time to get over Andrew’s death.” Every other widow mourned for a year, perhaps two. But here she was, seven years on, still dreaming about her dead husband.

Except for last night, when she’d had a most improper dream about Mr. Reeve, which had nothing to do with anything, and which she meant to forget immediately.

“You are a loyal person,” Susan said. “Mr. Snowe was lucky to have married you. But would he have wanted you to mourn him your entire life?”

“Who knows that?” Eugenia asked helplessly. “You make it sound easy, Susan. You and Harriet, and even Papa. I thought—when Andrew first died, I thought terrible thoughts.”

Susan wiggled her toes. “It would have been extremely foolish to end your life for love. I always thought that Juliet was absurd.”

“I disagree. She was very young, and that sort of grief”—Eugenia kept her voice matter-of-fact—“is like being in a storm that’s ripping everything away from you: all your wishes and dreams, your clothes, your hopes, your future. Gone.”

“I am sorry that happened to you,” Susan said. “But it didn’t rip you away. You weren’t swept away, you didn’t fall off the cliff. You were older than Juliet’s thirteen, as well. You have a good fifty years, if not more, left to live.

“Fifty,” she repeated, giving Eugenia a pointed glance. “Alone.”

“You’re as old as I am, and you’ve never given your heart even once, let alone twice!”

Susan turned her head and met Eugenia’s eyes. “How do you know that?”

Just because a woman has never married doesn’t mean she hasn’t been in love. Eugenia knew that.

For goodness’ sake, she’d grown up in a house notorious for parties welcoming actresses of the most dubious reputation, as well as opera dancers and courtesans. The ladies—to use the term loosely—were always in love with someone, and marriage was rarely a consideration.

“It’s time you thought about finding a second husband,” Susan stated.

“Do you know what would happen if I married again?” Eugenia asked, taking another healthy swallow of sherry. It burnt its way down her throat.

“You’d come to work with a smile and circles under your eyes?”

“Susan!”

Susan shrugged, unrepentant.

“The moment I turned from the altar, my husband would own Snowe’s. He would own my inheritance from my mother, the dowry my father gave me, and Andrew’s settlement. He would own the house that Andrew bought for our marriage.”

“Well, but—”

“There are no ‘buts.’ A woman has no legal rights to her own property. I’ll be damned if I’ve built this company up to be the very best of its kind in all England, only to hand it over to a man as his plaything, to sell if he wishes.” Eugenia discovered that her voice had risen to a fierce pitch.

Susan finished her glass and set it down. “Right.”

“‘Right,’ what?”

“You don’t want to marry again.”

“For good reason, you must admit.”

“I certainly don’t like the idea of a man in charge of Snowe’s. But does that mean you’re going to live alone forever? Be alone forever?”

“I gather you’re not talking about our friendship,” Eugenia said dryly.

“I am not.”

“What about you?” Eugenia demanded. “You haven’t had even one husband. Any number of men would love to marry you, and don’t tell me that you haven’t a dowry. I pay your wages, and you’ve worked with me for years. Your dowry must be larger than many men’s estates.”

Susan shook her head. “I’ve never met anyone remotely like the Duke of Villiers and even if I did, I’m too fat for the current styles.”

“You are not; you’re delicious and the right man will adore every curve.”

Her assistant just waved her hand dismissively at that idea. “So, you don’t want to get married. But you do know what that means, don’t you?”

“No,” Eugenia said cautiously.

“You must take a lover,” Susan announced. “Discreetly, as not to tarnish the reputation of Snowe’s. You cannot go on like this, Eugenia, working day and night. It’s no way to live.”

“Why am I being singled out?” Eugenia protested. “You work as hard as I, and don’t tell me there’s a man in your bed, because I’d never believe it!”

“I can’t,” Susan said with a sigh. “Vicar’s daughter and virginity . . . those two impediments hang like millstones around my neck, even if I did want to fall into bed with a handsome man. But you are free, Eugenia.”

“Free?” She’d never thought of it that way.

“No husband and no children, and an impeccable reputation. You can please yourself.”

“I suppose . . .” Eugenia began.

“It’s that, or wither into a dull woman who never takes pleasure for herself,” Susan said.

“I will consider it,” Eugenia said, surprising herself. But inside, she knew that something had to change. The challenge of making Snowe’s a success had been remarkably diverting.

But now that her agency was the best in all London.

She needed a new challenge.

All the same, she had the distinct sense that she could walk into a ballroom and have her pick of unattached men.

What kind of challenge was that?