Jane was still on edge two days later, when Hugh escorted her to Lord Stone’s elegant house in Berkeley Square. Despite Silas and Caro being so kind to her at the wedding, she didn’t feel near ready to face a multitude of Morwenna’s friends and family.

Nor did the wasp dress do much to bolster her confidence for her first London party. It had arrived from the modiste yesterday, along with its slightly less offensive companions, and was even worse than she remembered.

Looking in her mirror before leaving Half Moon Street, she heartily wished she’d never bought it. But Susan had insisted that the style was all the crack, and as the afternoon wore on, her sister had become increasingly annoyed when Jane vetoed all her suggestions. In the end, Jane had chosen three gowns not because she liked them, but to placate Susan.

The problem was that when one attended an intimate dinner in Mayfair, one needed to wear an evening gown. The wasp dress was the only candidate. Which meant she did what she’d done so often in her life. She put aside what she’d prefer and made do with what she had.

But, oh, how fervently she wished she met Hugh’s sophisticated friends looking her best.

“Are you ready?” Hugh asked in an undertone, taking her gloved hand to help her from the carriage. He was tall and handsome in formal black. His sartorial perfection only made her more miserably aware that she looked a complete antidote.

Jane bit back, “As I’ll ever be,” and struggled to sound as if she wasn’t terrified. “Yes, I am.”

He cast her a skeptical glance but bless him, didn’t argue. As they mounted the stone steps to the open door, he squeezed her fingers in encouragement.

They paused in the hallway to remove their outer wear. To her husband’s credit, while his first glimpse of her garish gown made him blink, he maintained his composure. He took her arm, and followed the butler into a sumptuous drawing room.

“Lord and Lady Garson, my lady,” the butler intoned from the doorway.

Jane entered a room crammed wall to wall with people, and the urge to run away rose like vomit. She squared her shoulders and stiffened knees that threatened to fold. She owed it to Hugh to perform creditably tonight. For heaven’s sake, she owed it to herself. As Hugh’s grip tightened in reassurance, she fixed a smile on her face.

“Jane, how lovely to see you again.” Caro advanced with her hands outstretched in welcome. Jane found herself hugged and kissed on the cheek, as if she was a friend and not an interloper at all. “I’ve been itching to call, but Silas said I couldn’t intrude upon your honeymoon.”

“And good evening to you, too, Caro,” Hugh said drily, as he bowed.

The lovely brunette released Jane and cast Hugh a laughing glance. “You must know all eyes are on Jane tonight. You’re merely background scenery.”

Silas came up to kiss Jane’s cheek. “Courage,” he whispered. “It’s years since anybody here has bitten a visitor.”

Jane stifled a shocked laugh and finally dragged some air into her lungs. What a difference a breath made. The hordes infesting the room shrank to a mere six people.

Caro and Silas she already knew. Curiously she looked at the other guests. A pretty blonde woman sat on a chaise longue beside a mountain of a man with black hair. A stylish, dark-haired lady with a commanding nose occupied a chair under the window. Standing beside her was a tall, elegant gentleman with thick gray hair that seemed incongruous on someone who couldn’t be much more than forty.

As expected, they were all beautifully presented. If only Susan’s modiste had offered her a gown like the black-haired lady’s teal blue silk, Jane would have had no difficulty making a hole in Hugh’s fortune. At least the faces turned toward her expressed friendly interest—despite the wasp dress and Hugh’s history with Morwenna. She began to feel less like a freak, although after two weeks alone with Hugh, she was unsettled to be in company again.

Caro drew her forward, while Silas and Hugh retreated to the corner beside the fireplace. “Let me introduce you to everyone.”

“It’s very kind of you to invite me,” Jane said, meaning it. Her smile became more natural.

Caro made a dismissive sound. “Hugh is one of Silas’s best friends—and anyway, I liked you at the wedding. I thought it might be nice if you met some people at a small gathering, before you have to face society en masse. I know how daunting that can be.”

“You liar, Caro. You wouldn’t have a clue.” With a mocking laugh, the dark lady rose. She was tall and slender, and Jane didn’t think she’d ever coveted anything in her life the way she coveted that spectacular gown. “When you came out of mourning, you were champing at the bit to queen it over the beau monde. Wild horses couldn’t have dragged you back to rural obscurity.” She turned to Jane. “I’m Helena, Silas’s sister. This is my husband, West.”

Jane had a moment to reflect that Helena and Silas looked nothing alike, as the striking, gray-haired man bowed over her hand. “Lady Garson, I’m delighted to welcome you to London.”

“Thank you, my lord.” Jane curtsied.

The blonde approached. Her pale green gown was more understated than Helena’s teal, but just as becoming. She took Jane’s hand and leaned in to kiss her cheek. “I’m Fenella Townsend, and I hope we’ll be friends.”

The greeting’s warmth left Jane floundering. “I hope so, too,” she stammered.

She caught a light of approval in Hugh’s eye. Her panic receded another few inches.

Fenella gestured the huge man forward. “This is my husband Anthony.”

The man held Jane’s hand. “It’s grand to meet you at last, lass.”

The thick Yorkshire accent took Jane aback. Then she realized that this must be Lord Kenwick, reputedly the richest man in England. News of his rise in the world had penetrated even as far as deepest Dorset. He and the ethereal Fenella seemed an odd pairing, Beauty and the Beast.

“I didn’t know you and Fen were back from Italy,” Hugh said, striding forward to shake Anthony’s hand with unfettered pleasure.

“We got in on Tuesday.”

“Good trip?”

“Aye, very. I closed a right jammy deal with the Genoans, and Fen hustled me around every mucky lump of broken masonry between Pompeii and the Alps.” He didn’t sound like he minded, Jane noted. “We ran into Sally and Charles in Venice.”

“They’re away more than they’re home these days,” Silas said.

Jane let the conversation flow around her, grateful that while discussion centered on travel and absent friends, she ceased to be the focus of attention. She soon found herself sipping a glass of sherry and sharing the chaise longue with Fenella Townsend.

“The new names and faces must be overwhelming,” Fenella said, her blue eyes sympathetic. “Eventually you’ll sort everyone out, but it’s all right to feel at sea at first. We’re all so happy that Hugh has married you. I can see just looking at him, how good you’ve been for him.”

“Thank you,” Jane said, glancing across the room to where Hugh and West were talking about horseracing.

Hugh had told her a little about his friends before she met them. He moved in influential circles. The Kenwicks formed the center of a worldwide network of power and business. The Wests were renowned horse breeders, with several Derby winners in their stables. Silas was a respected botanist and President of the Royal Society, while Caro busied herself with a brood of four children and charity work.

“How did you meet? When Caro wrote to us in Italy to say Hugh was getting married, it came as a bolt from the blue. He’s such a dark horse.”

Jane made herself smile. It wasn’t quite the effort it had been when she’d first arrived. “His proposal came as a bolt from the blue to me, too.”

“A whirlwind romance,” Fenella said with unabashed delight.

If only, Jane thought with a touch of bitterness. But she owed it to Hugh to keep the details of their pragmatic bargain to herself. “Not at all. He’s known me from the cradle. Our fathers were best friends.”

“Childhood sweethearts, then?”

Jane blushed with mortification. Not sweethearts in any sense. “Not at all. When the families got together, he thought I was a complete pest.”

Hugh caught her answer and crossed to stand beside her and rest his hand on her shoulder. His touch steadied her, lent a tinge of warmth to her blood. She’d need to get used to people asking questions—and most of the curiosity wouldn’t be as benevolent as Fenella’s.

“Jane, that’s not true. I never thought you were a pest.”

Her laugh was mocking. “What about that time I stole your favorite fishing pole and broke it? Or when you had to climb the biggest oak at Cavell Court to save me from falling?”

The affection in his smile reminded her that while they mightn’t be in love, they were genuinely fond of one another. That meant a lot. “Well, perhaps you were occasionally a pest. But you improved as you got older.”

“You didn’t,” she retorted.

He looked startled. “I say! That’s a bit rough.”

Her smile widened. “You were always an extremely nice boy, much kinder to a little girl with a bad case of hero worship than she deserved. And you’ve grown up to be an extremely nice man. See? No improvement needed.”

His face softened, and he kissed her briefly. “You little tease.”

The kiss was over in a second, but it left her lips tingling. Her blush flared hotter when she noticed all eyes on them. She caught flickers of astonishment and pleasure and relief, and the atmosphere in the room eased noticeably.

“That’s just lovely,” Caro said, breaking the surprised silence. “I can imagine Hugh was a nice boy. You’ll have to tell us more.”

“Let’s bring in some champagne and toast the happy couple, Hunter.” Silas nodded to the butler circling the room with the decanter. “This sherry is filthy stuff.”

By the time the ladies rose from the dining table to leave the gentlemen to their port, Garson was elated with how well the evening progressed. Jane had arrived so unsure—he couldn’t blame her, everyone at the dinner was intimately connected with the old scandal of his broken engagement. She knew she was on trial as Morwenna’s substitute. Even worse, she’d let that witch Susan talk her into buying that ghastly yellow dress. Being awake to Susan’s penchant for the limelight, while her sister faded into the background, Hugh suspected the lapse in taste had been deliberate.

Marriage had transformed Jane from a downtrodden drudge to the vibrant woman she’d always been at heart. With the right clothes, she’d sparkle like the jewel she was. If Hugh saw that change, Susan certainly would, and she wouldn’t like it.

But even in that expensive, unbecoming rag, Jane’s natural charm shone through. At first, his friends welcomed her for his sake. But by the time dessert was served, they liked her for her funny, quirky self.

He was dashed glad. His friends’ interest would be nothing, compared to the full glare of society’s scrutiny. Jane would now have Caro, Fen and Helena to defend her against the cats.

As if he read Garson’s thoughts—he probably had—Silas set down his port and regarded him searchingly across the shining width of the mahogany table. “That’s a fine girl you nabbed for yourself there, Garson.”

“Yes, she is,” Garson said, and found himself smiling. He was so damned proud of how she’d held her head up tonight. “Better than I deserve.”

He waited for his friends to make some joking rejoinder about his general unworthiness, but none of the three did. Instead West settled serious black eyes upon him. “Nice to see you getting on with your life at last.”

“Hear, hear,” Silas said, refilling Garson’s glass.

“Grand that you’ve rejoined the human race,” Anthony chimed in.

The reminder of his public humiliation and hardly less public sorrow over losing Morwenna stung. Although of course, everyone here knew how wretched these last years had been for him. “It was time to marry,” he said, as the simplest explanation for a complex series of decisions and events.

“Time to stop looking like a bilious piglet,” West muttered loudly enough for Garson to hear.

Garson scowled at his friend, although much as he disliked the description, he had a queasy feeling it held an element of truth.

“A bilious piglet’s a bit strong,” Silas protested, but before Garson could feel too grateful, he went on. “Society’s ladies found Garson’s pining very romantic. Not a one of them didn’t want to take his weary head to her bosom and anoint him with her tears.”

Garson shuddered. That was definitely true. It was one of the reasons he’d asked Jane to marry him, instead of some London belle. The picture Silas and West conjured up struck him as worse than looking like a bilious piglet. “You’re getting bloody poetic in your old age, chum.”

Derisive amusement twisted Silas’s lips. “Every time I heard one of them sigh after you, it made me feel dashed poetic, too. I thought Byron had to be back from the dead, until I looked around and saw it was just you.”

“Byron without the unsavory bits, so even better,” Anthony added in his bass rumble.

“Ugh,” Garson said, too pleased with how the night had turned out to take real offense at the jibes.

“Anyway, jolly glad to see you’ve found love again,” West said, sounding uncharacteristically sincere. “We’ve all hated to see you so unhappy, Hugh.”

Astounded, Garson regarded his three friends as if they’d lost their minds. Even without West breaking the habit of a lifetime and using his Christian name, he couldn’t mistake how worried they’d been about him. He only just bit back an angry denial of their asinine assumptions.

He could hardly credit this sentimental claptrap. They’d been cronies for years, in some cases since childhood. These men knew that he was as stubborn as a mule, once his affection was engaged. They also all knew that he’d been head over heels with Robert Nash’s lovely widow—even if in the end she turned out to be no widow at all. For God’s sake, Garson mightn’t have told Silas in so many words that he made a marriage of convenience, but his friend had known the truth when he stood up as best man in Dorset.

Over the last three years, Garson had come to loathe his steadfast heart. But loathing didn’t change its ways. He’d sworn his devotion to Morwenna. He’d go to his grave loving her.

It was his curse. It was his destiny.

He’d believed his closest friends understood that. But clearly they were as susceptible to the lure of a happy ending as any other romantic fool. These three men loved their wives. That good fortune deceived them into taking an overly rosy view of every marriage.

Garson’s hand tightened on his port, and he raised his glass to drink before he set it down with an angry bump. Damned love. Who needed it? Certainly not him, by heaven.

Love had given him nothing but humiliation and misery. If he’d fallen out of love with Morwenna, which he hadn’t, he had no wish to fall in love with anyone else, even his delectable wife. He and Jane were doing very well. He certainly wasn’t going to spoil things by convincing himself he was in love again.

The mere idea made his guts curdle. The fine port tasted sour on his tongue.

Only loyalty to Jane made him force a smile to his lips and raise the glass. After all, if his friends suffered the delusion that he’d married for love, not duty, what did it matter? “I’d like to offer a toast to our lovely wives, gentlemen.”