Francine sailed into the ballroom in a frilly mint-green gown and a haze of triumph. The previous evening, Baron Erwin Bailey had danced with her, twice. Then, that afternoon, he’d called with a bouquet of hothouse flowers and the assurance he wished to dance with her again tonight. By tomorrow evening, Francine expected to be engaged. As she was halfway through her third season, the baron’s attention was a keen source of relief. After all, no one else seemed to want her…especially not the one man she wished did.
She glided through the glittering ballroom, leaving her proud mama behind. Lords, ladies, misses and gentlemen turned to observe her. Francine couldn’t hide her smile, but marshaled her lips into a sublime curve. A victorious smile would be a bit premature, and a touch vulgar. Something her schoolmate, Prudence, would do, not Francine.
A few of the gentlemen guffawed. Behind lace fans and gloved hands, feminine titters rose. A thread of unease stirred, coiling through her. She glanced about, suddenly needing the reassurance of her childhood friend to debase her of the notion she was being laughed at, but Lawrence was nowhere to be seen. She strove not to frown. Lawrence attended every event she attended. His absence doubled her unease.
The crowd parted. Across the room, standing near one of the sweeping columns that held the gold painted ceiling aloft, she spied Baron Erwin. Dressed in a daring combination of puce and silver that emphasized the sallowness of his skin, he was turned toward her, frowning. Firming her smile against a tremor of worry, she went to greet him.
He watched her approach, but made no move to intercept her. When Francine reached him, she dipped in a low curtsy. She leaned forward on her descent, as she’d observed other women do. It was common knowledge men liked to avail themselves of the view the obeisance offered. That was likely the hidden origin of the act.
Popping back up to her full height, an ungainly four inches over the acceptable five and a half feet a woman should dare achieve, Francine offered a carefully sublime expression. She wondered if the baron appreciated that she’d worn her coppery locks in dangling curls, not piled atop her head, so as not to appear taller than him.
“Lord Erwin, how lovely to see you,” she said brightly. “Thank you again for the flowers.”
He cleared his throat and lifted his dun-colored eyes from the view to meet hers. “Yes, well, about those. I’d prefer you don’t mention them. In fact, forget I brought them.”
Francine blinked. “I beg your pardon, my lord?”
“The flowers. A mistake, that. Terrible one. Shouldn’t lead a girl on, I know. My apologies. Best forgotten and put behind us.”
“You’re--” Realizing that contraction came out as a loud squeak, garnering looks, she marshaled her shock and began again, low and quiet. “You’re breaking it off with me?”
“Nothing to break off.” He dusted invisible lint from his coat sleeve. “If you believe I was showing an interest, you’re mistaken.”
Francine stared, disbelief devouring her earlier triumph. “But, why?” was all she could think to ask. They’d been getting on so well. She’d done nothing improper during his visit that afternoon. She’d been everything convivial, correct, and drilled into her head by her mama.
He shifted weight from foot to foot, a scowl overtaking his narrow mouth. “You know why.”
She did? “I confess, my lord, I have no idea.”
He leaned close. “That kiss.”
Francine could only gape at him. Kiss? “I’ve never been kissed.”
“Don’t play coy with me, Fanny,” he muttered, using that hated nickname, coined by Prudence when they first met at school. “I heard all about how you kissed a duke last season, yet here you are, unwed.”
Despair wrapped about her like a sodden shawl. She shook her head. Maybe she could rattle her brain back into place, for a displaced mind was the only explanation. She couldn’t be hearing correctly.
“If you aren’t good enough for a duke, you aren’t good enough for me,” Lord Erwin continued quietly. “Not that I’d take what another has sampled, even if he hadn’t found you lacking.”
Francine had to suppress a slightly mad giggle at the inanity of that statement. “But I didn’t kiss anyone,” she whispered, her words edged with an infant kernel of anger.
His haughty features twisted into a sneer. “You must have. Everyone says you did.”
“Who is this duke?” She resisted the urge to stomp on his foot. This was her third season. She was practically on the shelf, and Baron Erwin had been her only offer. Not what she’d dreamed of in a husband, to be sure, but a man who would make her a lady. If Francine couldn’t have the man she wanted, at least she could make her mother proud.
“It would be impolite to name him.” His disdainful tone caused her to ball her fists at her sides.
“You don’t know,” she snapped. “You don’t have a name, because it isn’t true.”
He eyed her for a long moment. His expression eased into pity, effectively dousing her ire. “You’re correct,” he said. “I don’t have a name, but it doesn’t matter. If everyone believes you kissed a duke, they’ll condemn me as a fool for pursuing you. I’m sorry, Miss Conway. I’m sure you understand.”
Francine managed a nod. He turned and walked away, taking with him her chance at a match, her chance of making her mother proud. More titters sounded, decidedly vicious now. Francine looked about. Everyone stared at her, but not in the dreamy, envious way she’d hoped for earlier.
Her temples throbbed. The ballroom was hot, overcrowded. Too noisy, with too thick a press of bodies. She needed to get free of it, if only for a moment.
Dropping her gaze to the elaborately inlaid floor, she hurried along the edge of the room, desperate to escape the whispers and condemnation. She suppressed a groan. Her mother would hear. Any moment now, some well-meaning, or vindictive, fellow mama would whisper the ugly rumor into her mother’s ear.
The ruffles of a familiar cream dress appeared half-hidden behind one of the columns. Her head popped up in time to take in Prudence’s guilty look, quickly smoothed into false-concern. Francine froze, her anger returning tenfold. Prudence was always playing tricks on the unsuspecting. Would she have started the rumor of a kiss? She’d flirted with the idea once, but actually carrying through with it seemed too cruel, even for her.
Then again, Prudence was the reason everyone in the world called her Fanny. Even Francine’s mother used the hated nickname. Only Lawrence seemed to understand how much she despised it. Only he knew her well enough to see the annoyance it sparked.
As well he might. Years ago, he was her closest confidant. If only he would appear now and stay by her side, she could endure this ball. But much as she wished it, she knew he couldn’t, or wouldn’t. They were no longer children. He couldn’t attend her all evening, warding off pitying and malicious looks. Now, they could only speak briefly at each event, and dance one fleeting dance, lest they start rumors.
She wouldn’t have minded the word marriage whispered about her and the tall, broad shouldered marquess, but he would. She could tell by how careful he was to dance with her only once each evening. To never linger by her side, though she wished he might. She wished she could keep Lawrence with her always, and be Francine, and happy. Instead, for all the other hours of her life, she’d become Fanny, thanks in great part to Prudence.
“Fanny, I heard.” Prudence’s commiserative tone grated, her insincerity ill-concealed. “I’m so sorry. I know you had your heart set on Lord Erwin.”
Francine eyed Prudence, seeing not her blonde schoolmate, but a squat, grimy toad of a person. The sort of creature you found half buried in loose dirt, waiting to hop out and startle you when you bent to pick a flower.
“Why?” Francine asked.
“Why what?” Prudence replied, false-innocence unable to completely obscure her glee. “You seem distraught, Fanny dear. Maybe some punch?”
“Why did you put it out that I kissed a duke last season?” Francine wondered if this was her punishment for standing aside while Prudence toyed with other young women. She hadn’t approved of Prudence’s pranks, but usually they were embarrassing, not harmful. Not worth fighting with Prudence over, to be sure. “This isn’t the same as tricking me into angering my mother, or making me look foolish. You’ve ruined my chances with Lord Erwin. Possibly with any gentleman. What were you thinking?”
“I’m sure I didn’t start that rumor, if indeed it isn’t true,” Prudence said, the haughty note in her voice a near mirror of Lord Erwin’s. “I’ll admit to repeating it once, last season, but Liza and Emily were there. Likely, one of them told me.”
“Neither of them would do such a thing,” Francine snapped. Liza, who was at the theatre, was her dear friend. Their former schoolmate, Emily, was far too busy with her new husband. Besides, neither had such cruelty in them. “I know you did it, Prudence. I want to know why.”
Under her curls, Prudence’s eyes narrowed into reptilian slits. “As soon as Lord Erwin put out he was in the market, you pushed your scrawny, too-tall self into his face.” She tossed her head. “I am prettier than you. I have a more pleasing figure. My family is wealthier. If one of us is going to become a lady, it should be me.” Her lips stretched into a flat smile. “But I will never admit to starting that rumor.”
Francine gaped. “We both danced with him,” she stammered.
“Yes, but with your great big, gawky frame, your breasts are practically in his face,” Prudence snapped. “How can someone as delicate and virtuous as I compete with that?”
Francine shook her head. She couldn’t believe a schoolmate, a girl who’d stood beside her for three and a half seasons, commiserating over their shared goal of finding husbands, would sink so low. “I thought we were friends.”
“Not when it comes to this,” Prudence said. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have a baron to comfort.” With another flip of her curls, she marched away.
The throbbing in Francine’s temples intensified. The snickers grew louder. She made out a man’s voice mumbling something crude. Another so-called gentleman chuckled in reply. Her face heated. Across from her, an arched doorway opened to a corridor leading from the ballroom.
She set a rapid pace in the direction of that hall. She didn’t know where it led. She knew it was rude to wander off. She even realized what sneaking about alone would mean to the tattered remnants of her reputation. She didn’t care. She couldn’t remain there, her face heating, while a roomful of her peers laughed at her.