Eleanor, the Duchess of Haverford, looked around with interest at Miss Clemens’ Oxford Street Book Palace and Tea Rooms. Long ago, in the early miserable days of her marriage, one of Haverford’s elderly aunts had told her to always look for the silver lining. Aldridge had been born later that year, the first silver lining in the dark cloud of her life as a duchess.
More than thirty years had passed, and she was usually able to arrange her life just as she liked it, but every now and again, the game of hunting silver linings still kept her calm and sane.
The current cloud was Haverford’s dictate that she have nothing further to do with her two closest friends because they were sisters to the Earl of Sutton, on whom he had declared war.
The silver lining was all the places she was discovering. Duchesses, in His Grace’s view, sent for anything they needed, and so she had ever since she wed the duke. The modiste came to her. Books were ordered from a catalogue and delivered. When she chose to redecorate, she selected what she wanted from samples and someone made it all happen.
Shops were a revelation. In all Eleanor’s life, she had never been to a fabric emporium, such as the one where she and her friends met two weeks ago, or a millinery—last week’s meeting place. Both had been fascinating, but today’s book shop surpassed them all.
Now that she had discovered the activity, she was going to continue to go out to shops, and not in disguise, either, except to meet forbidden friends. She would adore the opportunity to stroll, as other ladies were doing, taking a book from the shelves and reading a few pages. But the veil that kept her from being recognised was too heavy to allow her to read.
Instead, she followed the shop assistant to the private room where she was to meet Lady Sutton and Lady Georgiana Winderfield. The shop also served refreshments and had rooms that could be hired for meetings. This room was set up with comfortable chairs, and the table was already provided with all appurtenances for making and serving tea.
Eleanor was the first to arrive. She seated herself before reaching up to lift her veil, and had no sooner cast it back over the bonnet, and sighed with relief at being able to see clearly, when the door opened behind her back. Just to be careful, she did not turn. “Grace? Georgie?”
“Your Grace.” The deep voice was male. “My sisters send their regrets. They left yesterday for Winds’ Gate, and asked me to convey their apologies.” His tones warmed with humour. “I gather the usual channels of communication depend on the social calendars of my nieces and your goddaughters.”
Eleanor stood and turned, her heart in her mouth. “Ja— Lord Sutton.” If Haverford found out… No. She had taken every precaution. She let go the breath she had not known she was holding and held out her hand. “How are you?”
Eleanor could not take her eyes off him. She had seen him, of course, since he had returned to England; not just at that memorable ball when they stood face to face for the first time in nearly thirty-five years, then passed without a word, but also in the distance on the street, in the park, even at other social events they accidentally both attended at the same time.
She had not stood close enough to catalogue all the ways he had changed and all the ways he was still the young man—almost a boy—whom she had loved and lost.
She had not felt his hand, his fingers gently pressing hers. Even through two layers of glove, she felt a jolt, as if all the barely contained energy that gave him such presence and power had discharged up her arm and through her— through her torso.
“James,” she said again, her vocabulary deserting her.
