E dward didn’t usually attend dinner parties, belatedly touching his necktie to make sure he was wearing one as he entered his parents’ blue and gold drawing room. If he discovered himself lacking neckwear, it wouldn’t be the first time he’d arrived partially undressed. Once he’d gone to a party without gloves. He had kept his arms folded until they sat down at the table, waited for the other guests to remove their gloves, and then relaxed while he ate.
A lack of neckwear would be harder to hide.
However, this evening, he had been summoned to Park Lane. In their villa-style house with its balconies and spacious rear veranda, reminding him of Brighton, his parents were the hosts. His formidable, long-suffering mother had specifically requested his presence.
Edward was already wary of her matchmaking interference since she made it known she longed for grandchildren. He was relying upon his sister to handle that duty if only she would hurry up and find herself a husband.
“Thank God you came,” his father said, “or I would never have heard the end of it. My life, such as it is, would be ruined.” The senior Lockwood was nearly as dramatic as his wife.
Edward was so unlike them in that regard as to make him wonder if he was even a fruit of his father’s loins.
“I am certain you would have survived,” he said, “and had many happy years to come.”
His father laughed uproariously.
“There you are!” his mother said, echoing his father’s sentiment.
He kissed her cheek. “Here I am. As summoned.”
“You speak as if I am Her Majesty and not simply a loving mother who misses her only son.”
His mother sounded entirely reasonable until she added, “And who intends to find that son the perfect wife if he’s too lackadaisical to do it for himself.”
What could he say? “Thank you, Mother. I’m going to get myself a glass of wine. Unless you’re already serving brandy. Are you?”
She fixed him with a hard stare. “You didn’t even tell me how lovely our home looks. And after I went to such an effort.”
Naturally, she meant she’d driven her staff probably to Bedlam with her demands. Yet he hadn’t noticed that the house in which he’d been born and reared on the outskirts of Mayfair appeared any differently from any other time he’d gone to a party there.
As usual, it displayed all the lavish niceties. His father had done very well for himself as a man of many interests, as a commissioned soldier, and then as an investor in the East India Company while also importing tea and silk and even the coffee of which Edward was so fond.
“It looks magnificent. Is there any brandy?” he asked again.
“No. We are serving wines from Burgundy and from Champagne. If by the evening’s end, you have asked some lady for permission to call upon her in the upcoming days, then I shall make sure you have a glass of brandy.”
Edward was of two minds — one, he ought not to have come at all, which was nearly what happened because he’d forgotten about the dinner until Mrs. McSabby had saved his bacon by entering his workroom and giving him a tongue-lashing.
While he was deciding whether it was worth the effort, she’d laid out the terrible consequences. If he didn’t attend, his parents would coat him with a layer of guilt so thick he would have had to cut his way through it with a carving knife. More than that, his mother’s disappointment would be made known to him every day for the rest of the year.
His second choice, if he had remembered the party, was to have come early and taken up a clandestine place in the corner of the drawing room. It was only by arriving fashionably late that his parents had noticed him. And then he spotted Lillian, his sister, and crossed the room through the two dozen or so guests.
“Well met,” he said fondly.
“Greetings, Brother dear. You came to keep me company at last.”
“Hardly necessary. I know you attract suitors like —”
“Please don’t say flies. That’s not a very nice comparison.”
“Like bees, then, to honey,” he said.
“And how would you know?” she scoffed but with her usual good nature. “You haven’t been at the same assembly as me in months. Not since last Christmas.”
“I know you are much admired because you are Miss Lillian Lockwood, pretty and —”
“There’s Lord St. John,” she interrupted. “I have been hoping to meet him. Excuse me, Edward.”
“Pretty and a devoted sister who would never choose a handsome face over her own brother,” he finished after she hurried toward their mother in order to gain an introduction.
He cast his gaze around the room, and that was when he saw her — a head of flame-red hair, mostly swept up with some curls down around her ears. What’s more, she was staring at him. How on earth had she secured an invitation?
It was painfully obvious she would do anything to get into his good graces. Without hesitation, he strode toward her, watching while her green eyes widened.
“What are you doing here?” Edward demanded, barely restraining himself from grabbing her arm and hauling her out. There was something entirely galling about her boldly breaching his parents’ house, using their hospitality for whatever plan she had hatched.
“I was invited,” she said, without an ounce of shame.
“Were you? Shall I ask my mother if there is a Lady Lambchop on her guest list?”
The infernal female smiled at him, a smile as dazzling as a stone that had received the most perfect cut, a brilliant, not a table cut.
“I doubt you will find such, sir, but you might try asking about —”
“Edward,” interrupted his mother’s voice. “You cannot defy all grace and civility and start introducing yourself to my guests. You must await either myself or your father. Regardless, I am glad you noticed this particular young lady. I have only recently begun a friendship with her mother, the Countess Diamond.”
Edward let that sink in. The Countess Diamond. Lady Diamond. A daughter would be —
“Lady Radiance Diamond,” his mother continued, “may I present my only son, Edward Lockwood.” He wished her tone didn’t have that hint of disappointment whenever she spoke of him. She thought little of his line of interest, regardless of his success in the field. Playing with rocks , she called it.
In any case, the redheaded lady now had the upper hand. Lady Radiance raised an eyebrow, while his humiliation colored his cheeks a deep-ruby shade.
“Thank you for the introduction, Mrs. Lockwood,” she said, “but we are already acquainted. I have attended two of your son’s informative lectures.”
“Have you?” His mother glanced at him and then slowly back at Lady Radiance, without the least subtlety.
“Imagine that, Edward. A beautiful lady who also has a brain.”
“Just like your own mother,” his father added, having come upon them. “I apologize for interrupting, but I need you, Wife, on the other side of the room.”
“Nothing grave, I hope.”
Edward’s father shrugged. “That remains to be determined. A matter of seating preference.”
“Gracious!” Edward’s mother exclaimed. “Now that you two are properly introduced, we shall leave you to get better acquainted. I’m sure you had little opportunity to chat during one of those dusty lectures on rocks.”
Edward sighed. His mother had no idea what he did, nor did she understand his passion. On the other hand, she would be shocked to learn how much discourse had already occurred between him and the interesting Lady Radiance.
As soon as his parents moved away, Edward took a deep breath and looked directly into the lady’s verdant eyes, peridot in the lamplight. Luckily, he saw mirth rather than malevolence dancing in their depths, reminding him of Monty when he was being his most mischievous.
“I offer my profound apology,” he said.
“For calling me Lady Succulent Lambchop?”
“I apologize for my assumptions and accusations,” he said. He’d made an arse of himself, without doubt.
“Your apology is accepted, sir. I have no interest in making you squirm.”
“But you do have an interest in gemstones, do you not?” he surmised. “And it is genuine?”
“It is. Practically from the moment I saw what was presented at the Great Exhibition, the jewelry and the gems, I knew I had to learn about both. I also know a bit about how to make precious metals moldable.”
“Do you?” He was surprised.
“Watching hard gold turn to liquid,” she began, then sighed. “I find metalworking to be almost as fascinating as gem work.”
She was the oddest female he’d ever met.
“I suppose I must now ask why you ill-advisedly came to my home.”
“Why was it ill-advised?” she asked.
Edward wasn’t sure if she was being serious, so he answered.
“Obviously a single lady cannot stop at a man’s home willy-nilly. We hadn’t even been properly introduced as we have now.”
“I admit I have a tendency to flout certain restrictions put upon my sex, but I always take along a maid, at the very least. Moreover, my decision to visit you was not made lightly.” Then she offered him a saucy smile, and he thought her lips looked succulent indeed.
“Besides if you recall, we were suitably introduced, and by a titled lord, no less! Just because you didn’t believe my name in no way lessens the fact that I was, in fact, presented to you.”
Well! She had him there, and objecting would only lead to a fiddlestick’s end.
“Regardless, sir, you haven’t asked me why I came knocking upon your door, which you answered yourself.”
His cheeks warmed again. She was teasing him as if they were friends.
“I assumed you were there to get your hands upon the Hope Diamond.”
She nodded. “Then you are correct. I do wish to look at it again. Am I too late? Have you already returned it to Mr. Hope?”
“I still have it. He is out of town and instructed me to hold on to it until he comes back.”
“Then it is not too late,” she mused.
At that moment, his parents summoned all the guests into their large dining room, made larger by two great doors being opened into the smaller salon beside it. Seating, as usual, was assigned.
To Edward’s dismay, he found his name card before a place setting that was too distant from Lady Radiance to continue their conversation. Thus, for the next two hours, he was left to wonder about her reason for wanting to look more closely at the diamond. He had deduced it was something beyond mere curiosity.
Tucking into his meal, he busied his brain with considering the combined weight of all the gems on the men and women currently in his parents’ home. However, the young woman to his right interrupted his summing of carats.
After determining what he did for a living, she had little interest beyond asking if he could get a discounted price on jewelry for her. His curt response — “No!” — had her turning to the guest on her right and ignoring him from the pottage to the pudding course.
On his other side, a lady wondered if he knew the best way to clean her jewelry. He nearly gave the same response. Yet since she’d asked nicely, he replied, “I suggest you send it to a jeweler to have it professionally cleaned. Barring that, you may ask your maid to let your gold and silver soak in vinegar or gin.”
“Gin!” she exclaimed. “I never have that wicked liquor in the house.”
Not caring about her moral view upon gin, he continued, “For gemstones, however, it’s best to use diluted soap and then rinse with warm water. Vinegar can get into porous stones and damage them.”
He was warming to the discussion. “Always dry with a soft badger’s hair brush and polish with a fine cloth or soft leather. Did you know you can keep your silver from tarnishing by storing it completely covered in sifted arrowroot?”
Her response, a long blink, followed by, “No, I did not,” ended the conversation, apparently satisfying her enough that he could return to his own contemplations. But he found his mind and his glance wandering down the long table to Lady Radiance. He could scarce believe he’d made fun of her name and been rude to her. Twice!
If his mother hadn’t approached, he might have gone too far.
Not that Edward gave a fig about her being an earl’s daughter, but he tried not to be discourteous. Sadly, he’d been accused of such before, when his mind had wandered during someone’s discourse. It was usually inadvertent, not intentional, disregard. Most people simply could not keep his attention the way crystalline corundum, which made up both sapphires and rubies, or pondering Dr. Hutton’s geological theory of the igneous origin of everything could keep him enthralled.
Catching Lady Radiance’s gaze, he received a smile from her which surprised him into returning the expression. After that, he kept his gaze on his plate, thinking this dinner party was as interminable as every other one, worse because the courses were keeping him from the only interesting thing at the party — finding out why she’d shown up at his door.
Finally, they reached the moment when the guests oohed and aahhed over the raspberry summer sponge cakes doused in thick, creamy syllabub. His mother’s staff presented them along the center of the table like pink and white buttons before each was taken away again to be sliced, served, and devoured. Then his mother rose, and his father and all the men followed suit.
“We shall have coffee, sherry, or brandy, to each their preference, in the drawing room,” she announced.
“Thank God,” Edward muttered. When silence ensued, he realized he’d spoken aloud ... and loudly.
On his feet, drawing out the chair for the lady on his right, he added, “For I know the quality of both the coffee and the brandy under this roof, and we are all in for a treat.”
That seemed to satisfy. But when he glanced again at Lady Radiance being escorted by Lord Chippens, she looked amused. He had a feeling she knew of his impatience, perhaps even relishing it.