Her Accidental Groom by Nadine Millard

Author:Nadine Millard [Millard, Nadine]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER NINE

“Mama is beside herself, of course. Desperate to impress your family. I don’t think I’ve ever seen her fawn so much over anybody or anything in my whole life.”

Natalia laughed at Bea’s description of Lady Fortescue’s behaviour. It was true, however. The lady practically salivated telling each new arrival to her house party that they were in the company of Russian nobility.

It made Natalia feel quite isolated from those whom she had previously thought of as within her sphere.

Now, she wasn’t just Lady Natalia. She was Lady Natalia Soronsky. The Russian. The outsider.

Not that anyone was impolite about it, of course. If anything, they were most interested in her company, even though she’d been attending these Christmas house parties for years and nobody had ever taken this much interest in her before.

Her family conversed in Russian when chatting amongst themselves, and Natalia supposed that had something to do with the intrigue surrounding them. And her.

“There have been comments, too, about you and Ben,” Beatrice continued, leaning forward to pluck another tartlet from the plate before them.

They were having tea in Bea’s favourite drawing room awaiting the arrival of a mantua maker. Lady Fortescue had ordered some gowns for Beatrice for the house party.

Every year the lady invited copious amounts of young bachelors in the hopes that her daughter would marry one of them.

Every year she bought her daughter a wardrobe fit for Town in the Season.

Every year, Beatrice remained single.

But Lady Fortescue was nothing if not determined.

Natalia had ordered two gowns herself but when Papa had arrived, he’d brought with him a trunk full of new gowns for his daughter. They were more elaborate than Natalia would have wanted to wear, but it was her father’s wish that she wear them, and so she would.

“What comments?” Natalia asked, her stomach fluttering in the most peculiar way.

Comments were what she wanted, after all.

Since that first dinner party two nights ago, Ben had been attentive and, she supposed, charming.

Papa actually seemed to like him, though he rarely allowed anything more than a few minutes of conversation between just the two of them before he interrupted or sent Mama or one of the twins.

“Oh, just about how attentive Ben has been,” Bea said airily, waving around the strawberry tart she held. “How you seem to be amenable to his attentions when you have never shown an interest in anyone before. Your acting skills are quite impressive.” Beatrice grinned.

Natalia’s stomach flipped at Beatrice’s words.

“Just what we wanted,” she responded weakly, taking a sip of her tea.

She couldn’t have said why Beatrice’s news made her feel so peculiar. After all, it was just what she had wanted, just what she’d planned.

Was it that she was worried her acting skills weren’t, in fact, all that good? That she was amenable to Ben’s attentions because since he’d been pretending to be attracted to her, she’d begun seeing him in a completely different light? That the memory of his kisses plagued her, and she found herself desperate to experience them again?

“Talia, are you quite well? You’ve become terribly flushed.

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