Most Improper Miss Sophie Valentine by Jayne Fresina

Author:Jayne Fresina
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Publisher: Sourcebooks, Inc.
Published: 2012-03-21T23:00:00+00:00

Chapter 20

It was James’s idea to attend the Morecroft assembly rooms. Sophie did not want to go, but when Aunt Finn gladly offered to come along as chaperone, Sophie couldn’t disappoint the lady.

“I do so love to watch the young people enjoying themselves,” Finn cried. “I promise I shall be very good and not flirt with any young man, no matter how handsome or how much he reminds me of my dear captain.”

“Very well, Aunt. But no gin. Leave the flask at home.”

Finn blinked her pale golden lashes. “Goodness, Sophie, do you think I can go nowhere without it?”

James dutifully arrived at the appointed hour, having borrowed his grandmama’s barouche to drive them there in grand style. After helping each lady up into the carriage, he took a swift, critical appraisal of their attire. Sophie saw it but excused him. She knew he couldn’t help himself. He would, no doubt, be disappointed, but although her muslin frock with the primrose sprigs had seen better days, it was her best. She’d dressed her hair in a simple knot and wore a pair of small amber earrings. She had no other embellishments, and when his narrowed blue eyes focused momentarily on those tiny amber chips, her heart wilted under his disapproval.

“These were a gift from my father, James.”

“Oh.” He smiled quickly. “How…quaint.”

As for Aunt Finn’s appearance, it was not the sort of thing one could take in all at once. Her gown was black gauze over bronze silk, very low cut to show an astonishingly pert bosom of which a woman half her age would be proud. Around her throat she wore a black velvet choker decorated with amber stones. But one’s eyes went almost immediately from her bosom to her head, atop which she carried a silk, turban-like affair that tilted precariously for a foot and a half above her pale curls. At some point, it might have been fashionable, Sophie thought, making excuses for her beloved aunt—or perhaps she was merely ahead of the trend. Finn was not the sort to care either way. She wore what she liked, whatever caught her eye and her fancy. Poor James eyed that turban with suspicion but dared not speak a word against it.

The monthly assemblies were held above the Red Lion in the High Street, in a long, echoing room with a dais at one end for the musicians and frail gilt chairs set about the edges for those who didn’t dance. One large chandelier shook and swayed from the ceiling when the dancing became particularly rowdy, and there were more candles in iron sconces, casting a soft light on warm, merry faces. It was all much as Sophie remembered it from her youth, and when the music vibrated through the boards under her slippers, she felt that old spark of excitement.

It was crowded on that summer evening. Their arrival might have gone unnoticed if not for Aunt Finn’s extraordinary hat. James tried to act as if she were not with them, and Sophie wanted to laugh, glad her scar, for once, was not the first thing people pointed at.

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