The Perfect Rose: A Clean Regency Romance by Brooke Hampton

Author:Brooke Hampton [Hampton, Brooke]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2023-09-07T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter Twenty-two

Miriam brought out a blindfold after dinner. “I propose we play blind man’s bluff.” She pronounced. It was Owen’s favorite game and had been since he was a child. They played it often enough that Frederick was certain he could at least identify Miriam, Quentin, Owen, and Samuel within seconds of catching them.

Lady Gardner stood with a regal air. “I’ll be taking the dowager into the library, should you need us.” She guided the elderly woman from the room but bent her head and whispered something or other to Lord Hanby as they left.

“Mr. Redford,” Frederick turned toward Owen, “would you care to go first?”

Owen’s eyes lit and he nodded his acquiescence in long, quick nods. If he’d had on spectacles, they would have flown from his face in his excitement. He looked around the room until his eyes fell on Lady Rose, his obvious target. Miriam assisted him in tying the handkerchief behind his head. She spun him in a circle while everyone shuffled about the room finding somewhere to stand. Frederick sat on the settee. He looked down and saw a basket of embroidery poking out from beneath the adjacent table. There was a simple yet elegant pattern of flowers along the hem of some type of garment. He needed not ask whose it was; Lady Rose had begun yet another project, it seemed.

Frederick watched Owen focus on the subtle sounds in the room, the scrape of a chair, a cough, the swish of a skirt. It was the latter’s direction in which he moved, and Frederick wondered if his blindfold was doing its proper job. Owen wasn’t the cheating type, however. He must have been attuned enough to Lady Rose’s movements to walk straight toward her, his hands outstretched before him. Frederick jumped up from his seat and began shaking the table beside him. The clattering an old distraction that he’d used many times in the past.

Lady Rose used the cover of sounds to run from Owen’s path and toward Frederick. It wasn’t what he’d planned, but he couldn’t help but smile at his good fortune. Or perhaps it was bad fortune. He was supposed to be staying away from her, wasn’t he? But he couldn’t go and allow Owen to do anything that would embarrass himself or her: it was just a game after all.

Owen changed course and headed straight for Rose again. She turned her head abruptly and looked at Frederick with wide eyes. When Owen was but a step from her, Frederick stepped in front of her, but bent his knees so he was a good head shorter than he normally was. Owen’s hands grasped at the shoulder of his jacket and his face fell.

Frederick shouldn’t have felt so guilty of taking away a simple pleasure from his childhood friend; he felt he was acting in the best interest of everyone when he did. Owen guessed his identity after feeling his hair. Lady Rose had moved herself about five paces to the side so when Owen was unmasked, he saw her standing further away than he’d so obviously hoped.

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