Page 1 of Lady Waldrey’s Gardening Almanac for Cultivating Scandal

PROLOGUE-

Life, Candace decided, could not get more miserable than this. She walked briskly through the park, her lady’s maid, Hortense, trailing behind her.

People were starting to notice; people were starting to whisper. Perhaps Candace could have avoided attention had everyone around her not been pairing off and marrying almost as fast as Madame Aubert could sew their wedding gowns. When Percy had married before she did, that was forgivable. He was the man of the house and a marquess to boot. Besides, everyone who knew Percy knew he did whatever he pleased. He didn’t care about the order of things, especially not weddings.

But now—oh, calamity! The Viscount Thomas had proposed to her younger sister, Sophia. Younger sisters, as a rule, were not supposed to wed until the elder ones did. Though this principle had largely been abandoned because of love matches everywhere, it certainly seemed to apply in the case of the Waldrey sisters. For surely a younger sister should not be married before the elder, when the elder had already been engaged a year!

Not even Percy knew the whole story behind Candace’s engagement. As far as he was concerned, one morning, the Marquess Shelbourne had shown up and asked for his blessing. The man hadn’t even proposed to her properly—just thrust a paltry bouquet and a ring box in her direction, with no words at all. The engagement had just been done.

The second Shelbourne actually had to commit, it was as if every romantic notion had flown from his head—much like birds from a tree when a rifle is fired. He’d stuck around long enough to buy her a ring—a hideously ugly thing she never would have chosen for herself—and then he’d fled to Paris. He hadn’t even bothered to say goodbye in person! He’d sent a messenger round with a note.

Candace smiled and nodded at the two ladies heading her direction, trying not to notice that they didn’t even wait until she passed to start murmuring together beneath their parasols.

She was living the greatest of lies and she didn’t know how to stop. When their engagement had been announced in the papers, everyone had claimed theirs was the most romantic love story. The Marquess of Shelbourne—the dashing, tall, flaxen-haired paragon of everything a man should be—was to marry the Diamond of the Season. They made such a striking couple that society as a whole had forgotten appearances were often deceiving.

Perhaps Candace had forgotten that, too.

She brought her hands together to wring them, then caught herself, dropped them by her sides, and increased her pace. Home was the only place that was truly safe now. Except not even that was true. Percy and Adelaide would be there, fairly drunk on their love for each other. It was a spritz of lemon on a papercut, the fact that Adelaide was now a married woman and could act as Candace’s chaperone.

She snorted a laugh. As if anyone was needed to chaperone her and her books, her and her letters! It would be funny if it weren’t so terrible, so lonely. Rejected—she had been rejected,thrown away like a worn-out shoe.

If only she hadn’t become so caught up in the glittering social whirl of her first Season! Candace had been wooed by many men she could now see were twice—no, four times—the man that Shelbourne was. If only she hadn’t fallen prey to his honeyed words and scintillating murmurs. If only she’d never gone out to the gardens with him...

No....would not think of that. She’d thought that humiliation had been grim. This was far worse.

CHAPTER 1- CANDACE

SEVERAL MONTHS LATER…

From the Quentin Daily-

Rumors abound in the most exclusive neighborhood in London this week. A young lady was caught in an embrace with one of her beaux behind a curtain at the theatre! Their engagement was announced the next morning, with a wedding planned for a fortnight hence. One wonders who got the better part of the hastily made betrothal, as the Miss is lovely but has very little dowry. Best for her, then, that her intended is from a well-established family!

Candace Felicia Waldrey loosened her death grip on the parasol handle and tried to soften the edges of her smile. The curve of her lips, the entire width of the thing, felt manic, even to her. She could only imagine what she looked like. It wouldn’t do to snap her delicate parasol handle, wouldn’t do for her to bring it down in a swooping arc onto Miss Daisy Knope’s head.

Daisy. What a misnomer for the lady staring at her with all-too-naive eyes. Though she looked the part of a flower—blonde curls, big doe eyes, and a perfect little pink pout of a mouth, Daisy Knope was a social vulture, and she had come to pick Candace’s bones clean.

“When do you think the marquess will be back from Paris?” Daisy asked, tilting her head just so.

It was an innocent enough question—for those who hadn’t heard the rumors. But Candace had long ago learned that there were only two kinds of people who asked painful questions in full hearing of others—well-meaning, ignorant people...or the exceptionally cruel. Daisy, for all her pale-yellow flounces and fluttering ribbons, fell into the latter category.

“Once he’s amassed the lace I require for my trousseau, I’d imagine.” Candace punctuated the casual tone of her reply with a little shrug, as if she couldn’t care less about her missing fiancé, as if it weren’t all she thought about every waking moment.

“He must be very dedicated.” Daisy leaned forward with a conspiratorial smile. “One would think fourteen months would be plenty of time to gather a mountain of lace and ribbons.”

“I’m sure you’re right, if he were buying lace and ribbons of the common variety.” Candace pointedly raked Daisy’s ensemble from head to toe, a little moue of displeasure on her lips.

The dress was actually quite pretty, and the quality nice enough. But as expected, Daisy wilted a little under the scrutiny, under the implication that her outfit was found wanting.

Daisy’s eyes narrowed; her smile turned brittle and sharp. “I’m sure you will make the most magnificent picture when your wedding day finally comes. We all wish you well.”

She smiled and looked over toward the refreshment table as if she didn’t feel the barbed words snagging and pulling at her skin. “I wish you the same joy someday.”

Candace’s pointed reference to Daisy’s enduring singleness hit its mark. Daisy flounced away toward her mother, ribbons trailing in her wake—most likely she was off to demand another trip to the modiste.

Candace sighed but did it with a smile. She hated what she’d just done—hated that in order to not be flayed alive by the words of these women, she had to bring out knives of her own. It had been a mistake to come here. This wasn’t a garden party; this was the Amazon River, full of piranha, and Candace was a bleeding side of beef.

Candace knew why some of the ladies treated her so—in her first Season, she’d been the proverbial belle of the ball. A string of suitors lined up outside her drawing room doors every day; the florists loved all the business as bouquets and nosegays perfumed Candace’s brother’s townhouse. She’d reveled in the attention, just as any young lady would.