Page 7 of Lady Waldrey’s Gardening Almanac for Cultivating Scandal

A pit yawned within her stomach. “I think it must be. Daisy is many things, but creative isn’t one of them.”

“Surely he’s at your door as we speak.”

“Do you think so?” Hope raised Candace’s eyebrows.

“It’s very probable. You know how fastidious he is about his appearance. Doubtless, he wanted to bathe and shave and rest…”

“She said he’d been back for days.”

“Perhaps he had to buy a new coat?” Vera’s voice was as thin and tremulous as the possibility that Shelbourne required days to prepare himself to visit his betrothed.

Candace pressed a hand to her stomach. “I feel sick.”

Vera guided her to a small chair against the wall. “Shall I fetch you water? Would you like me to call the carriage?”

Candace closed her eyes against the questions and took a deep breath. Shelbourne had returned to London but hadn’t come to see her. What on earth was he playing at? Surely he knew he was supposed to visit her upon his return...right?

Then again, there was no handbook on how one behaved once one was engaged. There were strict guidelines as to how one behaved before a proposal, but not much on what came between the contract and the wedding. Could it be that he was simply...ignorant?

As soon as the word landed in her mind, Candace felt a palpable relief. Yes, that was it—Shelbourne just didn’t know how it looked. Men had many matters to attend to besides social appearances.

“No, I’m quite all right. I’ll send a note to him when we return, gently pointing out his mistake. I’m sure he’ll deliver a massive apology bouquet in person and all will be rectified.”

“Are you certain?”

She nodded. “It would take far more than Daisy Knope and an unthinking man to keep me from Madame Aubert’s designs. Let’s get you measured and pick out some silk.”

Vera smiled encouragingly. But as they debated blue grey versus grey green and held tails of bolts against their cheeks to check which suited their skin tones, doubt turned like a rock at the center of Candace’s gut.

CHAPTER 4- CANDACE

From the Quentin Daily-

All that glitters is not gold. QD has it on excellent authority that one of the best-dressed men in the ton is being relentlessly pursued by angry creditors, including a bootmaker who exclaims, “He ordered four pairs and didn’t so much as pay for a single heel!”

Candace pressed her hand to her stomach, trying to ease the slight nausea there.

It will be fine, she thought to herself. Everything will be all right. He’s finally returned to London, and tonight all will be set to rights.

She gripped the tufted bench of the carriage beneath her. It was all she’d wanted for the past months—for Shelbourne to return, for him to follow through on their hastily made betrothal. So why did her stomach feel as if she stood on the rolling deck of a ship in high seas instead of inside a spring-cushioned carriage pulling up a cobblestone driveway?

Candace inhaled slowly through her nose and exhaled through her mouth.

You are absolutely fine. Your dress is beautiful. You’re about to see your betrothed. Everything is as it should be.

The problem was, she didn’t believe a word she was saying to herself.

Except for the part about her dress being beautiful, because it was. The grey-blue silk gown had a square neckline that exposed a great abundance of her perfect, pale skin. The beading around the neckline drew the eye up past her elegant neck to the matching rare blue-grey sapphire-and-diamond earrings that dangled from her delicate earlobes. Hortense had outdone herself, sweeping Candace’s rich red hair up into a beautiful arrangement of curls and small braids, draping several long ringlets forward over her shoulder.

If Candace had ever looked more beautiful, she couldn’t quite remember when it had been. That should have been enough to secure her happiness, to galvanize her confidence, but her flawless appearance was an insufficient comfort.

Why hasn’t he come to visit me? she thought, for the thousandth time.

It was a question she didn’t have an answer for—at least, none that didn’t make her clench her teeth in worry. The truth of the matter was, there was no good reason why Shelbourne hadn't called upon her. It had been days. Three of them, to be precise, since she’d first heard of his return. At least five since he’d re-entered London. Why didn’t he want to see her? They were engaged, for heaven’s sake!

Candace’s house should have been his first stop—well, perhaps the second, to allow for a bath, a meal, and a change of clothes. But there was no good reason, not even at the far fringes of her wildest imaginings, for him not to have visited.

Everyone else certainly had.