Page 1 of One Thing Leads to a Lover

Chapter 1

For as many of her thirty-two years as Amanda could remember, her mother had been urging her to mind her step.

Not that Amanda was particularly clumsy—barring the summer of her twelfth birthday, when she had grown several inches taller in mere weeks and both the dressmaker and the dancing master had thrown up their hands in despair over her ungainliness.

No, the wrong-footedness Mama fretted over was primarily of the social variety. Did Amanda comport herself properly? Did she say the right things to the right people? Did she attract neither too much notice, nor too little?

Amanda had always been a little too curious, a little too bold to suit her mother.

One might have hoped—Amanda certainly had—that her mother would relax a bit once Amanda, at nineteen, had received and accepted a much-coveted offer of marriage from the Earl of Kingston. If not then, surely once the vows had been spoken in St. George’s in front of hundreds. Or once the requisite heir and a spare had been born.

But if in fact Mama had ever allowed the phrase to fall into disuse, she soon took it up again when Amanda found herself a young, and most eligible, widow.

Though she loved her mother, Amanda despised being told to mind her step. To be forever minding your step meant worrying more about others’ thoughts than your own. Making yourself small, fearful of taking up space. Always looking down instead of looking up.

But when the glorious June sun shone from a sky of cerulean blue, dotted with puffs of white clouds so fat and happy they appeared to have been added to the world’s canvas by an enthusiastic five-year-old, then who, on such a day, would not rather look up?

Heedless of the potential for either gossip or freckles, Amanda tipped her face to the sunshine and reveled in its warmth, watching light and shadow dance across her eyelids in a rose-tinted quadrille. The sounds and smells of Bond Street washed over her like a raucous stream flowing around an unmoving stone. Clutching her parcel—a copy of Pascal’s treatise on geometry in the original French—so that one sharp corner fitted against her ribs, she drew in a deep breath and—

A sharp blow to her left shoulder and elbow jerked her from her moment’s reverie. Her chin snapped downward and her eyes popped open as the paper-wrapped book flew from her hands. Before she could bring him into focus, the man who had jostled her arm was already disappearing into the crowd.

The footman who had accompanied her on the outing—at Mama’s insistence, for Amanda had been firmly of the opinion that a widow could surely go into a bookshop alone—had been trailing at a respectful distance. Now he surged forward and would have given chase had not Amanda instead directed him with trembling motions to rescue the package, which had skidded to a landing on the pavement several yards away. The book she’d bought for Jamie’s birthday was in danger every moment of being kicked by careless feet into the gutter.

Just before it met an ignoble fate on the steaming pile left by a passing dray, the footman snatched up the package. In another moment, it was back in her kid-gloved hands, the paper wrapping scuffed and torn at one corner, the string holding the paper frayed but still knotted. No real harm done.

“Thank you, Lewis. Thank you.” Once more, she clutched the book to her chest, heedless of the grime it had gathered.

“I’m only sorry I couldn’t lay hands on the fellow who treated you with such disrespect, milady.” A flush, part anger, part embarrassment, spread across his youthful cheeks and to the edges of his powdered wig, clashing miserably with the rusty orange of his livery. “Mrs. West will box my ears.”

Her eyes traveled in the direction the stranger had been walking, but of course, he was long out of sight. She had caught no more than a glimpse of him, just the back of a drab greatcoat and tall beaver hat, an identical costume to the one sported by dozens of gentlemen strolling and striding along the busy street.

“I’m sure it was an accident, Lewis. I hadn’t any business stopping in the midst of all this bustle.” The crowd still surged around them, oblivious to the incident. “But I think it’s best if my mother hears nothing of the matter. Now.” She nodded in the opposition direction. “Let’s make our way back to Bartlett House, shall we?”

Lewis sent a glance toward the package. If he had been carrying it, as was his duty, doubtless a passerby would have been unable to knock it from his hands as easily as it had been knocked from hers. But Amanda had refused when she first left the shop with it, and she made no reply to this silent repetition of his offer. He bowed. “As you wish, milady.”

Away from Bond Street, the crowd thinned, and though the streets of Mayfair were not empty, they were quiet enough that one could pick out the notes of the birds perched high in the lush treetops. Now and again the air was split by the cheerful shrieks of children, barely contained within the nurseries whose windows had been flung open to the fresh morning air.

With a rueful roll of her aching shoulder, Amanda slowed her steps but did not stop again. She had lost a little of her taste for soaking up the sunshine. Perhaps later, in the seclusion of the garden at Bartlett House, while the boys made observations for their project about bees.

But first she intended to meet with the housekeeper about the week’s menus, if Mama had not already done it. Then she had some invitations to which she wished to respond, if Mama had not already written on her behalf. And of course, George, Lord Dulsworthy, had promised to call on her today, and Mama was predictably delighted at the prospect.…

A swallowed sigh pushed Amanda’s shoulders a notch lower. How had things ended up thus?

When they reached Bartlett House, she paused to collect herself as Lewis preceded her up the stairs. While he held open the door, she ascended, watching the toes of her brown leather half-boots peep from beneath her skirts as they landed squarely on each step.

Inside, all was quiet—unsettlingly so, given that two young boys lived within.

Matthews the butler came forward with a reproving glance for Lewis and a hand outstretched for the package she carried. But before he reached her, the hand fell to his side and the movement folded into a bow. Lewis must have communicated, whether through mouthed words or gestures, that the assistance would be unwelcome.

“Mrs. West rang for her morning cocoa not a quarter of an hour ago, my lady,” Matthews reported.

Mama was having a lie-in? Good. “And the boys?”

“In the drawing room with the fencing master, my lady.”

“Oh? Is it…Tuesday?”

The butler very nearly smiled. “No, my lady. When Mr. Jacobs arrived, he indicated that Lord Dulsworthy had requested the change.”