Page 56 of To Steal a Kiss

Alice regretted it at once, regretted making him unhappy, but it didn’t change the fact she needed an answer, an honest one. “I think you are everything I dream of, I think it enough to marry you, Nate, but the truth is this has all happened so fast. Too fast. If things were different, we would have more time. If things were different, you could court me and I could be certain of everything I think, before I speak those vows before God.” She stared at him, willing him to see that she trusted him, but she would have the truth, no matter what it may be. “The world has shown me the face of Nathaniel Hunt and he is a reckless libertine. You have shown me the face of the man beneath the façade, and I have fallen in love with him, but how did Alice Dowding, perpetual wallflower, catch such a man? How does she keep him?”

His breath caught and he stopped, staring at her, and Alice knew people were looking but she couldn’t move either, trapped in his blue gaze. “You love me?” he said, his voice rough.

Alice smiled. “I do.”

He laughed, a breathless rush of amusement that made his lips curve and his eyes sparkle.

“Do you want to know how to keep me, Alice?” he said, lowering his voice to a whisper.

She nodded, wanting to know that above all things.

He leaned down and she shivered anew as his breath fluttered warm against her neck.

“Love me,” he said. “Don’t ever stop.” He lifted his head and smiled at her, sincerity shining in eyes that were just a little too bright. “I’m yours alone, Alice, I’ll never give you reason to doubt it.”

Alice’s heart was expanding, she felt certain of it. It filled her chest, pushing at the confines of her ribcage as she stared upon this extraordinary man who had changed her life with a kiss in the moonlight.

“If you two carry on like this, we’ll never keep it quiet,” Matilda muttered, moving closer and elbowing her brother. “You do remember you’re in a public place?”

“Oh, I remember,” Nate said with a heavy sigh. “But I’m finding it hard to care. Tilda, say hello to your soon-to-be sister.”

Alice smiled as Matilda looked between them and then gave a heartfelt sigh. “Thank heavens,” she said, and then gave a little squeal and ran to clutch Alice’s arm. “I’m so excited!”

To Alice’s delight, her joy seemed genuine and whole-hearted, and knowing that Matilda would stand beside her gave Alice courage.

“Tell me everything,” Matilda said, bubbling over with excitement and having just as hard a time as they had at keeping her voice down. “Where and when is the happy event to be? We have so much to arrange.”

Nate laughed and looked between his sister and Alice, and the happiness in his eyes made her throat tight with pleasure.

Chapter 17

Dearest Alice, I’m so excited to see you and the rest of our Peculiar Ladies. Helena has excelled herself with this ball. It will be glorious.

―Excerpt of a letter from Her Grace, Prunella Adolphus, Duchess of Bedwin to Miss Alice Dowding.

28h June 1814. Baker Street, London.

Alice stared at herself in the mirror. She thought she looked a little different somehow. Oh, she was still small enough to go unnoticed in a crowd and for many of her acquaintance to pat her on the head and chuck her under the chin, as if she were twelve years old and not a woman of two and twenty. There was certainty in her eyes, though, a straighter line to her back, a more determined lift to her chin. Nathaniel Hunt loved her, and, on Monday morning, she would leave this place in secret and she would be his wife.

Little Alice Dowding, who had stammered and blushed her way through life, never putting a foot wrong or doing or saying a thing to disoblige anyone, would please herself. She would not marry a vile man who would make her unhappy so her parents could climb a little higher in society. She would face their wrath, their retribution and their condemnation, which she did not doubt would come. Alice would look them in the eyes and explain her reasons and they could accept them—and her husband—or they could disown her. It would be their choice, just as Nate was hers.

Turning before the looking glass, Alice smiled. She had bought this dress in the days after Nate had kissed her, fuelled by desire and a new burst of confidence. The confidence to wear it had, as yet, eluded her. Not tonight.

It was dazzling confection in deep burnt orange, the heavy satin shimmering bronze as she moved. She had even been daring with her hair and allowed her maid to arrange it in a tumble of loose curls, caught here and there with jewelled combs. It was most out of character and made her feel rather wicked.

She was wicked, she supposed.

Alice Dowding had kissed a stranger on a moonlit balcony. She’d met in him secret and captured his heart, and soon she would run away and marry him against her parents’ wishes.

Wicked indeed.

A slow smile curved over her mouth, a knowing look appearing in the reflection before her as she slid a hand down the decadent satin. Shy, biddable little Alice was gone, chased away by someone bolder and more courageous. This Alice was a woman who knew what she wanted, she decided, looking at the petite but nonetheless voluptuous figure in the glass. Yes, she thought, smiling, and Alice rather liked her. She thought perhaps her scandalous grandmother would have approved too.

In the dark of the carriage, concealed beneath a voluminous cloak, Alice kept the secret of her new dress to herself. Her mother had not seen it. She would not approve. Already she had disclaimed her hairstyle as less than respectable. Alice had taken that as a compliment and thanked her mother, who gave her a narrow-eyed stare.

“You’re in a strange mood this evening,” she remarked, giving Alice pause.

That would not do. She must not give her mother cause for suspicion.