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Chapter One
Earl of Montieth’s Ball
Edinburgh, Scotland
21 March 1721
Peeking around a Grecian column, Bethea Glanville warily scanned the illustrious assemblage. Elaborately attired, self-important gentlemen and ladies dripping in satin, velvet, every manner of jewel imaginable, and gasp-worthy towering wigs, packed the breathtaking, but overly-crowded ballroom.
One grande dame required two attendants, one on either side, to guide her around. Her pink ribbon-adorned white wig contained a birdcage—complete with a live and petrified looking canary. She could scarcely move her head lest the creation either topple from her head or send her tumbling ample bosom over abundant bum.
Bethea couldn’t help but wonder what would happen if the bird needed to relieve its wee self, and despite the direness of her situation, a naughty grin momentarily twitched her mouth.
Until now, she’d never considered herself a coward. She enjoyed challenges, meeting new people, and experiencing new things. Yet the past fortnight, she’d done her utmost to avoid an amorous lord’s wholly unwanted attentions.
Only now, she had begun skulking behind potted greeneries, diving into curtained alcoves, and made so many excuses to seek the lady’s retiring room that people might’ve begun pondering if a health condition plagued her.
Odin’s gnarly teeth.How had she ever thought this was what she wanted?
How many times had she and her sister, Branwen, complained to their guardian, Keane Buchannan, Duke of Roxdale, that he was too strict and protective? That they longed to attend elaborate fetes and soirees such as this very ball? That at one and twenty, she was of marriageable age, and she wanted to fall in love, marry, and have children?
Well, not precisely this minute or week or month even, but in due course.
In truth, Bethea thoroughly enjoyed the dancing and the gaiety. The musical performances, teas, and all the rest were exhausting but exciting, nonetheless. Though she wasn’t the belle of any ball, enough gentlemen had asked her to dance and otherwise paid her pretty compliments that she had a grand time thus far.
When noxious David Talbot, Earl of Montieth, wasn’t following her, sniffing about her skirts, that was. Rarely—never before, in truth—had she met anyone as off-putting and as persistent as the earl. He was worse than a ratty terrier after a meaty bone.
Pursing her mouth at the thought, Bethea stood on her tiptoes, craning her neck to see over the milling merrymakers and dancers. Tonight’s assembled were some of the most extravagant she’d seen, and she couldn’t help but be slightly impressed at the earl’s scope of influence—even if she intensely disliked the man himself.
Where are they?
She gripped the column tighter, scrutinizing the undulating crowd which seemed to have swallowed her sister, Keane, and his lovely new wife, Marjorie.
Wait.Squinting, Bethea arched even higher on her toes. Is that…? For an elated instant, she hoped she’d spotted a familiar raven head, shoulders above the milling assemblage.
Was Camden Kennedy here?
The notion caused a little thrill of excitement to rush through her, immediately followed by her knitting her eyebrows together into a perplexed vee.
Odd, but neither Keane nor Marjorie had mentioned Camden—one of her first husband’s brothers—was even in Edinburgh, let alone expected here tonight.
In a blink, the throng shifted, obstructing whoever the man was from her avid view. Inexplicable disappointment swept Bethea. She’d very much wanted him to be Camden Kennedy.
Standing well over six feet, all brawn and muscle, but with a perpetual twinkle in his vivid blue eyes, Camden would’ve kept her safe from Montieth. Now there was a man she could trust not to impose himself on her. Not once in the times that she’d encountered Camden had he stepped beyond the mark in word or action.
A practiced flirt possessing a disarming wit, he usually made her laugh, too.
The heavy-treaded, unsteady clickety-clop, clickety-clop announced the Earl of Montieth’s approach before she smelled the perpetually malodorous man.
Lovely.
Daring another peek, she stifled a distressed gasp.
Drat, drat, and double drat-damn.
The very man she’d managed to avoid the past hour toddled toward her on ridiculously embellished blue and silver high-heeled shoes, perspiration profusely beading the wide expanse of his brow and upper lip. His ridiculously curled wig brushed his shoulders, and she strongly suspected a number of vermin made the wig their home. The engraved, shiny silver buttons fastened across his stomach strained to contain his corpulence.
By all the saints, if he sneezed, the fastenings would become lethal projectiles.
