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So, he didn’t fault her. He was forced to repeat this to himself when, hours later, Alan’s valet knocked on the cottage door to hand him a black-bordered envelope delivered to Umfreville House with the last post. Lavinia’s mourning stationery. Neal ripped it open.

My Dearest Neal, the letter began.

I spent the day barnacled with callers and couldn’t get out the door.

He took the letter inside, read the rest of it over a drink, then poured another and reread the concluding lines.

On Saturday, the Sambourns host their annual garden party. My attendance is all but compelled, so I compel yours. Wouldn’t my pirate like nothing more than to swarm up the back wall and drop down behind the holly trees? All eyes will be turned to the tennis court. No one will watch for the figure stealing down the path, except, your devoted, Lavinia.

He stood, let the letter drop, and pressed his thumb hard into his eyebrow. He flung himself backward onto the bed. The linens diffused her scent, faintly. Rose and gardenia.

A sound rumbled in his chest, caught behind his ribs. He couldn’t tell if it was a laugh or a groan.

—

Lavinia sipped Möet under an arbor. She felt like the black center of an anemone, a half dozen girls ringing her in a blaze of color. With her title, plus Anthony’s seal of approval, she’d converted from pariah back to princess.

All afternoon, Cora, Agnes, and Elise had stood closest, chattering at her brightly. Cora’s overlong engagement to a grouse-obsessed Scottish earl was nearing its conclusion. The wedding was scheduled, and Cora did so hope Lavinia could attend. Agnes, married years ago, kept her eyes on the tennis court so she could belittle her own husband’s every move as he lost serially to opponents young and old, male and female. Elise’s titters never ceased.

Tripe-spouting, intolerable friends. Lucy was right, of course. They’d been bred to it, just as Lavinia had. Perhaps they would read her novel—Miss Laliberté’s novel. They would read of the pirate duchess—a spoiled girl who discovers a world beyond the drawing room, breaks every social taboo, and ends up richly rewarded for her transgressions with a life of love and freedom—and they’d long for broader horizons themselves. Bigger hearts. Muriel Pendrake wanted to thrill readers and inspire new enterprises with writing. Well, so did Lavinia. Only not for the sake of botanical discovery. For the sake of self-discovery, not just hers, but other girls’ too.

What did Cora do well?

“Cora,” Lavinia spoke over Agnes. “Do you still play tennis? I remember you were brilliant at it. You let the gentlemen beat you because they wouldn’t ask you to dance otherwise. But you were better than all of them.”

Cora looked surprised, and displeased. She’d always underplayed her athletic ability. And what did Lavinia imagine? That she’d leave the earl to his grouse, don a cricketing cap, and head for the greenest pitch, where she’d bowl her way into history?

The surrounding girls goggled briefly. Lavinia never used to say anything odd. Then Agnes sighed.

“I wish someone would let Stokes win.” She referred to her husband exclusively by his surname. “It grows embarrassing.”

“There’s Miss Powell, by the refreshment table.” Elise pointed with her champagne flute. “Maybe she can tell Sir Vincent to ease up on his serve. Though I don’t know as that would help. Have you considered Stokes might require spectacles?”

“It’s more than his vision. He holds the racket like he’s wringing a goose’s neck. He couldn’t win against a goose.” Cora rolled her eyes. Then she waved to Miss Powell, beckoning her over.

“You don’t mind that Liz is joining us,” she said to Agnes, who was absorbed in a brief volley. “Your husband’s crushing defeat will bring her joy.” She addressed everyone with a small, pink smirk. “It proves her fiancé isn’t the worst tennis player in Christendom. Only the worst rider. Did you hear he was thrown into the Serpentine?”

A quick, mean-spirited anecdote followed, summarizing Sir Vincent’s unfortunate morning ride in Hyde Park.

Lavinia hardly listened. She was staring as Miss Powell approached. A pretty blond flibbertigibbet. Lavinia had never wasted a thought on her, except to note that her prettiness was similar to her own, and to assure herself that she didn’t suffer by comparison. She’d certainly never called her Liz. Or Elizabeth.

Elizabeth Powell, engaged to Sir Vincent, baronet.

Lavinia’s hand flew to her chest. She’d taken to carrying Neal’s silver cigarette case in her bodice, beneath the ruching of black lace. She imagined it as a shield, protecting her heart. It wasn’t enough. She had to leave, now.

She opened her black parasol. “Sometimes my grief overcomes me,” she murmured, and set off across the lawn.

The Sambourns’ property was large, with a slight slope atop which the house towered. Croquet at these parties was something diabolical, and she gave the match a wide berth. Debutantes in pale summer silks were drifting back and forth from the tennis courts, as older ladies and gentlemen seated in basket chairs or reclining on turkey rugs inspected them languidly and commented among themselves. An embowered band played familiar tunes of dutiful merriment.

Same old ton. Perhaps this summer’s hats were bigger.

The gardens stretched behind the house. Roses had been trained up the back wall. The vines bloomed profusely, spiky with lurid red thorns. She’d forgotten the roses. They foretold a brutal climb, brutal indeed. She couldn’t warn Neal, so she returned to the edge of the patio to wait. Surely, he’d come soon. She turned her head, and she saw him. He stood inside the house, stood by the piano, laughing with the Sambourns’ eldest son, Graham. They both wore short cream-colored jackets and knickerbockers.

He didn’t need to swarm up the back wall, like a pirate. He’d walked through the front door, like a gentleman. A gentleman who’d once been engaged to Miss Elizabeth Powell, a facsimile of Miss Lavinia Yardley.

She stepped quickly off the patio. She was the one stealing down the path. She grabbed bunches of her gown in her left hand and flew through the garden toward the back wall, so quickly she could feel the drag from her parasol. She let it go, let the handle sail over her shoulder. She reached the wall and stood for a moment, blinking at the stone and the roses. Now would she swarm up? Her little fantasy had turned inside out and reversed—unhappily.

She already felt too hot and her skin prickled at the very sight of the thorns.