Three Times a Lady

THREE TIMES A LADY EILEEN DREYER All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be sold, copied, distributed, reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, mechanical or digital, including photocopying and recording or by any information storage and retrieval system without the prior written permission of both the publisher, Oliver Heber Books and the author, Eileen Dreyer, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews. PUBLISHER'S NOTE: This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. COPYRIGHT © Eileen Dreyer Published by Oliver-Heber Books 0 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 Created with Vellum CONTENTS Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4 Chapter 5 Chapter 6 Chapter 7 Chapter 8 Chapter 9 Chapter 10 Chapter 11 Chapter 12 Chapter 13 Chapter 14 Chapter 15 Chapter 16 Chapter 17 Chapter 18 Chapter 19 Chapter 20 Chapter 21 Epilogue Also by Eileen Dreyer About the Author 1 AUTUMN, 1815 A sensible woman would know when to give up. But then, Phillipa Ellen Alexandra Trentham Knight had never been sensible. Even if she had not been told so since birth, she would know it now. After all, wasn't she standing behind the potted ferns in the Duke of Dorchester's crowded ballroom just so she could catch a glimpse of Beau Drummond? Hadn't she spent most of her life doing much the same thing? Hiding behind ferns and curtains, trees and river rocks, chairs and desks, just to be able to watch Beau Drummond as he went about his day? This time was different, though. This time she was protecting him, even though he didn't know it. She had sensibly laid down her childhood dreams of a life with Beau a while ago. She had only been able to get passing glimpses of him for the last few years. But her favored lurking position came in handy when she needed to keep him safe. “Pip, when are you going to give up?” she heard behind her. Pip didn't bother to turn or drop the gold lorgnette from her eyes. She couldn't afford the distraction right now. Not when Beau needed her. But it was her friend Lizzie Ripton standing behind her, and she could never quite be mad at Lizzie. Lizzie Meant Well. “This is not what you think,” Pip whispered without removing her attention from Beau as he stood across a crowd of swirling dancers conversing with the deadly beautiful Lady Pamela Smythe-Smithe Pip didn't trust Lady Pamela Smythe-Smithe, and not merely because she had a ridiculous name. Lady Pamela had set her sights on Beau long ago. But worse, tonight she was distracting Beau from what Pip knew was his purpose here. And he didn't even seem to mind. If he did, he would be rubbing at his temple as he did when he was impatient, or tugging at his earlobe, which he still didn't realize was his sign asking somebody to save him from an unpleasant situation. No, Beau was smiling. “Then what is it?” Lizzie asked, her elegant voice patient. But Pip couldn't tell her. Lizzie was one of her very best friends from their days together at the boarding school they had nicknamed Last Chance Academy. But Lizzie didn't know everything about Pip. She certainly didn't know everything there was to know about Beau. “What do you think of Pamela the Perfect?” Pip asked instead. Lizzie did something almost unheard of from her. She snorted. “I think her husband needs to take himself out of the card room long enough to control her. And I’m afraid your Beau is as idiotic as all the other men who have thrown themselves at her dainty little feet.” Maybe her feet were dainty, Lizzie thought sourly. Everything else, though, was built along more voluptuous lines and arranged to highlight them, from the barely contained coils of thick, burnished hair the color of a chestnut horse to the black lace dress that should have made people think of mourning, but somehow didn't, to the perfectly demure diamond and ruby necklace that managed to draw the eye right to her over-sized breasts. Then there was her face, as sensual and sleek as a cat, with knowing green eyes, porcelain skin, and a mouth that made one think of pillows. Pip was thinking of pillows herself, but more in how she would like to press one over that smirking face. “You are far prettier than she is,” Lizzie said. “She's predatory. You're--” Pip swung around and leveled the lorgnette up at her friend like a weapon. “If you dare say the word elfin, I swear I shall skewer you.” Lizzie grinned down on her. “I would never.” It was Pip's turn to snort. With yellow hair the shape and texture of a dandelion, oversized blue eyes, and the stature of a tweeny, Pip was well-acquainted with her reputation. Isn't she cute? Don't you expect to find her perched on a lily pad? Isn't she...elfin. It was enough to make a girl mad as snakes. Especially when the man she loved was making cow eyes at a veritable siren. Pamela was sliding her perfectly manicured fingers down Beau's arm, as if petting him, and it made Pip see red. Not because the hussy was acting like a hussy—how else would hussies act, really? —Because Beau—her Beau—was smiling like an idiot. And it was the first time she had seen him smile in over a year. “St. Stephen's sidewhiskers,” she blurted out. “Isn't there one man who can think with the correct part of his body?” She heard Lizzie sputter and couldn't help but grin. One of her greatest pleasures in life was disconcerting Lizzie. Poor Lizzie had been raised the very proper daughter of a duke—the Duke of Dorchester, to be precise. Pip