For Love of the Duke(99)
Katherine snorted and deposited her champagne glass onto the tray of a servant. “Just be sure you don’t go and trade the hand you use for holding glasses, or it would certainly dull your pleasure.”
Anne sighed and took a final sip of her drink. She deposited the empty glass upon the same servant’s tray. “You do know Mother has been eyeing you with that stern frown upon her lips?”
Yes, Katherine had detected the signature frown worn by her mother since she’d entered Lord and Lady Harrison’s ball a short while ago.
Anne glanced around and then leaned close. “I think you look splendid, Kat.”
Katherine smiled. “As my twin sister, you have to say that.”
Her sister pointed her eyes to the ceiling. “Hardly. Haven’t you learned I don’t do anything I’m supposed to do?” Yes, the years had certainly taught Katherine that very fact about her headstrong, if whimsical sister.
Anne glanced down forlornly at her ivory satin skirts with a lace, ruffled trim. “I’m entirely too old to be as ruffled as I am.”
Katherine studied her sister a moment. Whereas ivory and white fabrics had dulled Katherine’s drab brown locks, the colors only served to heighten Anne’s golden beauty. Anne epitomized the perfect English lady. “You’re beautiful,” she said with all sincerity and no trace of resentment. As twins, they shared a unique, unbreakable bond. She could not envy Anne her beauty. Never Anne.
Anne tugged at her skirts and feigned a short curtsy. “Perfect, proper, English miss, no?” She sighed. “I’d trade even the forbidden champagne for your sapphire skirts.”
She glanced down momentarily at the gown designed by Madame LeBlanc, the most sought after French modiste in London and smoothed her palms over the front of her sapphire blue satin gown with its crisp plaiting.
When she had taken her leave of Castle Blackwood, Katherine had arrived at a staggering, if saddening, realization. She would not have her children. And she would not have the husband to sit reading poetry with around the hearthside. But she would have her sapphire blue gown.
In the end, she’d lost Jasper, but she had her dress.
And that would have to be enough.
Anne looped her arm through Katherine’s. “How very fortunate you are,” she said on a sigh. She gave Katherine’s arm a faint squeeze.
A tightness settled in Katherine’s chest. She had a husband in love with a ghost. She would never have children of her own. Her heart would forever belong to Jasper, whether she wished it or not. Her lips twisted wryly. Fortunate, indeed.
She reached up and fiddled with the heart pendant looped around her neck. The latch clicked and the chain slipped into her hand.
“What are you—?”
She held out the necklace. “Here, Anne,” she said softly. Katherine no longer needed the insignificant bauble that forever reminded her of the heart she’d never possess. But, her innocent, whimsical sister still believed, and for that, Anne should be the sole owner of the pendant.
Anne stared down at it a moment. She wet her lips and then reached tentative fingers toward it. She pulled her hand back. “You still need your duke’s heart, Katherine. I can w—”
“Take it,” she insisted. Anne could free her of at least the small reminder of all she’d never have.
Her sister’s fingers closed around the precious memento. She looked down, silently at the bauble, a wishful smile playing upon her lips. She glanced up…and her smile promptly withered upon her lips to be replaced with a scowl.
Katherine followed her disapproving stare over toward Harry, the Earl of Stanhope.
Anne mumbled under her breath. “I do not know why you associate with that man. Mother is right, where he’s concerned.” She grimaced. “And you know I do detest admitting Mother is ever right about anything.”
From a short distance away, Harry caught Katherine’s gaze, and gave a devilish wink.
Katherine shook her head. What an insufferable rake he was.
“Winking at you in the midst of a ball,” Anne muttered. “Why, you’re a married woman.”
“He’s been a friend to me,” Katherine gently chided.
“That man can have no intentions that are honorable, Kat,” she said in a hushed whisper. “He’s vile, and rude, and completely condescending, and boorish, and…”
“Who is this paragon of a person you and your sister discuss, Your Grace?”
Anne screeched and yanked her arm free of Katherine’s. High color flooded her cheeks as she glared at Harry. She gave a flounce of her curls, otherwise ignoring him. And, cunning, she mouthed back at Katherine as she took her leave with one last black look for Harry.