Free Annie Burrows by Reforming the Viscount

couldn’t help reflecting that he’d managed to leave her side before she’d emptied the contents of her stomach all over the drawing-room floor. Nor had he meant a single word he’d spoken to her in such tender tones.
    ‘Men,’ she said with just a touch of bitterness, ‘can appear to be all that one would wish for in a husband, but turn out to be far from what you first thought them to be, only when it is too late. Invite who you will to Westdene, Rose. So long as I am there to support her, nobody will be able to do Cissy any harm.’
    ‘Anyone who tries will have to answer to me, too,’ said Robert gruffly, taking her hand.
    ‘And we will send them packing,’ said Rose with a militant lift to her chin and the light of battle in her eyes. ‘For I wouldn’t dream of marrying a man who could not accept Cissy exactly as she is.’

Chapter Four
    R ose was all for getting into their carriage and leaving town at once, then writing to the people they would invite to stay with them for a week.
    Robert said it was the worst thing they could do.
    ‘People will become intrigued if we all just up and leave in a hurry. And they will ask questions. If we prevaricate, their curiosity will be roused to fever pitch. Do you really want Cissy to become the topic of gossip?’
    ‘Mama Lyddy,’ said Rose, turning to her imploringly. ‘What do you think we should do?’
    While the two siblings had been squabbling, Lydia had been sitting quietly, thinking. There was only one event she still really wanted Rose to attend and it was only a few days away. She would be willing to put off their departure from town until after the soirée at Lord Danbury’s house, so important for Rose’s future did she believe it could be.
    ‘On this occasion,’ she therefore said, ‘I concede that Robert has raised a good point. I do think it would be for the best if people thought we were leaving town because we’d decided to throw a house party, rather than having been called home for an emergency. And if I were to write to Marigold and tell her the exact date on which we will return, she and Michael could help Cissy to count down the days. It might help her to calm down, a little.’ Perhaps.
    * * *
    Once they’d agreed this was the course to take, she had written to Marigold, outlining their plans. She had left it to Rose to write out the invitations to her favourites, merely requesting a copy of her list so she could warn their housekeeper, Mrs Broome, how many people to expect.
    She could not stop worrying about Cissy, but she thought she managed to hide the depth of her concern from Rose. The last thing she needed was to hear that she did not believe anything would calm Cissy down but her own return to Westdene.
    * * *
    At last it was the eve of their departure and there they all were in Lord Danbury’s house, courtesy of his daughter, Lady Susan.
    She had her suspicions that the lady in question had her eye on Robert, though her invitation had included them all. Robert had wealth and reasonable looks, and, from what she could see of the other guests, Lady Susan had a kind of fascination for the unusual. And from the way she had questioned Rose, upon their arrival, at such length about her mother and her life in India, she had appeared truly interested, if a bit patronising in her manner.
    Perhaps, after this, when they returned to town, other society hostesses would begin to admit Rose to their ranks. If only Rose managed to make a good impression while she was here. The trouble was, even though Lady Susan had told Robert this was to be ‘a gloriously informal evening’, she wasn’t too sure what that meant. She had a horrid suspicion that the daughter of an earl could get away with much, under the banner of being ‘informal’, but that if the dark-skinned daughter of a colonel in the East India Company army behaved in exactly the same way, she would be condemned as ‘fast’.
    Not that Rose was doing anything more outrageous