As for Felicia, she, too, knew how to manipulate, but her love for Rand meant she rarely attempted to manipulate him. She and Rand shared a passion for logic and order and, from all Stacie had seen and heard, discussions between them tended to occur on a very rational and direct level.
And as Felicia had earlier said, Sylvia didn’t seem to know how to manipulate at all, which was just as well; Stacie didn’t think that, after being caught too often in their mother’s coils, Kit would ever respond well to being manipulated, even for his own good.
Of the five children of the late Marquess of Raventhorne, only Stacie and Godfrey remained unwed, and as Godfrey was only twenty-five and, in Stacie’s opinion, almost as unlikely to marry as she was, the present celebration seemed set to be the last Cavanaugh wedding for some years. Possibly for decades.
Kit’s was the last of the speeches. When he concluded and invited all to charge their glasses, Stacie lifted hers and, with a smile as bright as anyone’s, toasted first the bridal party, then Sylvia.
After that, everyone rose from the tables and mingled.
Stacie made a point of stopping beside the few Cavanaugh connections who were present and dutifully passing the time of day. As usual, several of the ladies inquired in an arch tone as to her own matrimonial intentions, but she’d long ago learned how to turn such queries aside without giving offense and also without revealing any of her thoughts.
If they only knew...
But no one knew as much about what Lavinia, the late marchioness and Stacie’s mother, had done than Stacie. No one else knew the full extent of the scandalous behavior in which Lavinia had indulged. As a child, then a young girl growing up in her mother’s shadow, always in her mother’s household and held very close under her mother’s not-so-loving wing, Stacie had seen far too much to ever trust herself.
To ever allow another to trust her with their heart.
She was her mother’s daughter. As many had reminded her even today, she was the spitting image of Lavinia in her heyday. Before the lines and wrinkles of dissipation had started to show.
And the similarity extended beneath the skin; manipulation was a skill that came far too readily to Stacie’s mind.
Sometimes, it was almost second nature.
A nature she’d sworn to resist.
She had no ambition whatsoever to follow in her mother’s footsteps. That, in fact, was her one ambition—to never become another Lavinia.
Which meant that she could never marry.
She would not risk it. Even marriages of convenience had been known to end in mutual affection—and even that was a temptation to manipulation she might not be able to resist, not if the lure was constantly before her.
She’d been there, in her parents’ household; she’d seen what manipulation had done to their marriage—how deeply the slow death of her father’s trust in his wife had hurt him.
The payments Stacie received from the marquessate as stipulated by her father’s will were generous; she didn’t need to marry to keep a suitable roof over her head or pay an appropriate staff. And as Lady Eustacia Cavanaugh, with her connection through Mary to the powerful Cynster family, she didn’t need a husband’s title to give her standing in the ton.
The tables had been removed and chairs set in the corners for those who needed to sit. Now the musicians started up, and Stacie joined the other guests in watching Kit and Sylvia circle the floor in their first waltz as a married couple. As was expected, she and her partner—Godfrey—joined the other couples of the bridal party in the second revolution. Then the rest of the guests joined in, and laughter and merriment bubbled all around.
Subsequently, she danced with Wayland Cobworth, Kit’s longtime friend and business partner, and learned how their new enterprise, Cavanaugh Yachts, was faring.
Then exhibiting not the slightest preference, she danced with the others who admiringly solicited her hand.
She was a past master at slipping from their side with a smile at the end of each measure.
Finally, the musicians put up their bows, and she was free to wander the hall. She’d noticed Godfrey circling the walls, pausing before each portrait that adorned the paneling. She caught up with him, sliding her arm through his and looking up at the portrait he was presently studying.
He glanced at her, then returned his gaze to the picture—of a man in robes with a chain of gold discs hanging halfway down his chest. A past mayor, she supposed. “What are you doing?”
“Hmm? Oh, examining these. Some are really quite good. I wonder if the council knows the value of what they have hangin
g in this hall.”
She peered more closely at the painting, trying to find a signature. “Are they really that valuable?”
Godfrey sent her a sidelong glance. “Enough to warrant stealing. Not that I’m about to embark on a life of crime.”
“Good to know.”
The exchange reminded her of something that had struck her the day before, when the bridal party had gathered at Kit’s house and everyone had been sitting around catching up with each other’s news.