Barely a Bride (Free Fellows League 1)

Her mother sighed once again. “The one on the left is Viscount Grantham. The one in the center is Viscount Abernathy…”

Good heavens! So that was Lord Abernathy…Abernathy who wasn’t ignorant or a fool, but who was a sworn Free Fellow. Whatever that was.

“I had no idea Sussex was a part of their group. He’s a year or so younger.” Alyssa turned her attention back to what her mother was saying. “Shepherdston, Abernathy, and Grantham are boon companions, and now it seems that Sussex is as well… Of course, that will probably change after your marriage. It is always understood that once a gentleman marries, he relinquishes his previous friendships with his unmarried friends and begins a new life with his wife and their friends.”

“How horrible!” Alyssa was shocked.

“You say that now,” Lady Tressingham said, “but you’ll feel differently when you’re a duchess. Look up and smile. He’s headed this way.”

“A duchess?” Alyssa blinked. “I don’t want to be a duchess.”

Chapter Six

“I’ve met the future Viscountess Abernathy. We appear to share similar sensibilities. I’ve no delusions of grandeur. Fortunately, neither has she.”

—Griffin, Lord Abernathy, journal notation, 26 April 1810

“And I, for one, am relieved to hear it.”

Lady Tressingham gasped. “Where did you come from?”

“According to family legend, my mother and father gave birth to me. Here in London. Some years ago.”

Alyssa recognized his voice the moment he spoke. She looked up to find her gaze snared and held fast by the bluest pair of eyes she’d ever seen. Eyes she recognized from two other occasions.

He bowed first to her mother and then to her as Lady Cowper, the most amiable of Almack’s seven patronesses, made the necessary introductions. “Lady Tressingham, may I present to you Lord Abernathy?”

The countess nodded reluctantly.

Lady Cowper beamed at the viscount and then at Alyssa. “Lord Abernathy, Lady Tressingham and her daughter, Lady Alyssa Carrollton.”

“Lady Tressingham.” The viscount lifted her hand and brushed his lips over her knuckles.

“We were expecting someone else,” she offered by way of apology.

“I gathered,” he said, before lifting Alyssa’s hand and brushing his lips against it. “Lady Alyssa.”

“My lord,” Alyssa murmured.

Lord Abernathy turned to Lady Cowper. “Thank you most kindly for the introduction.”

“Not at all, dear boy,” she replied. “Glad to be of service. To you both.” She gave Alyssa a mysterious smile. “Enjoy yourselves in the waltz.”

“The waltz?” Lady Tressingham glanced at Lady Cowper.

Lady Cowper’s smile broadened. “Many of our ladies and gentlemen have danced the waltz in their travels abroad. And although it is not generally accepted here in England, we—the other patronesses and I—have decided to be the first to allow one waltz an evening.” She turned to Lord Abernathy. “I believe it’s next.”

Griffin recognized an opening when he saw it. “Do you waltz, Lady Alyssa?”

Alyssa nodded. The dance instructor her mother had hired had taught them all—Lady Tressingham and her four daughters—how to waltz, even though the dance had not yet found acceptance in England.

“May I?” Griffin bowed to Alyssa, then took her by the hand and led her onto the dance floor.

Her thoughts were in turmoil as he whirled her around the room in time to the music. Raising her chin a bit higher in order to meet his gaze, Alyssa found herself staring into the intricately tied folds of his cravat. He was taller up close than he’d looked at a distance and far more handsome. He wasn’t as classically handsome as his friend the duke. Lord Abernathy’s face was a bit too masculine, his features too strong. But his eyes, as blue as a newborn baby’s, were truly gorgeous and succeeded in softening what might have otherwise been too rugged a face.

Alyssa studied the line of his jaw and the tiny indentation in the center of his chin. Although she was certain that he had shaved earlier, the shadow of his beard had begun to darken his jaw. She wondered how his whiskers would feel beneath her fingertips, how they would feel against the tip of her tongue.

“A penny for your thoughts.”