“No, no,” she said, still feeling terribly distracted by all this. She was a widow, for heavens sake. Men weren’t supposed to bring her flowers. Were they?

“My lady?”

“I… I…” She turned to Priestley, straightening her spine as she forced her mind back to clarity. Or tried. “I will just, ah, have a look at…” She turned to the nearest bouquet, a lovely and delicate arrangement of grape hyacinths and stephanotis. “A pale comparison to your eyes,” the card read. It was signed by the Marquess of Chester.

“Oh!” Francesca gasped. Lord Chester’s wife had died two years earlier. Everyone knew he was looking for a new bride.

Barely able to contain the oddly giddy feeling rising within her, she inched down toward an arrangement of roses and picked up the card, trying very hard not to appear too eager in front of the butler. “I wonder who this is from,” she said with studied casualness.

A sonnet. From Shakespeare, if she remembered correctly. Signed by Viscount Trevelstam.

Trevelstam? They’d only been introduced but once. He was young, very handsome, and it was rumored that his father had squandered away most of the family fortune. The new viscount would have to marry someone wealthy. Or so everyone said.

“Good heavens!”

Francesca turned to see Janet behind her.

“What is this?” she asked.

“I do believe those were my exact words upon entering the room,” Francesca murmured. She handed Janet the two cards, then watched her carefully as her eyes scanned the neatly handwritten lines.

Janet had lost her only child when John had died. How would she react to Francesca being wooed by other men?

“My goodness,” Janet said, looking up. “You seem to be this season’s Incomparable.”

“Oh, don’t be silly,” Francesca said, blushing. Blushing? Good God, what was wrong with her? She didn’t blush. She hadn’t even blushed during her first season, when she really had been an Incomparable. “I’m far too old for that,” she mumbled.

“Apparently not,” Janet said.

“There are more in the hall,” Priestley said.

Janet turned to Francesca. “Have you looked through all the cards?”

“Not yet. But I imagine-”

“That they’re more of the same?”

Francesca nodded. “Does that bother you?”

Janet smiled sadly, but her eyes were kind and wise. “Do I wish you were still married to my son? Of course. Do I want you to spend the rest of your life married to his memory? Of course not.” She reached out and clasped one of Francesca’s hands in her own. “You are a daughter to me, Francesca. I want you to be happy.”

“I would never dishonor John’s memory,” Francesca assured her.

“Of course not. If you were the sort who would, he’d never have married you in the first place. Or,” she added with a sly look, “I would never have allowed him to.”

“I would like children,” Francesca said. Somehow she felt the need to explain it, to make sure that Janet understood that what she truly wanted was to be a mother, not necessarily a wife.

Janet nodded, turning away as she dabbed at her eyes with her fingertips. “We should read the rest of the these cards,” she said, her brisk tone signaling that she’d like to move on, “and perhaps prepare ourselves for an onslaught of afternoon calls.”

Francesca followed her as she sought out an enormous display of tulips and plucked the card free. “I rather think the callers will be women,” Francesca said, “inquiring after Michael.”

“You may be right,” Janet replied. She held the card up. “May I?”

“Of course.”

Janet scanned the words, then looked up and said, “Cheshire.”

Francesca gasped, “As in the Duke of?”

“The very one.”

Francesca actually placed her hand over her heart. “My word,” she breathed. “The Duke of Cheshire.”

“You, my dear, are clearly the catch of the season.”

“But I-”

“What the devil is this?”

It was Michael, catching a vase he’d nearly overturned and looking extremely cross and put out.

“Good morning, Michael,” Janet said cheerfully.

He nodded at her, then turned to Francesca and grumbled, “You look as if you’re about to pledge allegiance to your sovereign lord.”

“And that would be you, I imagine?” she shot back, quickly dropping her hand to her side. She hadn’t even realized it was still over her heart.

“If you’re lucky,” he muttered.

Francesca just gave him a look.

He smirked right back in return. “And are we opening a flower shop?”

“No, but clearly we could,” Janet replied. “They’re for Francesca,” she added helpfully.

“Of course they’re for Francesca,” he muttered, “although, good God, I don’t know who would be idiot enough to send roses.”

“I like roses,” Francesca said.

“Everyone sends roses,” he said dismissively. “They’re trite and old, and”-he motioned to Trevelstam’s yellow ones-“who sent this?”

“Trevelstam,” Janet answered.

Michael let out a snort and swung around to face Francesca. “You’re not going to marry him, are you?”

“Probably not, but I fail to see what-”

“He hasn’t two shillings to rub together,” he stated.

“How would you know?” Francesca asked. “You haven’t even been back a month.”

Michael shrugged. “I’ve been to my club.”

“Well, it may be true, but it is hardly his fault,” Francesca felt compelled to point out. Not that she felt any great loyalty to Lord Trevelstam, but still, she did try to be fair, and it was common knowledge that the young viscount had spent the last year trying to repair the damage his profligate father had done to the family fortunes.

“You’re not marrying him, and that’s final,” Michael announced.

She should have been annoyed by his arrogance, but the truth was, she was mostly just amused. “Very well,” she said, lips twitching. “I’ll select someone else.”

“Good,” he grunted.

“She has many to choose from,” Janet put in.

“Indeed,” Michael said caustically.

“I’m going to have to find Helen,” Janet said. “She won’t want to miss this.”

“I hardly think the flowers are going to fly out the window before she rises,” Michael said.

“Of course not,” Janet replied sweetly, giving him a motherly pat on the arm.

Francesca quickly swallowed a laugh. Michael would hate that, and Janet knew it.

“She does adore her flowers, though,” Janet said. “May I take one of the arrangements up to her?”

“Of course,” Francesca replied.

Janet reached for Trevelstam’s roses, then stopped herself. “Oh, no, I had better not,” she said, turning back around to face Michael and Francesca. “He might stop by, and we wouldn’t want him to think we’d banished his flowers to some far corner of the house.”

“Oh, right,” Francesca murmured, “of course.”

Michael just grunted.

“Nevertheless, I’d better go tell her about this,” Janet said, and she turned and hurried up the stairs.

Michael sneezed, then glared at a particularly innocuous display of gladiolas. “We’re going to have to open a window,” he grumbled.

“And freeze?”

“I’ll wear a coat,” he ground out.

Francesca smiled. She wanted to grin. “Are you jealous?” she asked coyly.

He swung around and nearly leveled her with a dumbstruck expression.

“Not over me” she said quickly, almost blushing at the thought. “My word, not that”

“Then what?” he asked, his voice quiet and clipped.

“Well, just-I mean-” She motioned to the flowers, a clear display of her sudden popularity. “Well, we’re both after much the same goal this season, aren’t we?”

He just stared at her blankly.

“Marriage” she said. Good heavens, he was particularly obtuse this morning.

“Your point?”

She let out an impatient breath. “I don’t know if you had thought about it, but I’d naturally assumed you would be the one to be relentlessly pursued. I never dreamed that I would… Well…”

“Emerge as a prize to be won?”

It wasn’t the nicest way of putting it, but it wasn’t exactly inaccurate, so she just said, “Well, yes, I suppose.”

For a moment he said nothing, but he was watching her strangely, almost wryly, and then he said, his voice quiet, “A man would have to be a fool not to want to marry you.”

Francesca felt her mouth form a surprised oval. “Oh,” she said, quite at a loss for words. “That’s… that’s… quite the nicest thing you could have said to me just now.”

He sighed and ran his hand through his hair. She decided not to tell him that he’d just deposited a streak of yellow pollen into the black strands.

“Francesca,” he said, looking tired and weary and something else.

Regretful?

No, that was impossible. Michael wasn’t the sort to regret anything.

“I would never begrudge you this. You…” He cleared his throat. “You should be happy.”

“I-” It was the strangest moment, especially after their tense words the night before. She hadn’t the faintest clue how to reply, and so she just changed the subject and said, “Your turn will come.”

He looked at her quizzically.

“It already has, really,” she continued. “Last night. I was besieged with far more admirers for your hand than for my own. If women could send flowers, we’d be completely awash with them.”

He smiled, but the sentiment didn’t quite reach his eyes. He didn’t look angry, just… hollow.

And she was struck by what a strange observation that was.

“Er, last night,” he said, reaching up and tugging at his cravat. “If I said anything to upset you…”

She watched his face. It was so dear to her, and she knew every last detail of it. Four years, it seemed, did little to smudge a memory. But something was different now. He’d changed, but she wasn’t sure how.

And she wasn’t sure why.

“Everything is fine,” she assured him.