When an Earl Meets a Girl (Chase Family, #1)

by Lauren Royal

London April 22, 1661 THE LAST TIME Amethyst Goldsmith saw her king, she was five years old and he was about to have his head severed from his body. Now, twelve years later, she sincerely hoped his son would have better luck.

Hugh and Edith Goldsmith joined her, shaking their heads at their daughter’s tenacity. Hugh’s sister Elizabeth squeezed in behind. Ignoring the grumbling of displaced spectators, Amy spread her feet wide to save more room at the front. “Robert, over here!” Robert Stanley tugged on her long black plait as he wedged himself in beside her. She shot him a grin; he was fun. Although he’d arrived just last week to train as her father’s apprentice, Amy had known for years that she was to marry him. So far they seemed to be compatible, although he’d been surprised to find she was far more skilled as a jeweler than he. Surprised and none too pleased, Amy suspected. But he would get over those feelings.

“Marry come up, Robert! You must be pleased King Charles will be crowned tomorrow. Twelve years of Cromwell’s rule was enough. Now we have music and dancing again.”

Feeling a stab of sympathy, Amy hugged her around the waist. Aunt Elizabeth had lost her three children to smallpox last year. “We need her artistry here,” Amy’s father protested, poking his sister good-naturedly. “Your shop will have to do without.” “Ah, Hugh, how selfish you are!” Aunt Elizabeth chided. “Hoarding my niece’s talent for your own profit.” She aimed a mischievous smile at her brother. “No wonder we moved to France to escape the competition.” Amy grinned. Aunt Elizabeth and Uncle William had been forced to move their shop when business fell off during the Commonwealth years. But they’d flourished in Paris, becoming jewelers to the French court, and wouldn’t think of returning now.

Amy didn’t care for horses—she was terrified of them, truth be told—so she paid no attention to the magnificent beast himself. But three hundred of her family’s diamonds sparkled on the gold stirrups and bosses, among the twelve thousand lent for the occasion. “Oh, Papa,” she breathed, “I wish we could have designed that saddle.”

Before her family even stopped laughing, the king was gone, as suddenly as he had arrived. But the spectacle wasn’t over.

Yet none of it mattered to Amy, for there was a nobleman riding her way. It wasn’t the richness of his clothing that caught her eye, for in truth his garb was rather plain. His black velvet suit was trimmed with naught but gold braid; his wide-brimmed hat boasted only a single white plume. He wore no fancy crimped periwig; instead his own raven hair fell in gleaming waves to his shoulders. Deep emerald eyes bore into Amy’s, singling her out as he angled his horse in her direction. His glossy black gelding breathed close, but she felt no fear, for the man held her safe with his piercing green gaze. It seemed as though he could see through her eyes right into her soul. Her cheeks flamed; never in her almost-seventeen years had a man looked at her like that.

She looked back, and he grinned as he passed, a devastating slash of white that made Amy melt inside.

“Amy?” Robert tugged on her hand. She turned and gazed into his eyes: pale blue, not green. They didn’t make her melt inside, didn’t make her feel anything.

Her father paused to unlock their door. Overhead, a wooden sign swung gently in the breeze. A nearby bonfire illuminated the image of a falcon and the gilt letters that proclaimed their shop Goldsmith & Sons, Jewellers.

Robert stepped onto the balcony and moved close. His voice was quiet beside her. “This is a day I’ll never forget.” “I’ll never forget it, either,” she said, thinking of the man on the black steed, the man with the emerald eyes. Robert tilted her face up, bending his head to place a soft, chaste kiss on her lips. It was their first kiss; she was supposed to feel fireworks. But she felt nothing.

Five years later August 24, 1666 “ARE YOU TELLING me you made this bracelet? A girl? This shop is Goldsmith & Sons, is it not?” Robert Stanley puckered his freckled face and made his voice high and wavering. “Where are the sons?” From where she stood by the stone oven, Amethyst Goldsmith’s laughter rang through the workshop. “Lady Smythe! A perfect imitation.”

Robert’s pale blue eyes twinkled, but he stayed in character, cupping a hand to his ear. “Imitation? Imitation, did you say? I was led to believe this was a quality jewelry shop, madame. I expect genuine —”

Five years she’d lived and worked with Robert Stanley, and he still didn’t understand her. She couldn’t believe it. She was marrying him in two weeks, and she couldn’t believe that, either. Once it had seemed like a lifetime stretched ahead of her before she had to wed. She’d put it off, and put it off, then last spring her father had announced she was twenty-two and it was time to get on with it. He’d set a date, and that had been that. No matter that Robert thought his wife should stay upstairs and mend his clothes; no matter that he resented it when her designs sold faster and she received more custom orders than he did. No matter that she didn’t love him. Not the way a wife should love a husband.

She would learn to love Robert, her father said. But it hadn’t happened—not yet, anyway. Not even close.

He rose and came up behind her, tilting her head back with a hand beneath her chin. “Two more weeks, and a proper wife you’ll be.” With little finesse, his mouth came down on hers. The faint scent of his breakfast had her squeezing her eyes shut and praying for the end to this torment. “Part your lips, Amy,” he demanded against her mouth. She didn’t. She wished he’d use one of those newfangled little silver toothbrushes Aunt Elizabeth had sent from Paris. Finally he raised his head. “Two weeks,” he repeated.

“Hugh Goldsmith won’t be here forever.” His hand moved to snake down her bodice. Amy’s gaze flickered toward the showroom in warning. Wrenching away, he strode back to his workbench, back to his ale. “At least soon he won’t be able to threaten me with bodily harm for sullying his virginal daughter,” he spat, raising the tankard in a salute. “Two weeks,” he added with a grin. A grin that Amy had once thought boyish, engaging…but of late had made her uneasy. They both turned as the bell on the outside door tinkled. Amy stood and whipped off her apron. “I’ll get it.” “Your father is out there,” Robert reminded her. “He can handle it.”

“A locket,” a young woman at the far end of the L-shaped case was saying, smiling up at a gentleman with his back to Amy.

The tall man addressed Papa. “My sister would like a locket.” He urged the lady—his sister, not his mistress—forward. “Go on, Kendra, see what you fancy.”

“Have you a style in mind, or a price, Lord…?” “Greystone.” His back still to Amy, he waved an impatient hand. “Whatever she likes.” Papa cleared his throat. “Perhaps my daughter can help you decide. Amethyst, please show Lord Greystone the lockets.” She took a tray from the case and moved to set it before the man’s sister instead.

She snapped open the locket and extended it, looking from Lady Kendra to Lord Greystone. “It’s—” Her voice failed her. Papa nudged her, frowning. “Amy?” “It-it’s quite feminine,” she stammered out, telling herself Lord Greystone couldn’t be the man she remembered. But then his emerald green eyes locked on hers—as they’d done five years earlier. He was the man she remembered, the man she’d been unable to forget… The nobleman from the coronation procession. Her heart seemed to pause in her chest, and for a second she thought she would drown in those eyes; then she looked away, with an effort, and down to the locket she was holding.

When he finally spoke, his voice, smooth and deep, sent a shiver down her spine. “Have you a locket with…amethysts?” Amethysts… She opened her mouth to answer, but the words refused to come out.

largest key, then lifted the lid and rummaged inside. Luckily, the locket she was after was there in the top tray. “Ah, here it is.” Just seeing the piece, the shimmering gold, the sparkling gems, made her smile. She rose and headed back to the showroom, Robert at her heels. He lounged against the archway and fixed Lord Greystone with a distrustful blue stare. Well, she would just ignore him.

Lord Greystone blinked at the piece in his hand. “Beautiful. It’s truly beautiful.” Amy’s heart swelled. “It does have amethysts, my lord, and diamonds, too.” “I can see that,” he said, staring at the locket. “It’s splendid.” It had taken her weeks to make it, so many hours she could still see it with her eyes closed. On top, a cutwork pattern of diamond-set leaves surrounded an amethyst flower. The lozenge-shaped locket dangled beneath, encrusted with amethysts and diamonds, its lid enameled with delicate violets. Swinging from the bottom, a large baroque pearl gleamed.

“I made it.” Amy felt a flush blossom on her cheeks. Lady Kendra’s mouth dropped open in surprise. Lord Greystone’s startled gaze swung to Amy, over to her father, who nodded proudly, then back to Amy. “I don’t believe it. You’re—” “A woman?” She heard the challenge in her own voice. His grin was a bit sheepish. “However did you learn to make something like this?”

“Well, jewelry was much frowned upon, other than some mourning pieces. I had time aplenty to train Amy in the arts of goldsmithing.” Amy’s father placed a possessive hand on her shoulder. “She’s a natural—even did the enameling herself.”

As she returned the pouch to Lord Greystone, he handed her the locket. His fingers brushed her hand, and a brief, warm shiver rippled through her. Her breath caught; she hoped no one noticed. Robert sullenly pulled a cloth from his apron pocket and moved from the archway to stand beside her.

Lord Greystone ushered his sister outside, then lingered in the doorway, looking oddly reluctant to leave. “Can…” The long fingers of one hand drummed against his muscled thigh, then stopped. “Can you make a signet ring?” His question came low across the small shop, to Amy, not her father. “A signet ring?” she said with a small smile. “Of course, it’s a simple matter.” Beside her, Robert stopped polishing. “Excellent.” Lord Greystone paused, frowning a bit. “I’ll send a messenger with a drawing of the crest,” he said at last. “And my direction to deliver it when you’re finished.” Amy nodded, feeling a quick stab of disappointment that she wouldn’t be seeing him again. Robert’s hand resumed its deliberate circular motion on top of the counter.

“I cannot believe you sold your locket,” he remarked. “I thought it was your favorite piece.” “It was,” she answered dreamily. “But I can make another one.” Her stomach fluttered with happiness, just knowing Lord Greystone admired her craftsmanship and his sister would be wearing her locket. And soon, he would be wearing her ring. “If you ask me, it was a clod-headed idea,” Robert put in with a shake of his carrot-topped head. “You’ll never find time to make another locket with all the custom orders you get.” Amy and her father shared a quizzical look. “Besides, I didn’t like him,” Robert added. “I didn’t like the way he looked at you.” Amy lowered her gaze and brushed past him into the workshop. She’d liked the way Lord Greystone looked at her, very much. Very much indeed.

Colin could have asked himself that question. He’d known he was acting out of character, but in all his twenty-eight years he’d never met anyone like the girl who had made that exquisite locket. He’d wanted his sister to own it, and he’d wanted something she’d made for him, too. “I need a signet ring, for a seal.” Kendra shot him a look of patent disbelief. “You couldn’t even afford this locket.” She shook her bright head. “Something happened in that shop.” “Nothing happened,” he said, although he knew very well something had. He’d noticed the way the girl’s amethyst gaze had been drawn to his own. She’d felt it, too—that compelling, undeniable attraction. Remembering, he smiled to himself. It made a man feel good, though nothing would ever come of it.

She was completely off limits, of course. Not a widow, not an actress, not a lightskirt, not a highborn member of King Charles’s licentious court.

A sheltered young woman of the merchant class, she would never bed with any man outside of marriage. And Colin Chase, Earl of Greystone, had no intention of marrying beneath himself.

Besides, he was already betrothed to the perfect woman.

As they passed Goldsmith & Sons, he glanced out the window. He would never go back there. It had been a harmless flirtation, nothing more. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d set foot in a jewelry shop, and… No, he had no reason to ever return.

“Ring-a-ring o’roses A pocket full of posies A-tishoo! A-tishoo! We all fall down.”

Amy looked down to the seamstress who knelt at her feet, pinning up the hem of her wedding dress. “I’m sorry, Mrs. Cholmley,” she said with a sniffle. A tear escaped and splashed on the older woman’s hand. Mrs. Cholmley glanced up, concern in her kind hazel eyes. “Reminds you of your poor mama, don’t it? The children playing outside, I mean?” Amy nodded, blinking back more tears.

“It’s only a game, dear. Do you think they even know what they’re singing?” The seamstress reached absently for more pins, talking to herself, so far as Amy could tell. “Roses, the rash; posies to sweeten the putrid air. The ring is…the plague-token, of course.”

“And your mama? Did she suffer one?” Her gaze dropped to Mrs. Cholmley’s gray head. “Suffer what?” “A plague-token.” Would this woman never stop chattering? Amy’s fists clenched. “We don’t know. At the first sign of fever, she begged us to go to Paris and stay with Aunt Elizabeth.” Her voice dropped to a whisper. “I was in Paris. I don’t know what happened to her. I know only that she’s gone.” “Hard to believe a year has passed. It feels like yesterday they painted that red cross on my door. House after house marked for the quarantine and staffed with guards, all up and down the street. I thought I was like to meet my maker, right enough. And the death carts rattling by…’Bring out your dead! Bring out your dead!’” Mrs. Cholmley shuddered and pinned. “My Edgar was buried in a plague pit. Your mother, as well?” Amy shut her eyes and bit a mark into her lower lip. “We think so. We’ve found no grave.”

Ten more days and she would be Robert’s wife. Ten days! It seemed impossible. For six months now, her father had gone about making wedding plans, and she’d done nothing to stop him. It had given him something to think about in the wake of his wife’s death, and Amy hadn’t found the strength to fight him. It had all seemed so very far away. But now her wedding day was almost here. Every morning she woke up wishing it were no more than a bad dream. She had to find the courage to call off this wedding before it was too late. Now.

Papa sighed. “These marriages—they’re the way our trade works. I want your word that Goldsmith & Sons will go on. I need your promise.” “Nothing is happening to Goldsmith & Sons.”

The tool slowed as she focused on the ring—and the man who would wear it. A hazy image of Lord Greystone’s handsome features hovered in her mind. He’d just looked at her with his piercing emerald eyes, and she’d felt warm all over and known that it would never, just never, be that way with Robert.

Sighing, she turned to search her father’s concerned blue eyes. “It’s just Robert, Papa. He…he doesn’t understand me.” “He doesn’t have to understand you. You were promised to him years ago, and he knows his place. As a second son, he’s lucky—very lucky—to be marrying into a wealthy family, with his wife-to-be the sole heir. Without you, Robert has nothing. He knows that. He’s the right man for you—the right man for Goldsmith & Sons.” Her father didn’t understand her, either. “He scares me when he touches me.” “You know nothing of the marriage bed, poppet. It won’t scare you for long.” Tears stinging the backs of her eyes, she sat up straighter. “He wants me to stop making jewelry.”

A short, harsh bark of laughter followed that statement. “The man is feeling impotent now. When his apprenticeship is finished, he’ll feel differently. He won’t care to do without the income from your designs.”

Her fingers clenched tight around Lord Greystone’s ring as the tears that had been threatening welled up, and before she could stop herself, she dropped to her knees beside him. “Papa, look at me. Me!” She reached for his hands and grasped them in hers, the ring trapped somewhere amidst the tangle of their fingers. “Papa! Remember you told me I’d have a love, a love like yours and Mama’s? You promised, but it hasn’t happened! I don’t love Robert!” She felt a tear escape and roll down her cheek as her desperate eyes implored his pained ones. “If something happened to him, I wouldn’t gaze at his picture, I wouldn’t—” “Enough!” He stood so abruptly that Amy fell back. Never had he raised his voice to her. Now in his fear, his loneliness, he lashed out. “I loved your mother—I still do—and she’s gone! I cannot work—I stare at her painting—I loved her so! Better you and Robert think straight. Not like me!” His shoulders slumped, and his voice dropped to a husky whisper. “Not like me.”

“I’m sorry, poppet.” His eyes fluttered closed and then open as he ran a shaky hand through the black tangles of his hair. “That it’s come to harsh words…I’m sorry. But there’s more to life than love. It will be better for you this way. You must see a bigger picture. Tradition, continuity…this is how our guild has survived for centuries.”

Like the vast majority of betrothal agreements, hers was not binding until consummation. No money had yet changed hands. There must be another way for her that would still preserve the business.

The words echoed in Amy’s head, summing up her destiny. She was stuck, as sure as an insect in amber.

You cannot have everything. “Promise me, Amy. Promise me that Goldsmith & Sons won’t end with you.” “You have my promise.” “I love you, poppet,” Papa said quietly. He only wanted what was best for her. As she turned into his arms, the ring slipped from her fingers and clattered to the wooden floor. “I love you too, Papa,” she said.

IT WAS A LONG time before she bent to pick up the ring, an even longer time before Robert came in to find her staring at it. He stood over her. “You still working on that damned signet?” She looked up at him, but couldn’t find the energy to summon as much as annoyance.

Kendra paused before climbing from the carriage into Greystone’s little courtyard. “Listen.” A few low birdcalls, distant bleating from the fields, a faint rustle from the smattering of trees that stood sentinel around the tiny circular drive. “It sounds like no one’s home.” “No one is home,” Jason reminded her. “Colin has only Benchley for company until the renovations are further along, and he’s likely in the kitchen.” “Let’s go see the kitchen.” Ford urged them along. “Those pipes—” “That food—” “Those Chase stomachs!” Kendra laughed as they walked toward the door to Greystone’s modest living quarters. “I cannot say I’m surprised that Colin restored the kitchen first.”