Oh dear, her thoughts were flitting wildly. They occasionally received dignitaries and titled people in the shop, and thus she and her sisters had learned a little bit about keeping one’s head and maintaining a calm, professional behavior when nobility suddenly appeared. More often than not, however, their servants came in.
She certainly had not anticipated the praise regarding her chocolate creations would engender a marriage proposal from a duke. Besides, she had a suitor — if only she could recall his name or his face at that instant.
“And when I cast my net over London, one lady came to mind.”
He looked benignly at her. One lady came to mind? Herself! He sounded serious.
“Because you love chocolate?” she asked. Why else would he choose her?
He chuckled, and the sound made her shiver. How strange. She usually only had that exciting response when tasting a new strain of cacao bean or creating a brand-new chocolate sweet.
“I am not utterly enamored with it, no,” he said. “I have drunk my fair share like everyone else, but sometimes, it is oily, even slimy, or has a disagreeable aftertaste.”
Poor man! Amity shook her head. No one should suffer with inferior chocolate. The world had been made a better place, as far as she was concerned, when Dutch processed cocoa had been brought to England.
“Possibly, you have been drinking impure cocoa, my lord, with animal fat and potato flour. I assure you there is nothing more pleasant and delicious than a cup of Cadbury’s Cocoa Essence.”
“What I have eaten has been no better,” he protested. “Rather grainy, in fact. A little bitter and coarse.”
“Fry’s Chocolat Delicious à Manger,” she muttered, thinking of that company’s early solid chocolate bar. “Quite unpleasant by today’s standards,” she added. Chocolate had come so far since then. Apparently, the duke had not yet enjoyed the best.
He nodded. “I understand you can change my mind. I believe you can work wonders with your confectionery and make anyone say yes to anything — that’s what I was told. That’s what I’m counting on.”
Lately, she had been receiving rave reviews from all quarters, and even the palace had ordered a pound of her cleverly crafted chocolate squares, some infused with orange and some with raspberry liqueur.
Reaching for her reticule, which dangled from her wrist, Amity set it on her lap and opened the drawstring closure. Drawing out a very small, slightly crumpled paper bag, she held it out for him.
“Go ahead, my lord. Try a piece.”
He stared at the white sack with Rare Confectionery stamped upon it in blue ink. “You carry chocolate with you?”
“Almost always. Forgive the appearance. They might be a little squashed, but children seem to know who I am wherever I go around Mayfair, and they expect me to have something for them to sample, the same way they get to have a taste in the shop.”
He opened the top of the sack and peered inside.
“There should be three or four left, my lord. Assorted, so I cannot guarantee which flavor, but that’s half the fun, don’t you think?”
Glancing at her briefly, he looked again into the bag. “It is rather amusing,” he agreed, sounding surprised.
For her part, she loved nothing more than eating chocolate, except for making it, which she did almost daily in the back room of their lovely shop with her sisters nearby and her mother often at the counter.
“If you don’t care for these, and I don’t have a confection to your liking in our shop, then I can create one,” she insisted.
For the duke, her new husband, she would create a special line. The Pelham, smooth and creamy, with a hint of—
“It seems we are thinking in a likeminded way, Miss Rare-Foure. I do want a specially created confection. You see, I wish to be married in the not-too-distant future. Everything else is going well in my life, so it’s time. What do you say, Miss Rare-Foure? Will you help me with my marital goal? Please say yes.”
He was leaning forward so earnestly, making her heart beat a quick tattoo in her chest.
“My lord!” she exclaimed.
“Yes?” he queried.
“No, I meant the other ... that is....” She paused and pointed skyward. “Merely an expression, you know. Good lord, dear lord, oh, my lord!”
“Ah, yes, I see,” he agreed, looking at her as if she were a little touched in the head.
Amity needed to get this discussion back onto the marriage path before the duke opened the carriage door and sent her flying along with her confectionery supplies. Because while it was unusual amongst her class to be proposed to by a man she didn’t know, it was far more commonplace in the nobility. Perhaps to him, this abruptness was entirely normal. Moreover, he seemed, at first, second, and third glance and after a few minutes of discussion, to be someone extremely likable. His tone wasn’t nasally, nor was it harsh. His manner was friendly and agreeable. His brown hair was thick and a little wavy. And his eyes — a vivid shade of green — were clear, not red with lack of sleep or too much drink. Beyond that, he was a duke!
On the other hand, it was highly unlikely she could continue as a chocolatier if she were to become a duchess.
And just like that, her fantasy melted away. Nothing was more important to her than being with her family at Rare Confectionery and making chocolate.
“How long would it take?” he asked, breaking into her see-sawing thoughts.
Amity frowned. Many in the upper class were engaged for a year to prove there had not been a compromising indiscretion causing a rush to the altar. It also allowed the couple time to become familiar before marriage, since they usually didn’t know one another at the time of engagement any more than she knew the duke. In this case, a year or a day made no matter.
“I’m sorry, my lord. I cannot do it.” Dreaming of marrying him was a silly notion, yet it had been impossible not to muse upon his exciting request. After all, he was a larger-than-life duke.
“Are you so very busy at your shop? Can you not create something for me in a fortnight? I am having a large party in two weeks, and I want it revealed then.”
An engagement revealed in two weeks? Suddenly, Amity had an inkling she’d got the wrong end of the walking stick.
The duke nodded, looking satisfied. “I would be happy to come to your shop and assist by way of sampling or telling you my thoughts on the perfect confection.”
He wanted to come to her shop?
“I want something original, never hitherto tasted,” he continued. “And in two weeks, we shall reveal the chocolate at my party and entice the lady in question.”
She was beginning to realize she had made a rather large and erroneous assumption. Not usually considered a ninny, Amity had to put the blame on being swept into a carriage and “seemingly” propositioned by a duke. There could be no other explanation for allowing her fanciful thoughts to run away with her.
“Yes,” Amity changed her answer, thinking of the great benefit a duke’s patronage would mean for her family’s store. “I have time to create a chocolate for you. Go ahead and taste, my lord,” she insisted, reminding him he still held the bag of chocolates.
Watching him take one out at random, Amity had never hoped a customer enjoyed her confection more than at that moment. His eyes remained locked on her gaze as he popped the entire square in. She liked that, how he jumped right in.