He had come for one reason only: because he had said that he would.
A solicitor was only as good as his word. Who would trust a lawyer who failed to keep his promises? Arguably, a chef’s word was even more sacrosanct. Who would return to dine at the table of a man whose fish were not fresh, his ices not cold, his lemon curd not tart, his béchamel not creamy, his plum pudding not sweet?
Oh, very well, perhaps he had put in an appearance for a reason besides honor: His goddess had intrigued him. He did not wish to leave her in a bind. If there was a way for John to make things go right for her, he had been keen to do so.
Now, even more so. This temporary charade served them both. She could return home after her holiday with her cousins none the wiser about her innocent deception, and John could actually enjoy his holiday. A welcome respite from being…well, John.
But he was not thinking about his new pseudonym when he climbed into bed later that night. Nor was his debacle in London on his mind when he awoke with a gasp of pleasure from a sensual dream.
It was Miss Allegra Brown who had not left his mind.
She had looked just as stunning in ethereal blue as she had perched atop a runaway phaeton. The sort of woman to inspire frescoes…or, perhaps, lovelorn sonnets composed with the aid of one’s conveniently omnipresent pirate bard.
From Blond Ringlets (Miss Portia Townsend) and her cohort Pert Nose (Miss Dorcas Townsend), John had gathered that the delectable Miss Brown was a first cousin on the maternal side of the family, but was considered more like a sister, having never been farther than arm’s reach away for as long as they could remember.
The young ladies’ concern was not that Captain Hamish L’Amour might not actually be a fearsome sea-roving lawless scoundrel devoted to conquering every corner of the globe in the most improbable fashion imaginable…but rather, that he was, and that this meant he would take their dear Allegra away from them. Perhaps for good.
He had tried to assure them that he had no intention of permanently absconding with their glorious cousin, but these assurances were the ones met with the greatest degree of skepticism. Miss Dorcas had warned him that Allegra dropping by to visit once every twelve years would feel like losing their cousin all over again each time.
Miss Portia had simply stared up at him with glossy eyes and pleaded for Allegra’s happiness to come first in all things.
John rather suspected that when the great Captain L’Amour bid his inevitable adieu from Miss Brown, never to sail back into her life again, the Misses Townsend would find themselves in a conflict of emotions. Devastated on behalf of their cousin’s ostensibly broken heart, and relieved that Miss Brown would not be pillaged from them after all.
He settled at his escritoire, laden with themed stacks of books. He’d put in his appearance and danced his dance, but for now the charade was through. There was work to be done. Recipes to be refined and collated, meals to be planned for every occasion and palate. Perhaps he would even have another stroll past that perfect corner shop that would have made a most charming tea room.
If he happened to run into Miss Brown or the Misses Townsend over the course of his stay, he would simply put on his best—and briefest—Captain L’Amour act for a moment or two, then hurry back to his study to carry on with the rest of his life.
Until John became a renowned (not infamous) chef of critical acclaim and public favor, he would not invite bad luck by allowing his focus to slip from his mission. To succeed, he needed to craft the perfect plan, and then stick to every single letter. Cinnamon biscuits came to those who followed the recipe. All one needed for a perfect life was to gather the right ingredients and heed the written instructions.
Step One: Avoid any further entanglement with Miss Brown.
No matter how bewitching she might be.
Allegra awoke as she always did: in a nightrail made soft and thin with age, her hair springing every direction but down.
There was no hope for the hair, but she slipped on one of her sturdy, all-purpose dresses, stitched together from the still-usable bits of its predecessors, and hurried to help her cousins into their new walking dresses.
“Captain L’Amour was lovely,” Portia said. “Absolutely everything you said he would be.”
“Have you made plans to see each other again?” asked Dorcas.
“Not yet,” Allegra replied.
Not yet and not likely. He had agreed not to expose her as a liar, not to join a theatre troupe for an unceasing summer-long production. He had his own business to attend to, just as she had hers: the wiggling, fidgeting young ladies whose ringlets Allegra was attempting to style without burning their ears off with the curling tongs.
“Did you see the ex-sailor I danced with?” Portia asked her sister.
“No,” Dorcas answered. “I was trying to memorize all the names and faces of my own partners.”
“His name is Mr. Mayhew and he asked for a second dance.”
“Did you give it to him?”
“I could not. Every dance was spoken for. I hope to see him again before next week’s ball.”
“Papa hopes you’ll see a viscount or a marquess.”
“I might have liked that,” Portia said, “before I met Mr. Mayhew.”
Dorcas grinned at her. “I think you do need a dip in cold water.”
Portia giggled and handed Allegra a pink ribbon to thread through Portia’s hair.
Allegra did not personally see the point in wearing fine clothes and arranging one’s hair, simply to walk down to the beach and enter a fully enclosed private bathing machine, in which one removed one’s fancy walking dress and put on a bathing costume in order to be dunked three times in the sea.
But this was Brighton, where the beau monde might lurk around every corner. Portia and Dorcas had been unqualified successes last night at the ball, dancing each set with a new partner, and understandably did not wish to spoil the image by appearing a perfect dowd the next morning.
How viscerally Allegra understood that disinclination!
When she was younger, she had compensated for her discomfort by deciding she liked the scraps she was given. Claimed it as part of her personal style. That she dressed this way by choice.
Her poverty was not her cousins’ fault. They did not control the purse strings. Only in the past year had they grown tall enough to own dresses that might conceivably fit Allegra’s frame.
From their perspective, Allegra had always looked this unfashionable. It was difficult to notice an injustice when the injustice was “just the way things are.”
Oh, how Uncle would bristle to know Allegra framed his charity as injustice, even within the sanctity of her mind! She was housed, was she not? Fed? Clothed? Only the most ungrateful of leeches would presume herself the equal of his own daughters, and not the penniless ward thrust upon him against his will by scurrilous solicitors in a court of law.
He had done his duty, Uncle was fond of reminding her. A duty which had expired on her twenty-first birthday, he was even more fond of reminding her. That she would think herself owed anything above than the mercy and largesse he had already bestowed upon her…
“What are you going to do this morning, Allegra?” Portia asked.
Not frequent one of the bathing machines. Those cost money that Allegra did not have. Even if a coin fell from the sky, she would save her shilling for a sweet at the confectioner’s shop. If she wanted the waves, she could walk into the sea from the shore, as many of the locals did.