A Kiss to Remember Read online

  A Kiss to Remember

  By

  Rebecca Minto

  Eternal Press

  A division of Damnation Books, LLC.

  P.O. Box 3931

  Santa Rosa, CA 95402-9998

  www.eternalpress.biz

  A Kiss to Remember

  by Rebecca Minto

  Digital ISBN: 978-1-61572-588-5

  Print ISBN: 978-1-61572-589-2

  Cover art by: Amanda Kelsey

  Edited by: Kim Richards

  Copyright 2012 Rebecca Minto

  Printed in the United States of America

  Worldwide Electronic & Digital Rights

  1st North American, Australian and UK Print Rights

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned or distributed in any form, including digital and electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without the prior written consent of the Publisher, except for brief quotes for use in reviews.

  This book is a work of fiction. Characters, names, places and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to any actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  For my sisters of heart, Niki and Chelekins. I couldn’t have done this without your love and support through the best and worst times of my life.

  I love you guys.

  Prologue

  Daphne Davernay awakened to the early morning light slowly, as was her fashion. She languidly stretched her arms wide, arching her back slightly off the down mattress she rested upon, much as a kitten arched her back to the luxury of long strokes from her master’s hand, before finally blinking her eyes to the light. She sighed pleasantly, slowly sitting up so she could survey the room that was hers.

  Oddly enough, she had not slept in this chamber as many times as she should have liked. When she was but seven years old, her father had sent her to a very proper, and horribly obscure, boarding school where he had paid a great sum of money for the instructors and the rather haughty headmistress to teach her all about being a proper lady and manners and comportment. Daphne had, of course, despised those tedious years and longed with every beat of her rather timid heart for those precious holidays when she was permitted to return to her home, and her wonderful Papa.

  Ironically, now that she had long since graduated from Miss Barton’s School for Girls, she found herself yearning to see her two best friends in the entire world, Annalise and Chrysanthe. They, too, had hated the school, and although the three of them were quite different in their likes and preferred pastimes, they had forged a strong and rather loyal friendship. She had not seen Annalise in a full six months, when she had begged Papa to take her to London with him on one of his infrequent business trips, and a full year had passed since she had last seen Chrysanthe.

  She shook her head, sending wild, wheat-colored curls bouncing around an endearingly heart-shaped face. It seemed she could not be pleased. When she wanted to be home, she was enforced to be far away, and now that she could spend as much time as she liked in the beautiful country estate that had always been home, she wanted nothing more than to go into the city to visit her friends.

  On that thought, the door of her bedchamber opened faintly, emitting a petite young girl with vibrant green eyes and rich, dark auburn hair secured in a prim little bun and carefully covered with a cap.

  “Oh, missus, you’re up then,” Darcie whispered, relieved.

  Daphne sent her a brilliant smile. “Oh, Darcie, you have been my maid for a full two years now,” she chastised lightly. “You should know I rise with the birds.”

  The young woman scurried in the room, quietly shutting the door behind her. She glanced warily at the lacy pink draperies, which had already been drawn to emit the bright morning light. She frowned, knowing full well she had shut them securely before retiring the night before. ‘Twas an oddity of her mistress, that she liked to sleep with the draperies drawn. She shook her head at the peculiarities of the elite.

  “I’d be getting more sleep meself if you’d stay abed longer,” Darcie murmured, her charming lilt bringing a fond smile to Daphne’s lips.

  Although the Irish were not particularly liked in England, Daphne adored Darcie. Her voice was so soft and musical, her shock so absolute. She was unspoiled and, like herself, took pleasure in the smaller, more inconsequential things, something that Daphne’s father, Baron Davernay, found amusing to the extreme.

  “I have no wish to miss any special moments,” Daphne told her gently. “I can just tell today will be a marvelous day!”

  With a jubilant giggle, Daphne threw back the covers and mock-danced to the window, staring out at the bright green hills, filled with flourishing trees and flowers and, vaguely in the distance, a beautiful lake that sparkled a deep blue in the summer and spring, and turned almost opaque in the cooler months. It was her most cherished place in all of her father’s lands.

  She turned her head, only to see Darcie warily looking through the ornate armoire, in preparation of dressing her lady. She sighed. Although Darcie was a joy, sometimes she simply refused to be charmed by her mistress, as she insisted on calling her. Daphne struggled so hard not to become annoyed at her desperate insistence of living out their roles, as was proper behavior. She pursed her lips as Darcie carefully removed a rather prim looking gown with a high neckline and rather dull pleats.

  “Oh, no, Darcie; I’ll need a riding habit,” she instructed her in a soft, tremulous voice. “The pink, I believe.”

  “Yes, m’lady,” her maid murmured, lowering her head as she did as she was bid. “Will you be wanting your breakfast first?”

  “Heavens, no!” Daphne giggled. “Papa and I are going for an early ride, and we shall pack a picnic for beside the lake. It will be so wonderful.”

  Daphne twirled herself in a graceful pirouette, humming a favorite tune under her breath. Her dark eyes sparkled with merriment.

  “I would think all that riding would be bad for your digestion,” Darcie muttered beneath her breath.

  Daphne laughed. “Of course not, Darcie! We shall work up quite an appetite. Besides, today is a very special day. We must celebrate every single moment.”

  Darcie sniffed as she laid out the necessary garments on a stool, then went to preparing a small basin of water for her lady to use to refresh herself. Daphne danced her way there and hurriedly began to sponge herself with lavender water.

  It took just under an hour for Darcie to sufficiently prepare her for a morning’s jaunt. When she finally descended the long, spiraling staircase that led down to the first level, it was just going on eight o’clock.

  She glanced around, shaking her head at the quiet hour. Servants had long since been up, doubtlessly cleaning and cooking and doing all those minute tasks that seemed so silly to her, but needed to be performed nonetheless. She slowly walked into the foyer, for it would not do for Papa to think all those years and all that money he spent on her proper education had been wasted, and glanced around. There was no sign of him, however, and she frowned.

  She passed down a hall, and peered into a rather lonely looking parlor, surprised that Papa was not waiting for her. He usually was up long before she was, which was early indeed, poring over all his ledgers and books and files. It seemed like a waste of time to her, but there was little she could do to convince him.

  She figured he must have overslept, and thought vaguely of going and waking him up. As important as this day was meant to be, he would hate that he had missed their appointment for the mornin
g picnic, even if he had stayed up nearly all the night poring over all his notes.

  She started back down the narrow corridor, deciding that she should awaken him, or at the very least ask his valet to do so, and then noticed the door to his private study was slightly ajar. She shook her head. Papa kept the door firmly locked when he was not inside, and he was the only one with a key.

  “Papa, surely you cannot be looking at those silly numbers,” she called out in exasperation as she swung the door wide.

  Daphne stopped still, staring at the head that rested against the heavy, dark wood of his desk. She strode forward, truly annoyed that he could so have exhausted himself over his silly books, and then stopped still, for this was a most unnatural scene.

  The scent is what stopped her first, for the room was filled with a musky, metallic scent, something oddly familiar yet, somehow, unfamiliar. She stared at her father, the wide eyes, the perpetual shock written across his features. Then her eyes lowered to the blank page upon the desk…a page grown such a dark color that it was almost black.

  Without another thought, Daphne ran to him, wrapping her arm around his shoulders, although a distant part of her already knew it was far too late.

  “Papa,” she whispered. Then she repeated his name in a frantic scream.

  His head lay in a heavy pool of blood on the desk, cold and sticky. Daphne wrapped herself around him, hugging him against her breast as she began to sob. She cried his name over and over and over again.

  As the realization slowly began to seep into her, her legs began to tremble and ultimately collapsed, and even then she was unable to release him. She clung to the cold, lifeless form of her father, the only man she had ever loved, sobbing unrepentantly.

  There was the sound of polished hard shoes on the glossy wood floors, but she was too absorbed in shocked grief to hear it, as the butler ran in, his face white.

  Orders were shouted, and Darcie came, struggling to get her mistress to release the dead body, but even then all Daphne could do was cling to her father as though all her world centered around him.

  Eventually, although it took four of the brawniest men in her father’s employ to manage the deed; they pried her fingers away from him and forcibly carried her trembling, sobbing body out of the room.

  It was a day Daphne Davernay would never forget. It was her eighteenth birthday.

  Chapter One

  Daphne jerked awake as the jerky, rolling movements of the hired carriage came to a stumbling halt. She wearily opened eyes made puffy from tears to peer out the dark window. It was full dark now, with only the faint silvery light of a half-moon to light the cobbled stones. It had been raining recently, as well, she realized unhappily, for the wet stone shone like jewels in the dark night.

  She waited for the footman to come around and open her door. When he reached up to fetch her down, she recoiled. She made a point of brushing the wrinkles out of her skirts before jumping down unassisted, only to stagger from hours of being cramped in that stuffy old conveyance.

  Ignoring the movements of servants who were already fetching down her baggage, she straightened the cloak around her shoulders and made towards the gleaming stone stairs that led up to an impressive townhouse. Her pulse was jumping madly with anxiety, but she shoved all thoughts of her possible welcome aside. With trembling fingers she managed to knock on the thick oaken door.

  An impossibly familiar, and much dreaded figure, dressed in his formal blacks, answered her summons. Villiers, the Duke of Cheney’s very proper butler, answered with his stern face set into a grimace of disapproval. She had known him for years, yet still after all this time he managed to intimidate her as only one other person ever had.

  “Miss Daphne,” Villiers greeted her, standing aside so she could enter the glittering foyer.

  She mumbled something that could be interpreted as gratitude as he took her dark cloak and folded it over his arm. She absently brushed back her tousled curls. They were beginning to knot and frizz from the moisture of the wet night. She glanced around the brightly-lit foyer in dismay.

  Although she had been in this house more times than she could even begin to count, the pure grandeur never failed to make her feel like a dirty country-cousin. The polished marble tiles of the floor glittered in hues of gold and blue. Up above, there was an enormous chandelier made of the finest crystal that caught and mirrored the light around them. Everything was properly scrubbed and clean and…

  Completely unlived in, she thought wryly. The Cheney family seat had always reminded her more of a mausoleum than a home. With all the expensive trappings set and scrubbed just so, she was always afraid to move at all, as though she could easily destroy all the finery with her countrified clumsiness.

  From the parlor came a sudden cry and Daphne jumped in reaction. She barely had time to see a slim brunette barreling towards her before two spindly arms wrapped around her in a suffocating hug. The scent of ink and lavender surrounded her.

  “Oh, Daphne, I am so sorry!” Lady Annalise sobbed into her shoulder.

  Annalise pulled back to study her best friend. “You are pale,” she decided, and pulled her along to the parlor, leaving Villiers to put away her cloak and inform his master that the expected, and certainly unwanted, Miss Davernay had arrived.

  She shoved those unhappy thoughts aside and entered the comforting warmth of the parlor. This room, while equally grand, was somewhat more approachable with rose-colored silk lining the walls and the pale cream and rose upholstered settees. A fire was burning with warmth and welcome in the alabaster hearth.

  Annalise ushered Daphne into a plump seat and made a great effort of pouring her steaming tea in a delicate-looking china cup. There were also scones filled with clotted cream. Daphne helped herself to one, realizing with a start that she had not eaten since yesterday. Her stomach growled happily as she nibbled on the small snack.

  “I am so sorry,” Annalise said once more as she took her own seat and tepid tea in hand. “When we heard… Oh, Daph, why did you not write? I would have come to be at your side when you buried your father!”

  Daphne shook her head, blinking away painful tears. Here was all the warmth and love she had so desperately needed these past weeks. Now, when she least wanted it.

  “I… I am sorry, Annalise. I could not have,” she demurred.

  “Would not,” Annalise sniffed.

  Daphne knew that tone. Sighing, she studied her friend. Annalise was actually quite pretty in a rather bookish way. She had a lithe, skinny body, something for which Daphne, given towards plumpness, had always envied. Her long, spindly arms were encased in muslin, her sleek sable hair easily confined in a knot at the nape of her neck. A pair of square spectacles perched precariously on the edge of her small, button nose. Surprisingly full lips for such a slim figure were drawn downward at the edges in an expression of distaste.

  “I could not have,” Daphne reiterated. “I shall speak to you on this matter later,” she added in gentle reproof. “Is your brother unhappy about…?” She broke off, unable to find appropriate words to describe the mess that was now her life.

  Annalise sighed, but accepted the change of subject. She had no idea of just how worried Daphne truly was. “Well, of course he is unhappy your father is dead, Daphne. We all were shocked to hear of it. I thought the rumor would find me before the barrister did. Why did you not write?”

  Daphne closed her eyes briefly, recalling the hysteria that had taken her captive those days after the discovery. She had been incoherent with grief. Even then, she had not realized how dire…how impossible…

  “Anna, please, we will speak on this later,” she managed. “What might I expect from your brother? I understand I must meet with him,” Daphne whispered fearfully.

  Annalise gave her a peculiar look. “Well, James is sad, as I told you, but—”

 
“He is now my guardian!” Daphne exclaimed peevishly.

  Annalise nodded slowly. “Yes, he did mention it…”

  Daphne sighed, pushing aside tea and sconce and began to pace. No one knew of the changes Papa made to his will, she thought furiously. He had not even mentioned to her about the change in guardianship, or the finances. She did not understand, or even particularly care, about the trusts he had set up. What she did care about was that she was now wholly at the mercy of a man who had always frightened the very curl out of her hair as a child.

  “I am eighteen years old,” she grumbled, mostly to herself. “I don’t need a bloody keeper.”

  “Daphne, watch your tongue!” Annalise chided waspishly. “You are a lady, after all.”

  Daphne turned and opened her mouth to dictate a scathing lesson in titles, for she was not titled, the lowly daughter of a mere baron, but then thought better of it. Such things had never mattered before; she did not believe that they would now, either. She realized she must be in a foul temper, indeed, to be reacting so unkindly to Anna’s genuine concern.

  Truly contrite, she said, “I am sorry I am being so snappish, Annalise.”

  Annalise shook her head, as though it did not matter. Daphne knew better. Tears sparkled in Anna’s extraordinary eyes.

  “Anna,” she whispered.

  Annalise looked away as she struggled to keep the tears at bay. Daphne watched her blink several times and her remorse doubled tenfold.

  After a tense, drawn-out silence, Annalise finally said, “James will want to speak to you before you go to bed. I will just go direct the servants to…to which room will be yours.”

  They both knew it was an evasion. Villiers would have already have given directions and orders. Her trunks had already been unpacked for her, in any case. It was the first time since they had known one another that Daphne had been at odds with her dearest friend.