“Very well, then.” She’d been hoping he’d say she should keep it to remember him by. “I wish you a safe journey, Mr. Nesbitt.”
She’d called him Tristan—or Tris—for years now, but suddenly that seemed too informal.
His gray gaze remained steady. “Thank you, Lady Alexandra. I wish you a happy life.”
A happy life. She could be married by the time he returned, she realized with a shock. In fact, if he were gone two whole years, she very likely would be.
Her heart sank at the thought.
But at least she’d have his profile. When it was finished, she’d have a perfect likeness of his face, black-on-white in an elegant oval frame. And she’d been alone with him while making it.
As he walked from the room, she peeled the paper off the glass and hugged it to her chest.
RATAFIA PUFFS
Take halfe a pound of Ground Almonds and a little more than that of Sugar. Make it up in a stiff paste with Whites of five Eggs and a little Essence of Almond whipt to a Froth. Beat it all well in a Mortar, and make it up in little Loaves, then bake them in a very cool oven on Paper and Tin-Plates.
I call these my magical sweets…my husband proposed directly after eating only one!
—Eleanor, Marchioness of Cainewood, 1728
Cainewood Castle, three years later
June 1815
“NOT ALL OF IT!” Alexandra Chase made a mad grab for her youngest sister’s arm. “We’re instructed to add a little more sugar than almonds.”
Corinna stopped grating and frowned. “I like sugar.”
“You won’t like the ratafia puffs if they’re all sugar,” their middle sister, Juliana, said as she took the cone-shaped sugar loaf and set it on the scarred wooden table in the center of Cainewood Castle’s cavernous kitchen.
“Here, my arm is tired.” Alexandra handed Corinna the bowl of egg whites she’d been beating, then scooped a proper amount of the sugar and poured it into another bowl that held the ground almonds. Stirring them together, she shook her head at Corinna. “You really are quite hopeless with recipes. If you didn’t look so much like Mama, I’d wonder if you’re truly her child.”
A sudden sheen of tears brightened Corinna’s brilliant blue eyes. She quickly blinked them away. “She always made good sweets, didn’t she?”
“Excellent sweets,” Juliana said in a sympathetic tone, shooting a look at her older sister.
Alexandra felt abashed and maybe a little teary herself. She looked away, her gaze wandering the whitewashed stone walls of the kitchen. She’d meant only to tease her sister, not remind her of their mother. Mama had been gone less than two years, and memories could still be painful.
But the time for sadness was over…after years of loss and mourning, Alexandra and her sisters were finally wearing cheerful colors and ready to face the world again. In Alexandra’s case, she was more than ready to put the sorrow behind her and get on with her life.
During her first London season, she’d received many excellent offers of marriage. But at her father’s sudden death, all thoughts of a wedding had been abandoned, and she’d missed the rest of the season while mourning him. Shortly thereafter her dear mother had passed, followed by her oldest brother, and she’d missed this year’s season in yet another anguished period of mourning.
All of the marriage-minded gentlemen who’d courted her had long since found other brides. But Alexandra wasn’t sure she could endure another season, with all the attending frivolity, competition, and intrigue. She just wanted to be someone’s wife. She wanted to forget past hardships and start over, to feel settled and secure in a new place and a new situation.
As for her younger sisters, they’d yet to be presented at court and were beside themselves at the thought of finally having a season. It seemed all Juliana and Corinna could talk of were parties, balls, breakfasts, dances, and soirees.
“I can hardly wait for next spring,” Corinna said, echoing Alexandra’s musings.
Juliana added a few drops of almond extract to the egg whites. “If Griffin has his way, we’ll all be married long before spring. We’ll never have a season.”
“He cannot get you both matched up so quickly.” Alexandra idly stirred the almonds and sugar. “You two will have your seasons. He’ll have to be content with my marriage for now.”
“If the 'magical’ ratafia puffs do their job.” Corinna handed the bowl of eggs back to Alexandra. “Here, now my arm is tired. This is hard work.” Mopping her forehead with a towel, she looked pointedly through an archway to where a scullery maid stood drying a towering stack of dishes. “I cannot understand why you won’t ask her—”
“If the magic is to work,” Juliana interrupted patiently, “we must make the ratafia puffs ourselves, not relegate the task to a servant.”
“Ladies aren’t supposed to work in the kitchen.” Corinna tossed her mane of long, wavy brown hair. “Holy Hannah, it’s blazing hot in here with the coal burning all the day long! “
“Chase ladies work in the kitchen,” Alexandra said with a pointed glance at the ancient, stained journal that lay open on the long table. The heirloom volume was filled with recipes penned by Chase women going all the way back to the seventeenth century. Their foremothers and been renowned for their skill with sweets. ”It’s a tradition,” she added, still beating the eggs. “Will you be the first to break it?”
“I might. Unlike you, I don’t put much stock in tradition.”
Alexandra beat the eggs harder. “Well, perhaps you should—”
“Girls.” Always the peacemaker, Juliana took the bowl of stiffened eggs and dumped the almond and sugar mixture into it. “Why is there no ratafia in ratafia puffs?” she asked, adeptly changing the subject.
“Perhaps we’re supposed to serve ratafia with them,” Corinna suggested.
Alexandra laughed. “Griffin invited Lord Shelton to take tea, not spirits. I expect they’re called ratafia puffs because they taste of almonds like ratafia does.”
Corinna dipped a finger into the sweet mixture and licked it off. “Do you think Lord Shelton
