The Miseducation of Miss DelilahSchool of Charm #3
Maggie Dallen
Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
About the Author
1
Miss Delilah Clemmons held her teacup to her lips for a moment longer than necessary as she took a deep, fortifying breath.
The scent of tea leaves and sugar, she’d found, was far superior to the stench of illness that had permeated her family home for as long as she could remember.
“How is Father?” she asked once she’d lowered her cup.
Her stepmother’s voice was cold and even. “The same.”
Delilah nodded. The same. That was the response she always got. She couldn’t quite recall at what point her father’s health had fallen into decline, but it often seemed as though he had been plummeting toward death for as long as she’d known him.
His mental faculties were still there and her father, the baron, still ruled over this small family and his estate with an iron fist. Metaphorically, of course. In reality, he was confined to his bed day and night, and sent orders through his wife.
His wife who despised Delilah.
Perhaps that was unfair. Maybe despised was too strong of a word. What the Baroness of Linden felt for her stepdaughter could hardly be said—not even by Delilah. The older woman was difficult to read, but her interactions with Delilah had always been cold. There was no heat of anger, just a general sense of disdain and disapproval.
Even as a small child, Delilah had sensed it, and she had known better than to take offense. It was well understood that Delilah had failed her father horribly by not being born a boy. She supposed she’d failed her stepmother even more so.
With the estate entailed, she and her stepmother would be in a precarious position when her father passed.
Unless Delilah married well, of course.
Which she would. After all, it was the least she could do.
Besides, her father had set aside a small fortune and the one unentailed property he owned along the coast to ensure it. Whatever was not going to his heir had been tied to her dowry to ensure that she land a gentleman of means and power.
Delilah took another small sip and stole another breath of tea-scented air as a clock ticked loudly behind her.
She’d always hated this drawing room. So stiff, so dreary. Her stepmother’s cloying perfume mixed with the smells of medicine and the stale scent of a house that hadn’t seen sunlight or fresh air in far too long.
Altogether it made Delilah’s stomach churn with unease.
From the moment Miss Grayson had informed her she’d been summoned home for a visit, she’d felt it—the clawing sensation of panic barely suppressed. At the finishing school, where she lived amongst her friends, she could ignore it. Sometimes she even managed to convince herself it was gone altogether, this unpleasant mix of fear and anticipation. The sensation that her life was about to take a turn. That she was hovering on a precipice just waiting for a good shove.
Her stepmother set down her teacup with a rattle that seemed to shake the room. “Your father has found you a husband.”
And there it was.
The air left Delilah’s lungs so suddenly she felt lightheaded. A deep breath of that heavy, noxious air only made her head spin more. “Oh yes?” she said, taking another sip of tea.
It was through sheer habit that she managed to sound so cool and unemotional.
It had always been this way between Delilah and the baroness. A battle to see who could be the most contained. Which of the two beauties in this house had the most decorum.
Delilah would hardly give her stepmother the pleasure of stumbling now. She’d been training all her life for this.
The free-falling sensation that had her stomach plummeting was disguised beneath a haughty sniff and pursed lips. “And who might I be marrying?”
There. Not even Miss Grayson at the School of Charm could find fault with that delivery. She was practically the epitome of grace and nobility. She was—
“John Faring, the Baron of Everley.”
For the first time since she was six, Delilah forgot to don her façade. Horror shot through her, making her blood curdle and her stomach heave. “Lord Everley.”
She whispered his name, but it was the nickname her friends at school had given the man that clanged in her head like a bell. Lord Evil.
Silly nickname—no doubt Louisa had thought of it. The girl lived for melodrama. And yet…
Much as she tried to tell herself it was ridiculous, the nickname echoed in her skull.
Evil.
A man they called Evil.
This was who she was to marry.
Her stepmother’s lips quirked up a bit at the corners. “I see you are familiar with the man.”
Delilah stared at the baroness with lips frozen in shock. Familiar with him? The man had threatened to financially ruin Louisa’s family. He’d suggested Addie’s cousin should kill her little brother.
In jest, one might hope, but even so…
Her stepmother’s eyes glinted with malice. Or maybe amusement.
Or perhaps with her stepmother they were one and the same. It was difficult to say. The baroness had a sort of cruel beauty about her. Half the age of the baron, she’d come from a good family and embodied excellent breeding. Fair hair and unmarked skin. Blue eyes and a spine of steel. She’d taught Delilah well in the art of gentility and manners.
Delilah called on those lessons now as she steeled herself, forcing her shoulders to lower, her lips to snap shut, and her brow to clear. “Indeed,” she said, her voice pleasantly even. “I have made his acquaintance.”
“Excellent,” the baroness said. “He will host an engagement ball in a fortnight and the banns will be read.”
“But—” The protest died on her lips as she met her stepmother’s cold, malicious gaze.
But he is a monster. But they call him Lord Evil. But…what if I don’t wish to marry him?
Nothing she said would change matters. If anything,
