The Taming of Victoria Colton

Chapter Twenty-Five

Sorry it took a bit longer than norm :) And THANK YOU for getting this to number 1 today. I was so stunned... and completely honoured... and still a bit in denial! :P enough about me... go on... enjoy ;)

Chapter 25

There are some definite rules for cutting. A gentleman must never cut a lady under any circumstances. An unmarried lady should never cut a married one.

~ The Habits of Good Society: A Handbook for Ladies and Gentlemen (The Last London Editor; 1860)

Three days in London and Victoria had made social ruin of herself.

Gabriel reflected on the previous several days with an unpleasant disposition. The stubborn girl would just not quit and the public spectacles they were making were only affecting her reputation, not his.

As he found his way down the stairs of his lavish bachelor townhouse, a pungent aroma of roses and flowers assailed his nostrils and caused him to frown. He was not used to such an odour from his abode and the source soon became apparent as he peered into one of the drawing rooms close to the entranceway. Bouquets and arrangements lined every shelf, table, and even littered the floor.

“Who ordered these?” he barked irately at the nearest footman- a young, prematurely balding man garbed in the blue and silver Hawthorne tunic.

“T-they were delivered, my lord,” the young man stuttered nervously, clearly under duress from his master’s foul temper.

“Delivered?” Gabriel glowered at the young man. “By whom?” he demanded.

“Miss Colton, my lord.”

Her impertinence and ostentatious were ridiculous and it was getting progressively worse as the days went by. Sending him flowers as a devoted beau might her was completely unacceptable and absurd and should anyone get word of this, her tarnished reputation would take an even worse blow. Already she had befouled herself in the eyes of the ton so much that he seriously doubted she would receive any invites to attend many of society’s parties or balls again and Gabriel had been made privy to the more unpleasant opinions being voiced about her outright disregard for decorum and propriety.

If she continued in this vein, she would have to leave the country which he supposed she probably wanted anyway.

Without a word further to the aggrieved young footman, Gabriel strode agitatedly out of the townhouse, down the few steps, and climbed into the carriage that awaited him in the street to take him to White’s.

The woman was a menace to his very sanity, he thought as the carriage sped past dimly lit streets and townhouses. An incredibly beautiful, deceitful menace, he amended. Distinctly he recalled the way she looked at Lady Dullstrom’s ball that first night. God, that dress had been made to hug her curves and drive him wild. She had been enchanting and graceful, poised with an inherent elegance that belied her natural tendency towards bashfulness. The gown had been enticingly low and structured just right so that her breasts pushed high above the neckline. It was an ensemble designed to get him to notice her and he had. Remarkably so.

They had both ensured social devastation that evening by the scene they had caused during the waltz and it was widely known that they were at odds with each other. However, it was not Gabriel who suffered for the negative attention such antics would grant, but Vicky. Already nasty slurs about her overall character were being slung around loosely and with little adherence to courtesy. Her short courtship and now her perseverance to win him back publically made her “desperate”, “loose”, and “unscrupulous”. A few of the less contrite members of the ton who dwelled primarily in the fast set even termed her “floozy” and “inappropriately forward”.