CHAPTER ONE

      STILL holding his comb, Antoine looked at Kathryn in the mirror and tugged at a glossy black curl until it descended to lie just right across the white lace shoulder of her gown. Frowning just a little, he stood back to study his client’s hair once more, then reached for a spray bottle and began to mist the errant curl.

      Kathryn stirred irritably. “Aren’t you finished yet?”

      “Have patience, mademoiselle. All must be perfection when you go to meet your bridegroom.” Antoine snapped his fingers. “The headdress!”

      An assistant sprang to attention and handed him a delicate wreath of orange blossom. Trailing from it, so delicate that it almost floated, was a floor-length veil edged with lace that matched that on the gown. As his skillful fingers pinned the wreath in place, Antoine murmured, “Mademoiselle is anxious for her wedding, yes?”

      “Mademoiselle is anxious to have it over with,” Kathryn said under her breath.

      “Dear, dear.” Antoine made a sort of clucking noise with his tongue as he inserted the last hairpin. “There. All is complete. Rest assured I will be waiting for you at the top of the stairs to make certain every hair is in place.”

      In that case, Kathryn thought, she should probably allow an extra half hour to get from her bedroom to the temporary altar set up in the ballroom downstairs.

      Antoine’s assistant started to gather up his tools, and Kathryn’s maid swooped down on her to make certain that the hairdresser hadn’t put a nick in her makeup. Kathryn fended her off. “It’s all right, Elsa. Go down to the kitchen, please, and bring me a cup of tea.”

      “I will call and have it brought up. Though I wish you wouldn’t take the chance of spilling tea on that lovely gown, Miss Kathryn.”

      Kathryn’s hands clenched on the edge of her dressing table. “All right, skip the tea.” It took effort to keep her voice pleasant. “Just go away. After all the confusion, I’d like to have a few minutes to myself, Elsa.”

      “Of course, miss.” The maid turned away, pausing to hold the door for the assistant.

      He laid the last special comb in its fitted tray and picked up the heavy case. “Temper tantrums,” he muttered to the maid as he passed her in the doorway. “All brides have ’em. Trust me. She’s just excited at being so close to getting a wedding ring.”

      Kathryn rolled her eyes. Excited was hardly the word she’d have used to describe herself; twitchy was more like it. She supposed it was only natural to be on edge, after a full day of being poked and prodded and treated like a doll. And not the treasured porcelain kind, either, but the sort a small child dragged around by the arm and endlessly dressed and undressed…

      At last the room was quiet. She stood up, automatically shaking out the full skirt of the satin and lace gown, but she didn’t look at it in the mirror. Someone else would make sure, before she descended the stairs on her father’s arm to meet Douglas in the ballroom for the ceremony, that each layer was perfectly arranged.

      Kathryn didn’t particularly care. She only wanted this wedding—The Wedding of the Century, the newspapers were calling it—to be over.

      It wasn’t that she was having doubts, exactly. She’d made her choice logically, considering every possible factor before deciding that Douglas would make a suitable husband—and nothing had happened to change her mind about that. He was everything she’d looked for in a marital partner. Her father approved of him; Douglas was already an important cog in Jock Campbell’s business. He was well-mannered and good-looking enough; he knew all the same people she did; he had never raised his hand or even his voice to her; and most important on Kathryn’s list, he had enough money of his own that he didn’t need to acquire hers.

      No, she was certainly not having