“I’m sorry, Mr. Heppenstall. Pigs escaped their pen, and I had to round them up.”
The publican threw his towel on the bar and planted his fists on his hips. Grockles nothing. This local lad was enough trouble for him to deal with.
* * *
With her gloves in her lap, Stella dug her nails into the palms of her hands. Otherwise, she’d cry, and she hated it when she cried. After the fiasco at the stables, she’d changed into her favorite linen and lace tea dress; the embroidered lavender flower swirls usually made her feel like a walking garden. But trapped in the drawing room, a chilly room with vaulted ceilings and dark, heavy furniture, surrounded by portraits of men and women in lace collars or redcoat uniforms with the same stony gaze as that of the woman sitting across from her, Stella decided that the swirls on her dress reflected the nausea in the pit of her stomach.
“Ah, Mrs. Westwoode, Miss Westwoode.” Lady Atherly set aside the book in her lap, Wellington, Soldier and Statesman, and addressed two women Stella hadn’t met yet.
The matron, Mrs. Westwoode, her pale green and gray dress cleverly paired with the gray streaks in her golden blond hair, sashayed into the room. The congenial smile faded quickly from her face. Her daughter’s gaze never left the bold red and gold patterned carpet. Miss Westwoode, several years Stella’s junior and endowed with an enviable hourglass figure, would never be the beauty her mother was. Her hair was mousy colored, her nose was bulbous, and her cheeks were plump.
“May I present Miss Stella Kendrick . . .” Lady Atherly hesitated, as if the words were difficult to form in her mouth. “My son’s intended.” Stella flinched at those words. None of the women seemed to notice. “Miss Kendrick, may I present my good friend Mrs. Caroline Westwoode and her daughter, Miss Elizabeth Westwoode?”
“It’s nice to meet-,” Stella began as the Westwoode women arranged themselves on adjacent green velvet, carved mahogany chairs.
“Likewise, I am sure, my dear,” Mrs. Westwoode said, glancing in Stella’s direction before patting her daughter’s knee. “My daughter is fiancée to Lord Hugh, second son of the Duke of Tonnbridge.”
What did Stella care about the betrothal of a stranger, considering her own unbearable situation?
Mrs. Westwoode added, “Who will marry first? I wonder.”
Stella bit back the retort on her tongue. Not me. I’m never going to marry Lord Lyndhurst. She welcomed the anger that washed over her. If nothing else, it kept the self-pity and the tears at bay. But Mrs. Westwoode apparently never intended to wait for Stella’s reply.
“Where are the men?” The matron glanced about the drawing room, as if Lord Atherly, Lyndy, and the others were hiding behind the couch and she had missed seeing them upon her arrival.
“I requested the gentlemen join us at quarter past so that we ladies may get acquainted,” Lady Atherly said.
“Isn’t your vicar joining us?” Mrs. Westwoode said, looking around the room again.
“Yes, as I said,” Lady Atherly said. “At quarter past.”
“He was quite charming at luncheon, but I admit I was quite surprised to learn you’re allowing him to officiate at Lord Lyndhurst’s wedding. The Duke of Tonnbridge insists we have no one less than the Bishop of Winchester.”
“Is that so?” Lady Atherly said. “I had no idea His Grace took such an interest in his youngest son’s wedding arrangements.”
“But why shouldn’t the bishop officiate when my darling daughter, the granddaughter of a baron, marries the son of a duke?”
“Why indeed?”
As the two older women continued to discuss the merits for and against the bishop performing the Westwoode wedding, Lady Alice set aside the magazine she’d been reading and sorted through the stack on her lap. Titles like Life, the Ladies’ Home Journal, Cosmopolitan, Vogue, and Harper’s Bazaar flickered by. Miss Westwoode stared out the French windows. Stella followed the young woman’s gaze. From her vantage point, all Stella could see was the sky, peppered with darkening clouds. She shivered. Why hadn’t she brought a shawl?
Hoping to commiserate with a fellow sufferer, Stella leaned over and whispered, “Are you fond of the outdoors, Miss Westwoode, or planning your escape?”
Miss Westwoode gasped and glanced in her mother’s direction. “Whatever do you mean, Miss Kendrick?”
Are you marrying for love, Miss Westwoode, or are you being forced to marry by your family, as I am?
“For me, it’s a bit of both. I’ve always preferred the outdoors or the stable to drawing rooms,” Stella said. “Much to my father’s chagrin, I’m afraid, I like to ride, cycle, swim, play tennis, what have you. I’m not good at sitting about discussing last month’s ball or who wore what to the World’s Fair.” Or a wedding that is never going to take place. Stella rubbed her hands up and down her arms. “Is it always this cold in here?”
Miss Westwoode stared at the carpet again. Mrs. Westwoode stopped her conversation with Lady Atherly to stare at Stella. Lady Atherly sighed, as if her forbearance was near its end.
“Did I say something wrong?” Stella asked.
No one responded.
“As I was saying, Mrs. Westwoode . . . ,” Lady Atherly continued.
Stella looked to the other women for an explanation. Elizabeth Westwoode examined the vase on the octagonal table next to her, as if she’d never seen a bouquet of roses before. Aunt Rachel dozed in the overstuffed armchair by the unlit fireplace. Lady Alice had a smirk on her face while appearing buried in her magazines. Stella took their cue and sat wallowing in frustrated silence, digging her nails into her palms again, as the two matrons discussed wedding cakes. Then Lord Lyndhurst strode purposefully into the room. He was arrogance personified, and she despised him—he was complicit with her father in this wretched engagement, after all—but his presence brought much-welcomed energy to the room.
“Mrs. Westwoode,” he said. “I trust you and Mr. Westwoode had a pleasant journey?”
“Yes. Thank you, Lord Lyndhurst,” Mrs. Westwoode said. “We missed you at luncheon.”
“My son considered it more important to go fishing than to entertain our guests,” Lady Atherly said.
“But I came back in time to welcome the Kendricks, did I not?” Lady Atherly rolled her eyes as her son addressed another lady in the room. “Miss Westwoode, you look as lovely as ever.”
Miss Westwoode batted her eyelids and smiled the way women seemed to do here, thinly and without showing their teeth. Could all English women have particularly poor teeth? Why else would they smile so?
“Lord Hugh is a lucky man,” Lord Lyndhurst said.
Miss Westwoode’s cheeks reddened, and her tight-lipped grin widened before she shyly lowered her gaze. Her mother beamed at him, nodding enthusiastically.
“I see you have met Miss Kendrick,” Lyndy noted.
“Yes. Charming, I’m sure,” Mrs. Westwoode said, her words belying her fading smile.
Unlike Mrs. Westwoode, who had already focused her attention back on her daughter, Lord Lyndhurst’s focus remained on Stella. If he expected her to demurely look away, as Miss Westwoode had, he was surely disappointed. Stella held his gaze and continued to as he strode toward her and presumptuously took her hand. His dark brown eyes never left hers.
“Yes, she is,” he whispered as he lifted her hand to his lips.
Her relief in seeing him dissipated instantly. How did he know if she was charming? How did he know anything about her at all? She cringed in shame just thinking about the confrontation he’d witnessed between her and Daddy. He’d looked