“Isn’t Lady Emmeline such a lovely bride, Mr. Jeffreys? And this dress! Right out of last month’s La Belle Assemblée, isn’t it?” Mrs. Burns placed her arms akimbo and studied Emmeline. “Your Lord Colin is a very lucky man, my dear.”
“I believe Lady Emmeline would appreciate some time for . . . quiet reflection and prayer.” Jeffreys as always chose his words with care.
“Of course, of course.” Mrs. Burns kissed the air next to Emmeline’s cheek. “Don’t you worry, my dear: I will join you at the back of the church. Mr. Burns has a lovely homily planned. He’s borrowed a bit of fire and brimstone from the Calvinists, but transformed it to the fire of human passion, or something like that. I’m never quite sure. He’s such a clever man, my Mr. Burns.”
Then she was gone.
The room turned quiet. Without Mrs. Burns’s chatter, Emmeline’s anxiety reasserted itself in full force, the tension in her chest making it hard to breathe.
From the window, she could see that the duke once more stood by his brother’s side. By his presence and his smiles, the duke demonstrated to all that he approved of Colin’s match.
Her match.
She forced herself to breathe in slowly. They were always meant to marry, she reminded herself. Colin had declared that intention years ago, and no one—except her—had found it remarkable when he’d finally asked for her hand. She’d done nothing wrong in accepting. It was a fine match, and he would be a fine husband.
She studied Colin from the window. To her cottagers, he offered hearty handshakes. To the village spinsters, he gave a gracious half bow that left them blushing and tittering. To everyone, he was charming and kind. But of course he was.
When had she known him to be anything else?
She loved him. Of course she did. She always had. Their life together would be happy, pleasant, cheerful, useful. He would let her run her estate—she would let him do his secret work for the Crown. Why then did she feel her life might be ending rather than beginning?
* * *
She joined her dog, Queen Bess, at the warm hearth. Bess, sensitive to her mistress’s emotions, raised her eyebrows, and Emmeline leaned down to scratch the dog’s head. “There, girl. It’s all right. I’m merely anxious. Nothing to be worried over.”
The dog leaned her head into Emmeline’s hand, and Emmeline blinked back tears.
“You love him too, girl, don’t you?” Emmeline rubbed Bess’s ears, until the dog’s tail wagged. Emmeline stood for several moments, letting the fire warm her. But the chill she felt deep in her chest couldn’t be lifted. “If we were to run, girl, where would we go? Can you see us, both with bad legs, limping across the field?”
With a sad laugh, she turned back to the window. But she moved wrong, and the old pain shot angry through her leg. She gasped, and Bess pulled herself to her feet, instinctively positioning herself between Em and any furniture. Em rested her hand gently on the dog’s broad back, grateful for the extra support. When the pain subsided, she moved more slowly, careful to step just right. Bess followed at her side.
She’d stepped wrong with Colin when she’d agreed to marry him. Had he asked her privately, she could have tested his heart and hers. But he’d chosen Stella’s house party, with Stella and all her friends watching. Even at the moment she’d said yes, her heart had cried out no. Afterwards, she’d found herself carried away by Colin’s assurances. “It was always supposed to be you and me, Emmie,” he’d tell her as they planned the wedding dinner or looked at maps to plan their wedding trip. But in all the months of their engagement, Emmeline hadn’t had a peaceful night’s sleep.
Marry or run? Whatever decision she was going to make, she had to make it.
She surveyed the carriage yard where Colin and the duke greeted their guests. Sam Barnwell, her estate manager, had joined them, introducing those few Colin didn’t know. During her wedding trip, Sam would care for her estate. She had no worries there: he had been her steward for years.
Behind Sam stood Colin’s family, his brothers—Lords Seth, Clive, and Edmund—and their elder sister, Lady Judith. Her family. They had welcomed her into their hearts from the moment Colin—still a boy—had announced his intention to marry her. They had visited and written faithfully. Herself little better than an orphan, she’d drunk in their affection. They had been her confidantes, her friends, and she couldn’t imagine a life without them. Her hand clenched.
Seeing Colin’s family should calm her, not make her ill at ease. She had nothing to fear, but even so her chest constricted, and her sense of near panic swelled. She picked up her walking stick, so much more necessary in the last weeks, repeating, “All shall be well. All shall be well. All manner of things shall be well.” But the familiar litany offered her no peace.
At that moment, a carriage she didn’t recognize pulled into the yard. Colin’s friend, Lord Walgrave, stepped out, then handed down a dark-haired woman.
Lucy.
Even from a distance, Lady Fairbourne appeared frail and too thin. Emmeline’s guilt welled up, thickening her throat.
Emmeline watched for Colin to notice Lucy’s arrival. She needed to see his reaction. But he was deep in conversation with a local magistrate.
Walgrave hurried Lucy into Lady Judith’s outstretched arms, and the pair escorted Lucy to the part of the house where Colin’s siblings and cousins had gathered. Colin looked up in time to see Lucy’s back, and his face saddened. But when he turned back to his guests, he was smiling once more.
Emmeline’s stomach twisted. She wanted to throw open the window and yell Marry her instead! But she knew she’d only embarrass herself . . . and Lucy.
When Lucy had been found, drugged and held hostage to her cousin’s ambition, Em had expected Colin to call off the wedding. She’d even been relieved. But Colin had returned from London, even more committed to their impending nuptials. He wouldn’t break the engagement, nor would he—and his damned honor—let her, though she’d tried. Instead, he’d told her he’d wait, for a day, for a hundred, for however long it would take to ease her mind. And she’d realized in that moment that they would remain engaged, forever if need be, none of them happy.
Had she only refused him . . .
But it was too late for such regrets.
She looked past the chapel to the forest and open fields beyond. She had one way out. She could run.
She looked down at her walking stick ruefully. Anyone trying even half-heartedly would catch her.
Her father, Reginald, Lord Hartley, had run more successfully. He’d left one morning for a meeting in London and never returned. For months, the neighbors had speculated that, come spring, some cottager would find his remains at the bottom of the gorge. He wasn’t a man—they thought—who could bear such grief. Months later, he’d written his solicitors, directing them to forward his funds to a bank in Amsterdam. He never wrote her directly, never to her knowledge asked after her, and she, not knowing what to say, let all communication come through his solicitor.
She held her fist against the roiling in her stomach. Was this how her father had felt? Hemmed in by expectation and love? Or had he merely been the coward the townspeople called him when they thought she wasn’t listening? Deaf as well as lame, they seemed to think her, and the more she ignored the gossips, the more emboldened they became.
She caressed the head of her walking stick. Every time the gossips had called him reckless, she’d become more sober. Irresponsible, more dependable. Shameful, more upright. Until one day, they seemed to forget altogether that his blood ran through her veins as well as her mother’s. She was faithful where he had been faithless. Such a woman stood by her commitments, even those that frightened her.
If she didn’t know who she would be as Colin’s