Then, suddenly, they were finished, and her father was beckoning to Constance.
Isabel gave her the slightest of shoves; Constance made her way on trembling legs.
She dropped a tiny curtsy, afraid if she sank too low she would never rise again. To nurse a girlish dream was one thing; to live the reality quite another. I can’t go through with this.
The earl took her hands in his, an intimacy she hadn’t expected. His fingertips curled beneath hers, warm through the fabric of her best gloves, anchoring her.
“My dear Constance.” His smile held kindness, chagrin and an uncertainty that somehow boosted her confidence. “How fortunate I am that your nature aligns with your name, and you have waited for such a tardy wretch. Will you do me the honor of accompanying me into the church?”
Her gaze darted over his shoulder to the worn stone building she loved as well as her own home. She would enter the church a parson’s daughter; she would leave it a countess. A wife. His wife.
The earl’s grip tightened. Her doubts lifted like mist warmed by the sun, to drift away on the breeze.
“I will,” she said.
He brought her left hand to his lips, and through her glove pressed a kiss to her knuckles. Warmth flooded her, traveled directly to her legs where it had a bizarre weakening effect. Constance locked her knees, put all her energy into holding her ground.
“Come,” Spenford said, “let us be married.”
“I, Marcus Albert Edward Spencer Brookstone, Earl of Spenford, Baron Brookstone, take thee, Constance Anne Somerton…”
Constance calmed her nerves by focusing on the string of names. And reflected she would be more pleased if he were mere Marcus Brookstone.
Her father recited the next portion of the vows in the dear, measured tone that had guided her life. “To have and to hold…to love and to cherish…”
He spoke clearly, rather than loudly, but the words rang to the rafters above the heads of the enthralled congregation.
“To have and to hold…to love and to cherish,” the earl repeated firmly.
Constance let out a breath of relief. He had sworn to love her. Not today, or tomorrow, necessarily, but he would try, and when he succeeded it would be—
“Till death us do part…”
Yes. That.
She made the same vow, her voice shaking, adding the bride’s promise to obey.
Behind her, she heard a small sob. Mama. Pragmatic Margaret Somerton had surprised her daughters, and herself, with several bouts of sniffling over the past few days. Her mood had been unimproved by her husband’s assurance she was not losing a daughter, but gaining a son.
Constance slid a sidelong glance at her mother’s new “son.” At several inches taller than she, at least six feet, his height was potentially intimidating.
“Do you have the ring?” her father asked.
The earl—Marcus—turned to his groomsman. Constance had forgotten his name… Severn, that was it, the Marquis of Severn.
Severn handed over a circlet of gold. After a moment’s pause, Constance realized everyone was waiting for her.
She fumbled to free her left hand—the one he had kissed—from her glove. Marcus took her bare fingers, and for the first time they were flesh to flesh. About to be made one.
“With this ring, I thee wed,” he repeated after her father.
Another few moments, and the gold band slid down her finger. Making her his.
Constance’s mind shied away from the thought.
“Those whom God hath joined together, let no man put asunder,” her father intoned.
The next phrases washed over her, until she heard, “I now pronounce that they be man and wife.”
Constance’s gazed snapped to the earl. She hadn’t even been listening to that final declaration and now she was married. Just as well she didn’t attend to omens, because surely…
The worry evaporated in the warmth of the gaze Lord Spenford—her husband!—turned on her.
A half smile on his lips, he reached for her veil, lifted it.
His brilliant blue eyes scanned her face.
Constance smiled shyly.
Marcus’s mouth straightened into a line that could only be described as grim.
“My—my lord?” Words died away as Constance absorbed his expression.
He looked appalled.
Chapter Three
“Who the blazes are you?” Marcus snapped the moment they attained the privacy of the carriage.
The girl—the woman—his wife, blast it!—shrank back against the seat, her bonnet with that veil, that—that instrument of deception, askew.
“You know who I am.” Her voice quivered as she rubbed her elbow where he’d gripped it to escort her from the church. “I am Constance… .”
She stopped. As if she had been going to say Constance Somerton, but that was no longer true, because now she was—
She could not be Lady Spenford.
Outside, the villagers cheered and shouted good wishes as the coach pulled away, headed for the rectory, for the wedding breakfast.
Thoughts and images whirled in Marcus’s head, blurred by fatigue. Could some artifice—cosmetics, perhaps?—have made her look so different last Monday? Her voice was slightly altered, but in the church he’d attributed that to nerves.
“Remove your bonnet,” he ordered.
She clutched it to her head. So much for that promise she’d made not five minutes ago to obey.
He leaned forward; she gasped as his fingers closed around the ribbon beneath her chin. Then she froze as he worked the knot, careful not to touch her.
He lifted the bonnet from her head, tossed it to the floor of the coach. Which elicited another gasp.
“Your bonnet is the least of your worries, madam,” he said roughly. His gaze raked her face. Not at all the same. Brown eyes, not violet-blue, a perfectly ordinary nose in place of the charming version he’d seen on Monday. Thinner lips, a chin that might be described by someone in an uncharitable mood as pointy.
Marcus was in a very uncharitable mood.
In place of ink-black curls, this girl’s hair was a drab brown, drawn up in a knot, with a few tendrils curling around her nape.
“What is this trick?” he growled. “You must have planned it before I even arrived in Piper’s Mead. I swear, if your holier-than-thou father played a part in this—”
“You will not say a word against my father,” she blurted.
And now she dared issue orders to him!
Well, that wouldn’t last, nor would this marriage. He’d been duped into marrying this plain-faced fraudster, and fraud was grounds for annulment. There’d been the case of Baron Waring, some years ago…Marcus couldn’t remember the details, but the woman involved had misrepresented herself, and the bishop declared an annulment.
The girl, Constance, or whatever her name was, picked up her bonnet. As she settled it on her lap, it slipped through her trembling fingers and fell to the floor again.
Instinctive courtesy