Slightly Married (6 page)

“Your brother, the Duke of Bewcastle, would be appalled,” she told him.

“He need never know,” he said without denying it. “Besides, I am thirty years old and have long been my own man, Miss Morris. The differences between us need never embarrass either of us. We will not be remaining together after our nuptials.”

Why was she even arguing the point with him? There was still John, despite his failure to return to her. At their last meeting before he went to Russia, they had pledged themselves to each other. . . .

“I have never known anyone who married by special license,” she said.

“Have you not?”

Was it really so easy?

What if John
was
on his way home? But could she afford at this precise moment to continue deluding herself? He was
not
coming. And even if he were, how could he help now? All was lost. Unless . . .

“Well?” Colonel Bedwyn sounded impatient.

She licked dry lips with a dry tongue. “There must be a million arguments,” she said. “I cannot
think
. I need to think. I need time.”

“Time,” he said, “is something you do not have, Miss Morris. And sometimes it is best not to think but simply to do. Go upstairs and give your maid orders to pack a bag for you. We will leave early in the morning. Your aunt should accompany you for propriety's sake if she is able. Do you have a traveling carriage here? And horses?”

She nodded. There was the old carriage that had been such a symbol of wealth and status to her father.

“I will call in at the stables before I return to Heybridge, then,” he said, “and give directions about the morning. I will not keep you any longer. Doubtless there will be much for you to do if you are to be away for three days.”

He bowed with stiff formality and had stridden from the room before she could raise a hand to stop him. She heard him say something, presumably to Agnes, and then the front door opened and closed.

He was gone. She had not stopped him when she had the chance.

She had not said yes to his insane suggestion, had she?

But she had not said no either.

She should run after him and do it now—he had said he was going to the stables. She should tell him the full truth. But what was the truth? The stark truth was that Percy had died too soon and John had proved faithless. She had four days in which to take charge of a desperate situation—or not to.

She could not marry Colonel Bedwyn.
Marry Colonel Bedwyn?
She laughed suddenly, a convulsive, mirthless sound, then clapped both hands over her mouth lest Agnes hear her and conclude that she had run mad. She fought a silent battle with panic and hysteria.

She needed to think. She needed time. But she could not seem to do the former, and she did not have any of the latter, as he had so bluntly pointed out.

She got to her feet and began to pace back and forth across the room.

W
HEN
A
IDAN RODE UP THE DRIVEWAY TO
Ringwood Manor early the following morning, William Andrews a discreet distance behind him, he could see that an ancient and hideously ornate traveling carriage was drawn up to the front doors. She had not countermanded his orders after he had left, then. She was going to go through with this.

If there was still any doubt left, it fled after he had ridden onto the terrace and could see around the carriage to the front doors. They stood open. His approach must have been noted. Miss Morris, dressed for travel, in gray as usual, was on her way down the steps, drawing on a pair of black gloves as she came. The scruffy dog bobbed along at her heels. She looked as pale as a ghost. Her aunt, assisted by a thin young maid, came down behind her.

In the doorway stood the housekeeper, her hands planted on her ample hips as if she were itching to quarrel with someone, and the young governess who had an illegitimate child.

They all looked as if they were about to attend another funeral today. Well, he thought grimly as he dismounted, he felt a little that way himself. A plump young lad loped up to hold his horse's head. Aidan guessed from his genial, rather vacant expression that he must be the servant whose mind did not move too swiftly.

“You are ready?” Aidan asked unnecessarily after nodding a curt good morning to the ladies. He had not admitted to himself until this moment how much he had hoped she would change her mind. Not that there would have been any changing of mind to do. She had given him no definite answer last evening.

“Yes.” All she spoke was the single word.

“Allow me, ma'am.” He held out a hand to help Mrs. Pritchard into the carriage.

“Don't you do it, my lamb,” the housekeeper called out, fixing Aidan with the evil eye just as if he were about to abduct her mistress to have his wicked way with her. “Just don't do it. Not for us. We'll manage, the whole lot of us. You don't owe us nothing.”

“Agnes,” Mrs. Pritchard said after she had seated herself with a sigh, “you will only confuse Eve by keeping on saying that. Having said which, Eve, my love, I must say that now is the time to thank the colonel for his kind offer and send him on his way if you aren't quite, quite sure this is what you want for yourself.”

Aidan tapped his riding crop impatiently against his boot. One thing from which he cringed more than anything else was emotional drama, especially that of the female variety. The governess was looking stricken. The maid was sniffling.

“But of course it is what I want,” Miss Morris said to them all, so falsely cheerful that she would have been booed off any stage. “Aunt Mari and I will be back the day after tomorrow and all will go on as before. Nothing will be any different except that Cecil will not be able to come here ever again to threaten our peace. Remember—not a word to anyone until we return. Muffin, stay.” Aidan watched with disapproval as she bent to pat the dog's head instead of insisting upon instant obedience.

She climbed into the carriage then, placing her hand in Aidan's outstretched one but not looking into his face. Her own looked as if it had been carved of marble. Finally the maid scurried in after her, pretending not to notice Aidan's hand. If he said
boo
to her, he suspected, she would collapse in an insensible heap. He shut the door firmly, nodded to the coachman, mounted his horse again, tossed a coin to the lad, and followed the carriage down the driveway, over the bridge, and through the village, Andrews coming along behind.

London was a full day's journey away for such a monstrosity of a carriage, but fortunately the weather was fine and the road dry, and they made good time despite the fact that Aidan felt obliged to stop more frequently than the turnpikes necessitated. The carriage horses had to be changed at regular intervals, and the ladies had to stretch their legs and eat. Not that Miss Morris did much of the latter, he noticed, but Mrs. Pritchard seemed glad of the refreshments. She made an effort to be amiable toward Aidan, conversing with him cheerfully and rather loudly in her barely intelligible Welsh accent and preventing the awkward silences that would otherwise have descended upon them. He was very glad to be making the journey on horseback, not riding in the carriage.

Miss Morris looked like marble every time he set eyes on her, but he steeled himself against feeling sorry for her. What choice had he had but to talk her into doing what she was doing? Besides, who was there to feel sorry for him? His heart was not exactly dancing a jig over the prospect of tomorrow's business. Far from it. He was not a sentimental man. It would not have occurred to him to describe himself as a brokenhearted man today, but he felt a definite heavy sense of loss nonetheless. He had had other dreams than this.

By early evening they were entering the outskirts of town. Aidan and Andrews had been in the saddle all day, but that was nothing new to either of them. Aidan felt no great physical fatigue. He was, however, in the bleakest of moods. His life had been bought two years ago at a high cost indeed. Marriage to a stranger was to be the price of honor and an unpaid debt. A marriage of convenience—but a life sentence nevertheless, and to a woman who would indeed horrify Bewcastle if he ever heard about her. A coal miner's daughter, no less. Besides, he had not told the truth last evening. It was certainly true that until recently he had firmly believed a military career and marriage to be mutually exclusive ways of life. But what if, he had been asking himself for the past few months, there were a woman who had grown up knowing very little else but a military way of life herself? The daughter of a general who had always liked to have his family with him wherever he went, for example. It was not a hypothetical question. Aidan had met such a woman.

He was not betrothed to her. Not a word had passed his lips that could be construed as a commitment that bound him in honor to her. Not a word had passed her lips. But there had been a definite, unspoken understanding that soon words
would
be spoken on both sides. There had been an unspoken understanding that General Knapp would give his blessing when asked for it. Aidan had been feeling happy at the prospect of marrying after all and of being able to expect a tolerable life with the bride of his choice.

It was simply not to be. There was no point in brooding over what could not be helped. The words would never be spoken—not by any of them. No one's honor would be compromised. Any bruises to any hearts would be silently denied.

Aidan gave the coachman directions and rode ahead of the carriage to the Pulteney Hotel in Piccadilly, the best London had to offer. He reserved two rooms and a private sitting room for two nights and turned to take his leave of the ladies. It was only when he did so that he noticed how very out of place and uncomfortable they looked in such sumptuous surroundings. He should, he realized, have taken them to a more modest hotel, but it was too late now to change the arrangements.

“Someone will escort you up to your rooms,” he assured them. “There is a private sitting room where you may dine and spend the evening. I will return in the morning, as soon as I have a license and have made the necessary arrangements. You will be ready?”

“Where are you going to stay?” Miss Morris asked. It seemed to him from the fixed way she looked at him that she was afraid to glance about her at all the splendor of the Pulteney's lobby.

“At the Clarendon, if there is a room to be had there,” he said. “It would not be proper for me to stay here on the eve of our wedding.”

She nodded. “We will be ready,” she said.

Where, Aidan wondered as he strode from the hotel, was the best place in which to get thoroughly foxed? The possibilities were clearly legion. He was in London, after all.

But did he want to face tomorrow with a thick head?

Did he want to face tomorrow at all?

He just simply had no choice, had he?

Promise me you will protect her. Promise me! No matter what!

His solemn oath had rung a death knell over his dreams. He was to wed a stranger in a marriage of convenience instead of Miss Knapp in a marriage of mutual companionship and comfort.

C
HAPTER VI

W
HAT DO YOU THINK, MY LOVE?
” T
HERE WAS
a note of mingled mischief and triumph in Aunt Mari's voice when the door of her room at the Pulteney Hotel finally opened and she came into the private sitting room she shared with her niece, aided by her cane. She had been in there since breakfast, supposedly resting after the exertions of yesterday's long journey before getting ready for the wedding.

Eve had been waiting with some impatience for her to reappear. She had no idea exactly when to expect Colonel Bedwyn and so had long ago finished dressing. She felt smart, if somewhat dowdy, in her best gray walking dress. Edith, who was skilled with her hands, had brushed her hair into neat coils at the back of her head and coaxed a few waves to feather down over her neck and temples. Her black gloves lay on a table by the door, ready to be donned when it was time to leave. So did her bonnet—the second-best one she had worn yesterday since there was no sign of the best one she was
sure
she had seen Edith bring out of the house in its hatbox and hand to the coachman. Edith herself was tearfully insistent that she had
too
brought it and it must have tumbled off the carriage into the ditch for the birds to peck at and the foxes to pull at and some beggar to wear. Perhaps it had somehow been taken to Aunt Mari's room by mistake, Eve had suggested as much to soothe Edith as to convince herself.

“Ah,” she said with relief when she saw it upraised on her aunt's free hand, “
there
is my bonnet.”

Then she took a closer look. It was the same one she had worn to the memorial service at Heybridge two days ago, but it had been transformed almost beyond recognition. Wide lavender silk ribbon, cleverly pleated, lined the underside of the brim and had been fashioned into a cluster of bows at one side. Narrower, matching ribbons fluttered from each side.

“I had the ribbon in my box at home,” Aunt Mari explained, chuckling like an excited child, “waiting for a special occasion. I decided that this was it, my love—your wedding. Lavender is a color for mourning, but it is much more cheery than gray.”

“But it is not really a wedding.” Eve crossed the room to take the bonnet from her aunt's hand.

“What would you call it, then?” her aunt asked. “It is a ceremony that will bind you to Colonel Bedwyn for the rest of your life. It is a wedding, all right. If I knew you were doing it just for me, I would argue like the fury against it even now. But it's not just for me, so what can I say?”

“Nothing.” Eve drew on the bonnet carefully so as not to disturb her curls. “It is primarily for me, Aunt Mari. I cannot bear the thought of losing Ringwood and my fortune.” She tried to keep her tone light, but not
too
light.

“That will be the day,” Aunt Mari said tartly, “when you think only of yourself. You are the least selfish person I know, and you are doing this for everyone
except
yourself. But you may be rewarded yet. He is a good man, my love.” Despite fingers that were somewhat gnarled with rheumatism, she brushed aside Eve's hands and tied the ribbons to suit herself, slightly to one side of her great-niece's chin. “Even though he seemed dark and humorless the first time I met him, the colonel was very kind yesterday. If he had been traveling alone, I suppose he would have ridden at a steady trot and arrived here hours earlier than he did with us in tow. But he didn't try to rush me in and out of the carriage—did you notice?—and he made an effort to talk whenever we stopped, though I suppose he is much more comfortable talking about horses and guns with men and other soldiers than conversing with ladies. Not that I am a lady by his standards. He should have seen me a few years ago when I was coming up from a shift down the mine. But the colonel is a gentleman—a true gentleman.”

“Of course he is,” Eve agreed. “Papa would approve—more than approve, in fact.”

“I just wish you would not insist on ending your acquaintance with the colonel quite so soon,” Aunt Mari said, standing back to note the angle of the bow before making a few adjustments. “I wish the two of you would spend a little time together just to see if there might not be a spark of something lasting between you. It wouldn't hurt to try, would it, since you are to be married anyway. He is on leave for two months. He told me so when I asked yesterday.”

“You must absolutely not wish us upon each other for longer than a day, Aunt Mari,” Eve said hastily. “It would be intolerable.”

“But I so very much want you to be happy, my love,” her aunt said. “You give yourself generously to everyone
except
yourself. I know this is no grand love story. I would have to be a fool to imagine it is. But who is to say it couldn't
become
a love match? It isn't as if you love any other man, is it, despite all my efforts at matchmaking during the past year.”

Eve smiled as she moved toward the looking glass above the mantel, her legs feeling almost too leaden to carry her there.

“Oh, my!” she said. The newly trimmed bonnet seemed to add both flesh and color to her face. It made her look younger. After a whole year she had almost forgotten what it was like to wear colors. Her eyes looked larger, more blue than gray, more luminous. “You are
so
clever with your hands, Aunt Mari. Thank you, dear.” She turned to hug her aunt, who looked inordinately pleased with herself.

She was a
bride,
Eve thought. These were her bride clothes and soon she would be on her way to her wedding. The thought caused a definite physical sensation, as if the bottom had fallen out of her stomach. She was about to marry a stranger for purely mercenary reasons and with no intention of keeping most of the marriage vows she would speak. She was going to marry a man who was not John. Until this moment she had been able to tell herself that somehow she would find a way out, that some miracle would surely happen to prevent this thing from happening. But she knew now at last that nothing was going to stop it.

Unless he failed to put in an appearance . . .

At that very moment there was a brisk knock on the sitting room door. Both Eve and her aunt turned to look at it as Edith came scurrying out of Eve's bedchamber, darted them a look of sheer fright, and opened the door.

Colonel Lord Aidan Bedwyn stepped into the room, diminishing it in size as he did so. He looked large and powerful and very masculine even though he was not dressed in his uniform, as Eve had expected he would be. He bowed to both ladies and bade them a good morning.

Eve curtsied. And then a strange, horrifying, totally unexpected thing happened before he could speak again. Looking at his elegant, immaculately clad person and thinking of him as her bridegroom, she felt a rush of pure physical awareness stab downward through her breasts and abdomen and along her inner thighs. She had never considered him a handsome man. But it would be naive anyway to believe that she was reacting just to his looks. It was his undeniable masculinity that was affecting her. This was their wedding day. Under other circumstances tonight would be their wedding night.

She tried desperately to bring an image of John to her mind, and then hastily pushed it away again even before it could form. It was too late for that. Soon—very soon—it would be disloyal even to think of him. For a moment she stared at the colonel in blind panic.

“Are you ready?” he asked, his eyes lingering on Eve's bonnet for a moment before moving to Aunt Mari.

Eve nodded and reached for her gloves.

“Perhaps you would fetch my hat from my room, Edith,” Aunt Mari said, but she walked after the girl to stand in the doorway and point to the one she wanted.

Eve and the colonel, left virtually alone, locked glances. It was an extremely uncomfortable moment.

“I have the license,” he said, speaking briskly, without any discernible emotion, “and I have made the arrangements. We are to be at the church in half an hour.”

“Are you quite sure?” she asked softly.

“I never do anything I am not sure about, Miss Morris,” he said. “And
you
are quite sure too, are you not? Remember the lame ducks.”

With any other man she might have suspected an attempt at a joke. But there was no gleam of humor in his eyes or about his mouth. Aunt Mari came back across the room then, her hat in place on her head, and the tension lifted somewhat.

“Let us go.” The colonel opened the door.

P
URCHASING A SPECIAL LICENSE HAD BEEN
astonishingly easy, Aidan had discovered. Of course, it had probably helped that he had worn his uniform—the old, comfortable uniform, not the dress one—and all of London was deliriously, exuberantly in love with its military officers, even those, he suspected, who had never set so much as a single toe beyond the safe shores of England. The staff at the Clarendon, which had treated him with respectful courtesy last evening, had bowed and scraped and fawned over him this morning while other guests had stared admiringly and nodded approvingly and one of their number, a gentleman he had never before in his life clapped eyes upon, had insisted upon shaking his hand and congratulating him as if he were personally responsible for effecting the abdication of the Emperor Napoléon Bonaparte.

It was that very reaction that had persuaded him to change back into civilian clothes for his wedding, though he had fully intended to wear his dress uniform. He did not want to be noticed. More important, he hoped not to be recognized. This was something he wanted to accomplish swiftly and secretly. It would be altogether better for all concerned if Bewcastle never knew about his marriage. He hoped, more than anything, that he would not run into Bewcastle or any other member of his family today.

The license was in Aidan's pocket, and his bride and her aunt were seated opposite him in the smart carriage he had hired for the occasion. Andrews was following behind on horseback.

Miss Morris looked remarkably attractive this morning. It was the frivolity of the frills and bows on her bonnet that did it, he supposed, as well as the touches of color. And there were loose curls visible at her neck and temples. For the first time—and, he fervently hoped, the only time—he looked upon her with sexual curiosity. He was about to make mental comparisons with Miss Knapp, but he could no longer permit himself to think about her in any way at all.

Mrs. Pritchard kept up a running monologue, exclaiming loudly at the splendor of the buildings they passed, at the noise and bustle of the streets, at all the smart conveyances that passed them. She was trying, he realized, to set both her niece and him at their ease. He handed them down when they reached the church he had selected for the quietness of the neighborhood. The rector had assured him that they would not be kept waiting and that the ceremony would take a mere few minutes.

Miss Morris set a hand on his offered arm, and he led her inside the church. Her aunt came along behind them, aided by Andrews's steady arm. They were a wedding party of four, the bride and groom and two witnesses. For an unguarded moment Aidan pictured the sort of wedding Bewcastle would have insisted upon for him under different circumstances, the first of them to marry. It would have been a grand, glittering affair, full of pomp and splendor with half the
ton
in attendance.

The stone-flagged floor of the church echoed hollowly beneath his Hessian boots. The interior was dark in contrast to the bright daylight outside, and chilly. A little gloomy. The rector appeared through a doorway beside the altar and hurried toward them, a smile of welcome on his face. He was wearing his vestments and held a book tucked against one shoulder. He bowed and greeted them and led them forward, Mrs. Pritchard beside him. He instructed them on where they were to stand and beckoned a reluctant Andrews closer. All was cheerful, impersonal business.

And then suddenly it was happening. It had started. The nuptial service.

“Dearly beloved,” the rector began, “we are gathered together here in the sight of God . . .” He spoke with all the sonorous solemnity of a clergyman addressing hundreds.

Just a few minutes later, he was concluding in the same manner. “. . . I pronounce that they be man and wife together, in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.” He made the solemn sign of the cross with his right hand.

It was all over before Aidan had quite composed his mind to pay full attention. He had spoken vows when instructed to do so without really listening to what he said. She had spoken vows, quietly and unwaveringly. He could not recall a single word of them. He had held her hand and placed on her finger the shiny gold ring he had purchased earlier, repeating certain words after the rector as he did so. He had done it as if in a dream. But the earth had moved during those few minutes. Something momentous, irrevocable, irreversible had happened.

They were married. Until death did them part.

The church for a moment seemed as dark and as chill as the grave.

And then Mrs. Pritchard, teary-eyed and smiling, was hugging her great-niece and—after a moment's hesitation—Aidan too. Andrews was shaking him by the hand—a rare occurrence indeed. The rector was smiling and nodding affably and offering his congratulations. And they were signing the register, without once having really looked at each other, his bride in a neat, sloping hand, he in his bold, no-nonsense style. Her aunt and Andrews witnessed their signatures, the aunt with an X, he was interested to note. Aidan offered his bride his arm and led her out onto the pavement, where the hired carriage waited to take them back to the Pulteney.