‘Mom?’ she said. ‘Can you come over here?’
That request was all Tamra needed to jump to her feet, practically tearing around the pillar to get to her daughter.
‘What’s happening?’ she begged. ‘Honey, why on earth—’
‘Mom! Listen to me!’ Brianna Jade interrupted. ‘I just told Edmund: that night you had sex with Dominic after the party – it wasn’t Dominic, it was him!’
She took in her mother’s stricken expression, reading the guilt rather than the expected surprise.
‘Oh my God, you already know!’ she exclaimed. ‘But why didn’t you say anything?’
‘Honey, it was your fiancé!’ Tamra said, pale with shock and guilt. ‘I felt so terrible – worse than I can possibly tell you. I didn’t want to do anything to mess up your future . . .’
‘Oh, so that’s why you took off so suddenly!’ Brianna Jade gasped. ‘That’s why you stayed away for so long! Oh, yay – I thought you were pissed with me. Wow, now I get it. I get everything!’
She turned back to Edmund, who was still propped against the window for support.
‘Edmund, it’s okay,’ she said in utter happiness. ‘It’s more than okay. I don’t want to be Countess of Respers, and honestly, no offence, I don’t want to be married to you either – I really don’t. Mom, it’s the God’s honest truth!’
Words were spilling out of Brianna Jade faster than they had ever done before, her tone now louder, passionate, reaching wedding guests in the front pews: everyone was unashamedly craning forward to listen, and the Style photographer and videographer had both sneaked up the sides of the chapel to get closer views of what was going on.
‘I wouldn’t be a good Countess at all,’ she said, her smile huge. ‘I mean, we all know that, right? It’s totally not my skill set – if I even have a skill set.’
‘Honey—’
Tamra started an attempt to reassure her daughter, but Brianna Jade was far beyond needing reassurance. She was taking out the earrings, unfastening the necklace, reaching back to undo the sapphire and diamond hair clip, and putting them all down on the altar.
‘It’s you who should be marrying Edmund, Tamra! Don’t you see?’ Brianna Jade looked from her ex-fiancé to her mother. ‘It’s you two who’ve got all the stuff in common. You read the same books – those ones about the heiresses and whatever – and you can talk for hours about Stanclere and making it run properly, and Edmund actually really liked the party you threw. Well, of course he did, considering what happened at it . . .’
Edmund and Tamra glanced at each other involuntarily, went the dark pink of Tamra’s dress, and kept looking at each other.
‘I mean, it’s obvious! It was staring us all in the face,’ Brianna Jade continued, delighted. ‘Just look at the two of you! Okay, I’m getting out of here.’
‘You’re what?’ Tamra dragged her eyes from Edmund’s grey ones.
‘I have somewhere to be,’ Brianna Jade said with even greater delight. ‘Someone to see. The right guy for me.’ She grinned in sheer happiness. ‘Seriously, no offence, Edmund. But you’re the right guy for my mom, and he’s the right one for me, and I need to go find him right now.’
Reaching out, she took her mother and Edmund’s hands, put them together, picked up her train and swivelled around. Kicking off her heels, she started to run down the aisle. The wedding planner, the florist, and a few others who had been stationed at the back of the chapel jumped aside just in time as Brianna Jade flung open the doors and tore through them: the chapel was at the end of the east wing, and there was a door to the outside almost directly opposite. In a second she had reached it and pulled that one open too, and, in her stockinged feet, she dashed away over the lawn, the silk and lace wedding dress so well cut that it moved beautifully with her even as she tore along with the speed of a natural athlete.
Guests poured out of the chapel, riven with curiosity as to where Brianna Jade could conceivably be going.
‘Well, she’s not going to throw herself in the lake,’ Dominic drawled. ‘It’s completely in the other direction.’
‘Ohmygod, ohmygod, do you think she’s going to the pig guy?’ Minty said, actually jumping up and down in excitement, forgetting to care about her high heels sinking into the grass and getting ruined. ‘That would be the absolute best gossip moment ever in history!’
‘It really would,’ Sophie agreed as Brianna Jade took a path that skirted the ha-ha. ‘I must say, this is beyond epic.’
‘Lucky Ed,’ Dominic said enviously. ‘He gets the hot cougar and probably even more money! God, I’m never going to get to shag her now, am I?’
Brianna Jade vanished from sight behind the shrubbery, and the Style journalists turned from capturing her flight to recording the reactions of the guests.
‘I must say,’ the wedding planner commented ironically to Massimo, the designer, ‘your dress looked really beautiful in motion.’
Massimo threw his hands wide, hunching his shoulders: Brianna Jade had hitched up her train, but there was no question that his exquisite creation was going to get torn up as the runaway bride raced through the bushes. At least he could take some satisfaction in the knowledge of how wonderfully his tailoring was coping under pressure.
It truly was. Brianna Jade was tearing along at a positive sprint, and though sweat was dampening the silk and lace, and her stockings and feet were getting ripped up by the occasional twigs and stones on the path, she didn’t even notice because adrenalin was pumping a constant stream of energy and excitement around her body. Later she would realize how cut and bruised her soles were, but right now she was like a ballet dancer who breaks bones in her foot during a performance and doesn’t even notice until she comes offstage after the final curtain call.
The path looped into the cart track, and the cart track led to Abel’s cottage. She passed it without even checking, as sure as she could be that Abel would be at the piggeries at this time of day. As she took the turn into the narrow lane that served the piggeries, her heart rate sped up so fast that she felt almost frantic with the need to see him, and overcome with fear that she might not, after all. What if he’d gone down to Stanclere village to drown his sorrows at the pub, or taken off on holiday? Worse – what if that afternoon in the barn hadn’t meant as much to him as it had to her, and he didn’t care at all that she was getting married today? What if, God forbid, he had a girlfriend who was hanging out with him?
And when she didn’t spot his large figure beside the Empress of Stanclere’s sty, she could have sobbed aloud in misery. She’d told everyone that she was going to find him! He had to be here, he had to make those crazy, romantic, elated words come true—
She could see the Empress now, her enormous shape in the middle of the sty, another enormous shape beside her. For a moment, she wondered if Abel had imported another pig to keep the Empress company, but why would he risk the Empress having any competition for the epic quantity of food she needed to consume in order to win the Fattest Pig silver medal at the County Fair? And then, as she neared the sty, the shape resolved itself into not a pig at all, but a very large man squatting in front of the Empress, scratching her between the ears, his head ducked down disconsolately.
‘Abel!’ she managed to yell, though she didn’t have much breath left. ‘Abel, it’s me!’
His head rose and he stared at her in utter disbelief, this blonde vision racing towards him, her white dress hitched up to her knees, her muscled legs rising and falling even faster as she saw him jump to his feet, start striding towards the gate in the side of the sty. But Brianna Jade was there first, and she couldn’t wait for the gate to get opened: she reached the rail, put one hand on it, and vaulted over it in a titanic jump that did, at last, succeed in tearing her dress. Abel stepped aside just far enough to miss her feet and legs, catching her body as it shot through the air towards him: she landed in his huge arms with an ‘Oof!’ of breath and an audible ripping sound as her train, flying out behind her, caught on a splinter o
f wood and shredded the lace trim.
‘I didn’t get married!’ she said ecstatically. ‘I nearly did but then I didn’t!’
Pulling his head down, she kissed him fiercely. When she finally let him go, he was breathing as rapidly as she was, his eyes shining.
‘Your lovely dress,’ Abel said idiotically, beaming from ear to ear. ‘You tore your lovely dress!’
‘No problem – I’ll get it cut down and wear it for our wedding!’ she said, feeling absolutely drunk with love and happiness. ‘You don’t mind if I don’t have a train, do you?’
He goggled at her, his mouth open. She couldn’t help laughing: his expression, plus his mess of hair and the dungarees he was wearing over an old T-shirt, made him look exactly like the dozy yokel that she knew he was far from being.
‘Hey!’ She stuck her tongue out at him. ‘I just proposed to you, Abel Wellbeloved! It’s rude not to say anything back!’
‘But Brianna—’
‘You can put me down if you don’t want to marry me,’ she said.
His massive biceps swelled as he shifted her higher on his chest.
‘Of course I want to marry you,’ he said, as if it was the most obvious thing in the world. ‘But you can’t marry me! I’m just a pig farmer!’
‘That’s one of the main reasons I want to marry you,’ she said blissfully. ‘I’m dying to be a pig farmer too.’
He nodded seriously: this was, at last, something that made sense to him.
‘So that’s a yes?’
He nodded again, this time with great enthusiasm.
‘But—’ he began.
‘I’ll tell you everything later,’ she said, reaching up to kiss him again. ‘But right now I want you to carry me back into that barn we were in before and put me down on that hay bale we were on before, and fuck my brains out just like you did before. What?’
Because, even as he started to walk towards the barn, Abel was frowning deeply.
‘We’re going to be married, Brianna,’ he said firmly. ‘I love you. People who are getting married, in love, don’t use that word. We make love.’
‘Fine!’ she said, delirious with happiness now, at the supreme achievement of having finally taken charge of her own life and made a happy ending come true not just for herself, but her beloved mother. ‘Take me into the barn and make love my brains out!’
And he did.
Chapter Thirty
Back in the chapel of Stanclere Hall, Edmund, Tamra and the highly confused vicar were the only three people left inside. Everyone else had raced outside to watch a sight they would only see once in their lives: the near-mythical spectacle of a runaway bride. As soon as the exodus had taken place, Lady Margaret had stationed herself at the chapel doors to make sure that no one went back inside again, and though attempts were made, no one was capable of breaching her very capable defences.
Edmund, holding Tamra’s hand, stared down at her.
‘That night was . . .’ he said eventually, in a very soft voice.
‘I know,’ Tamra said equally softly.
The vicar, deciding that something very important was calling her away, slipped as quietly as she could down the aisle and out of the chapel, where she joined Lady Margaret in barricading the doors.
‘I haven’t been able to get it out of my mind,’ Edmund confessed.
They were both still bright pink, and Tamra’s colour didn’t dissipate at all as she said: ‘Me neither. It was . . .’ She gulped. ‘It was . . .’
‘I know.’ He paused. ‘Brianna Jade was completely right about everything, I think. I mean, you’ve been the biggest boon that could ever have happened to Stanclere. Which is not the reason I’m about to say what I’m going to say.’
‘Edmund, this is crazy,’ she said, her voice rising nervously. ‘You were just about to marry my daughter!’
‘I know – can you believe it?’ Edmund shook his head in disbelief. ‘She’s the loveliest girl in the world, but she’s not you. Honestly, Tamra, now I think about it, I realize that without you around, things would never have got this far. I suppose I saw Brianna Jade as being a younger version of you. As if I was hoping she’d grow into you, become the woman that you are. That was what convinced me to marry her, you know. I’ve known that for quite a while, actually.’
If Tamra could have flushed any more with pride, she would have. Edmund secured her other hand in his.
‘It was that night between us that kept me going, frankly,’ he said. ‘It was just . . . phenomenal. I kept thinking: She does have that passion for me, it’ll come out again, somehow, some way . . . I was waiting and waiting, trusting that it would come back – but I’m such an idiot, I should have realized that the passionate woman I was craving, the one who wanted me as much as I wanted her, was right under my nose. As soon as Brianna Jade told me just now, all the pieces fell into place. To think I once thought I wanted a restful life!’
He smiled down at her with immense fondness.
‘Tamra, don’t tell me I’ve actually managed to strike you dumb,’ he said teasingly.
‘All these months,’ she said slowly, ‘I’ve been thinking I’d have to keep the secret for ever. The relief that I don’t have to any more is just amazing! I’ve been feeling so guilty and miserable about wanting you, but if I’d said anything, Brianna Jade would have lost everything I had worked for . . .’
Edmund’s grip tightened, and he drew her closer, bending down to kiss her. It was just as mind-blowingly good as the last time; they had to pry themselves away from each other at last, Tamra’s hands clasping the lapels of Edmund’s morning suit, Edmund resting his forehead against hers, his breath coming fast.
‘I’m having to think of really awful things,’ he said to her. ‘I mean truly terrible, disgusting, revolting things, like that fish Dom left in my bed – for which, by the way, I owe that bastard the most enormous debt – because any moment now someone’s going to come in here and see that I’ve got an erection that’s bursting through my trousers.’
‘Edmund,’ she said, trying to sound reproving.
‘God, I wish you could do something about it right now,’ he said, his grey eyes gleaming.
‘Edmund!’ She dragged her hands away from him and took a step back. ‘Shit, I’d love to – no, don’t you dare touch me again, don’t you dare – we’re in the damn chapel, for fuck’s sake, you sick, twisted pervert!’
‘For some reason,’ the Earl of Respers said, ‘I get even harder when you swear like a trooper. Why do you imagine that is?’
Tamra looked at him, her eyes shining dark and full of mischief.
‘How the fuck would I know?’ she said deliberately.
Edmund promptly grabbed her again. By the time the vicar, aware that twenty minutes had passed and feeling that, since the bride hadn’t come back, she really ought to check on the groom and the bride’s mother, pushed one of the chapel doors open again, making as much noise as she could to give them due warning, most of Tamra’s hair had fallen down, the flower on her dress was bent askew, and a considerable amount of her fuchsia lipstick was smeared, clownlike, over Edmund’s mouth.
‘Ahem!’ the vicar said, clearing her throat and trying to avert her gaze from the dishevelled state of the two lovebirds. ‘Lady Margaret and I were thinking . . .’
‘We sent all the guests to start tucking in,’ Lady Margaret said briskly, following the vicar in and showing not a whit of the latter’s middle-class embarrassment at Edmund and Tamra’s considerable state of disarray. ‘Thought it was for the best. God knows where Brianna Jade’s gone off to, but it doesn’t look as if she’s coming back any time soon.’
‘I have a notion where she went and who she’s with,’ Edmund said, as Tamra, realizing how much of her lipstick had transferred to him, exclaimed in horror and reached for the handkerchief in his breast pocket to wipe it off. ‘And you’re not going to like it much if I’m right, Tamra.’
‘As long as she’s happy,’ Tamra said, li
cking the handkerchief to get more of the lipstick off.
‘Don’t do that,’ he muttered at the sight of her tongue. ‘I’ll hold you to those words,’ he said, louder, tucking her arm through his and turning to face the nave of the chapel. ‘Vicar, Lady Margaret, I think it’s pretty clear that Tamra and I will be getting married as soon as we can get the banns read. All very unexpected and unorthodox, but it is what it is, and to others it’ll be a nine-days wonder, I’m sure. It’s not as if everyone at the Hall isn’t dying to have Tamra as its official mistress already.’
Tamra smiled at him with such grateful sweetness that even Lady Margaret couldn’t help muttering, ‘Aww,’ to herself.
‘Edmund!’ Tamra exclaimed suddenly. ‘We can’t – Edmund, I’m forty, and you’re going to want heirs. I might not be able to get pregnant . . .’
Edmund shrugged with great nonchalance.
‘Tamra,’ he said easily, ‘like everyone else who’s ever met you, I believe that you can do absolutely anything you set your mind to. And if it doesn’t happen, who cares?’
‘I do,’ Tamra said firmly. ‘I didn’t bring the Hall back from rack and ruin just to see all my work inherited by some cousin of yours.’
‘Fine.’ He grinned down at her. ‘So we’ll adopt if necessary. Really, darling, relax, will you? I’m not marrying you because you’re going to give me heirs, or because you’ve got pots of money. I’m marrying you because, as you know perfectly well, you give me—’
Tamra clapped one hand over his mouth.
‘Edmund!’ she said firmly. ‘In front of the vicar! Will you fucking shut up!’
Epilogue
A few months later, the Harrods Bridal Boutique was packed to the gills with a glittering group of guests celebrating the delayed launch of the first-ever edition of Style Bride. The lavish space had been decorated by a crack team of Harrods’ in-house designers and Style event planners, and the result was a world away from the frou-frou and frilliness that often characterizes bridal salons: instead, from the ceiling were suspended floaty, underlit clouds, semi-transparent and glittering gently, which gave the entire room a sense of drifting magically in space. Strategically arranged lighting glowed in silvery globes around the walls, and Jodie had made the decision to banish anything as obvious as cupcakes and flowers from the launch.
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