“But how can we be ready in one month?” Her Grace wailed. “Olivia?”
“I am sure it can be done,” the countess said soothingly. “The invitations can be sent off tomorrow. They are the most urgent. Then we can sit down and plan everything else.”
“I think for this evening we might as well relax,” the earl said, “and await developments. Do have a seat, Rose. Olivia? And you, too, William. What can I offer you to drink?”
“This is quite like old times,” the duke said, beaming about him a few minutes later when they were all seated cozily, drinks in hand.
It was and it was not, Olivia thought. They were together, the four of them, talking and apparently relaxed, as they had often been in the past. But she was no longer seated beside her husband, their hands almost touching—they had never embarrassed their family or friends by showing open affection in public. He was sitting in a chair by the fireplace, she on the sofa beside the duchess. And she no longer felt quite part of the group. The three of them had continued the friendship over the fourteen years when she had been at Rushton.
She had agreed with Marcus that afternoon that the betrothal should be consented to if his interview with Lord Francis was satisfactory. She still did not know if they had made the right decision. Probably they would not know until several years had passed and they could see how the marriage developed. But she wished, after all, that they could have done something to prevent it.
If there were to be no marriage, she would be able to go back home without further delay. Home to the safety and familiarity of Rushton and to her friends—Clarence and Emma Burnett in particular.
But now she was to be at Clifton for at least another month, amid all the fevered excitement of an approaching wedding. And it was to be at the church in the village. It was going to be very difficult.
And difficult to be in company with him daily, both of them mingling with his guests. And there would be innumerable occasions when they would have to be alone together, working on the arrangements. It was going to be difficult to bear. Every bit as difficult as she had expected. More so.
He was so very attractive. She had never particularly thought of that word in connection with him before. He had been excessively handsome and vital and very, very dear to her. But she could not recall ever feeling this aching pull toward his masculinity. It was not a pleasant feeling. She had no wish to feel it. She was not a schoolgirl to be sighing over a handsome man. She was a mature woman.
Besides, he was Marc—Marcus—and she did not want to be reminded of a marriage that had failed a long time ago and from the misery of whose ending she had fought her way back to life through a year and more of hell. She wanted only to be away from him, to be at peace again. And she knew very well what had made him so very much more attractive than he had been when they were together. It was experience—experience gained with countless other women.
She wanted nothing to do with his experience. She had preferred her innocent Marc.
They were interrupted less than half an hour after sitting down by the sudden and unheralded opening of the doors and the arrival of Sophia and Lord Francis, hand in hand, their faces brightly smiling.
“Ah,” Lord Francis said, “you are all together here. Very opportune. Sophia has just agreed to marry me.”
“I have,” she said, flushing and laughing.
They were all on their feet suddenly, talking and laughing. And the duchess raised her handkerchief to her eyes again.
“Oh, my boy,” she said. “My baby. And it seems no longer than a year ago that you were in leading strings.” She hugged him and wept over him.
“Sophia, my girl,” His Grace said, opening his arms to her, “we have wanted you for a daughter-in-law from the time when you could climb stairs after our boys but not descend them again. And now our wish is to be granted. Come and have a father-in-law’s hug.”
Everyone had to hug everyone else, it seemed. Olivia submitted to a bear hug from the duke, who assured her that he could not be better pleased at the closer link there was to be between their families, and to a teary one from Her Grace. Sophia threw her arms about her and danced her in a circle, declaring that now they would have a whole month together, all of them. Lord Francis smiled sheepishly at her until she cupped his face in her hands and kissed his cheek and told him that she would be proud to have him for a son-in-law.
And then her husband was there as she turned, smiling, from Lord Francis and he was releasing their daughter. The duchess was sobbing loudly in her husband’s arms and lamenting the fact that their baby was leaving them and there would be no more weddings to look forward to until Bertie’s girls grew up.
“Well, Olivia,” the earl said, smiling at her. “We are to be the parents of a bride, it seems.”
“Yes.” She bit her lip and felt the unexpected emotion of the moment work at her facial muscles.
And then his arms came beneath her own and about her and he hugged her hard against him. Her own arms, for lack of anywhere else to go, went about his neck.
All she could feel was shock. Shock that he was quite unmistakably Marc, this older, broader man with the silvering dark hair. Quite unmistakably. It was something about the way he held her, perhaps. Something about the way he caused her body to arch itself against his. Something about the familiar cologne he wore. And something else, quite undefinable.
Marc!
His cheek rested briefly against hers. “We must be happy for them, Olivia,” he murmured into her ear. “We must believe that they will be happy.”
“Yes.” She closed her eyes and then was standing alone again, aware of the duke’s booming laugh and the duchess’s sniffles and Sophia’s chatter.
And she watched as Lord Francis set an arm about Sophia’s shoulders, drew her close against his side, and bent his head to kiss her briefly but thoroughly on the lips. The girl looked stunned, almost angry, for a moment, her mother thought, before flushing scarlet while everyone laughed.
“We want to be married just as soon as the banns have been read,” Lord Francis said. “Don’t we, Soph? It will not be worth anyone’s going home. There is going to be a wedding to celebrate.”
“Go home!” the duchess exclaimed. “Did you hear that, Olivia? We will be fortunate indeed, Francis, if there is even time to go to bed within the next month. Do you have any idea whatsoever of all that is involved in planning a wedding? No, of course you do not. You are a mere man. Olivia, my dear, I have the headache merely thinking about the coming month.”
The duke chuckled. “What Rose actually means, Olivia,” he said, “is that she is now in her element and woe betide anyone who tries to distract her from the sheer delight of wearing herself into a decline over the coming nuptials.”
“Shall we adjourn to the drawing room?” the earl suggested. “Our guests will be wondering why they have been abandoned for so long, though I daresay they will have guessed. I believe my wife and I have a betrothal to announce. Olivia?” He held out an arm for hers.
“AND WHAT DID you think you were about in the library?” Sophia demanded as soon as they were clear of the others.
She and Lord Francis had been permitted to step outside alone for a breath of air in light of the fact that they were now officially betrothed. Everyone else had appeared too tired from a day of outdoor activities and an evening of charades to accompany them. Or too tactful, perhaps. They were strolling along one of the diagonal paths of the parterre gardens.
“What was I about?” he asked, frowning. “I was about announcing our betrothal and trying to look suitably besotted.”
“Looking suitably besotted does not include kissing my lips,” she said. “You will stay far away from them in future, Francis, if you know what is good for you. You were fortunate indeed not to find yourself with a fat lip.”
“If you cannot control your passion sufficiently, Soph,” he said, “it would be better to bite me on the neck rather than on the lips. I can cover up the evidence with my
cravat.”
“Oh,” she said, “you are disgusting. Who in her right mind would wish to bite your neck? Ugh!”
“You turned an interesting shade of scarlet when I did kiss you,” he said. “I thought perhaps you were about to swoon in my arms, Soph.”
“Yes, well,” she said, “you said yourself that when you are acting you have to throw yourself wholeheartedly into the part. I had to convince Mama and Papa that it was my first kiss.”
“It probably was, too,” he said. “Was it?”
“Wouldn’t you like to know!” she said, tossing her head.
He chuckled. “The worldly wise look does not suit you, Soph,” he said. “We are going to have to steal several kisses, you know, over the next days. People will expect it.”
“Oh, nonsense,” she said.
“There are probably a dozen people lined up behind the darkened windows of the house right now,” he said, “just hoping to see our silhouettes merge.”
“What a ridiculous idea,” she said, glancing across to the house. “I do not see a single watcher.”
“Naturally,” he said. “You would not exactly expect them to be lined up there, a candle in each hand, would you, Soph? They are standing back out of sight or hiding behind the curtains.”
“Sometimes, Francis,” she said, “I think you must have windmills in your head.”
“It sounds painful,” he said. “Shall we thrill them?”
“What?”
“Your mama and papa might be among them.”
“Mama and Papa would not spy on me,” she said indignantly.
“They would not think of it as spying,” he said. “They will want to see for themselves that they made the right decision concerning us, Soph. They will want to see that we are not out here quarreling or walking ten feet apart.”
“Well, we are not,” she said. “Walking ten feet apart, I mean. We are always quarreling.”
“I think we had better do this right,” he said. “Stand still, Soph, while I kiss you.”
“Lay one hand on me,” she said indignantly, “and I will …”
“It will have to be two hands,” he said, “and my mouth. You aren’t afraid, are you?”
“Afraid?” she said scornfully. “Of you, Francis?”
“It is as I thought,” he said, stopping and setting one hand on her arm. “You are afraid.”
“Well,” she said. “Of all the …”
“Half a minute should be a decent enough time for a newly betrothed pair, I believe,” he said. “Count to thirty slowly, Soph. It will take your mind off your jitters.”
And while she still looked up at him in mingled indignation and embarrassment and fright, he set his mouth to hers, took her free arm in his other hand and merged their silhouettes.
“What are you doing?” She drew her head back when she had counted no higher than twenty-one and glared at him. “What do you think you are doing?”
“Trying to open your lips with my tongue, actually, Soph,” he said. “It becomes a little tedious merely to rest still lips against still lips, don’t you think?”
“No, I do not think,” she said. “That was a quite unnecessary part of the act. It could not be seen from the house. And if it had, Papa would doubtless be out here by now brandishing a whip about his head. Don’t you ever do that again. Ever, do you hear me? It made me feel all funny.”
“Did it, Soph?” He grinned. “You had better not go falling in love with me, you know. I don’t want to be responsible for broken hearts or anything like that.”
“Do you know, Francis,” she said, “I do not believe I have known anyone—anyone, male or female—who comes even close to you in conceit. Fall in love with you, indeed! I would be as likely to fall in love with a toad. I would be as likely to …”
“… fall in love with a snake,” he said. “Sometimes you are not very original, Soph. Let us change the subject, shall we? Are you happy, at least? Are you satisfied?”
“Oh, Francis.” She looked up at him with a radiant smile as they resumed their walk. “Was it not wonderful? Even more wonderful than could possibly have been imagined? They hugged each other. Did you see? Actually hugged. And I do believe he kissed her cheek, too. And in the drawing room afterward he kept her on his arm while everyone came about to congratulate us and kept his hand over hers, too, and talked about ‘my wife and I,’ just as if they had the most normal of marriages. Did you notice, Francis? Everything is going to be all right, is it not? After a month everything cannot fail to be all right.”
“It was definitely promising,” he agreed. “But I cannot help feeling that we have got in a little deeper than we expected, Soph. Good Lord, my mother must have soaked three handkerchiefs. And they were all so very pleased.”
“Your mother and mine are going to love planning the wedding,” she said, smiling up at him. “We must not forget that the guest list is to be drawn up directly after breakfast tomorrow. You must think of any special friends you want to invite, Francis, apart from Mr. Hathaway and Sir Ridley, who are here already, and I will think, too. I don’t believe I will be able to sleep tonight.”
“Soph,” he said.
“What?”
Lord Francis sighed. “Nothing,” he said. “Just a little thought from that alien world of sanity that I used to belong to.”
“Oh, that,” she said, sobering. “Yes, of course.”
THE EARL OF Clifton could have gone through the connecting door between his dressing room and hers. She was, after all, his wife, and there had been a time when the door between their rooms was permanently open. But times had changed, of course. Or he could have knocked on the door and waited for her maid to answer. He could hear the two of them talking behind it. But there was something demeaning about knocking on the door of his wife’s dressing room.
He strode around to the door of her sitting room and knocked.
She was dressed when she came through from the bedchamber a few minutes after her maid had let him in. But he must have taken her by surprise. He should have left his call until a little later in the morning, perhaps. Her hair had not been done. It hung smooth and shining halfway down her back. She had pushed it behind her ears. He tried to keep his eyes from it. It used to be short.
“I came to see if you had had second thoughts,” he said, smiling. God, but she was beautiful.
“Second and third and thirty-third.” She returned his smile. “I suppose we have to realize that we cannot live her life for her, Marcus, any more than our parents could live ours.”
“They seem happy enough,” he said.
“He is a pleasant young man,” she said. “I think his charm is more than just of the surface. I like him.”
“It seemed strange,” he said, “to see him kiss my little girl in the library and no longer have the right to plant him a facer.”
“Oh, Marcus,” she said, “she was such a sunny-natured little girl, was she not?”
“Do you remember how she used to try to run across the grass almost before she could walk?” he said. “She used to be angry rather than upset when she continually fell down.” He laughed.
“And then you would take her riding on your shoulders,” she said. “And she would clutch on to fistfuls of your hair so that you used to swear that you would be bald by the time you were thirty.”
He turned away suddenly and crossed the room to look out of a window. “Did you notice what she kept saying last night, Olivia?” he asked.
“About our all being together for the next month?” she said. “Yes. She said it more than once.”
“She has never said much,” he said. “I always thought she accepted the situation for what it was. Perhaps she did. Perhaps it is only being here with us like this that has made her realize that she grew up without a family.”
“Yes,” she said. “I did not realize, either, Marcus.”
“This month is going to be very important to her,” he said. “We are going to be important to her. W
e together. Her mother and father.”
“Yes.”
He turned from the window to look at her broodingly.
“Can there be some peace between us for one month?” he asked. “I know you have not liked me for many years, Olivia, and have made a new life for yourself in which there is no room for an old marriage. And I know there has been a dreadful awkwardness between us since you arrived—married but not married, separate parents to the same child. Can we at least outwardly be more together—for Sophia’s sake? Is it possible?”
She stared back at him, her face pale. She looked rather as she had looked the morning he left home never to return, he thought unwillingly, although at the time he had not dreamed that he would not see her again for fourteen years. He had gone away to give her a few weeks to come to terms with his infidelity. To give her a few weeks to forgive him.
She never had.
She licked her lips. “I would do anything in the world for Sophia,” she said. “You know that.”
“Yes,” he said. “And so would I. It will mean a little more than being under the same roof for a month.”
“It will be like last evening?” she said. “My hand on your arm? ‘My wife and I’? ‘Our daughter’?”
“Smiling at each other,” he said. “Doing things together.”
“Planning the wedding together,” she said.
“Can you do it, Olivia?” he asked. “For one month can you hide your aversion to me—at least in public?”
She raised her eyes to his. “Yes,” she said. “For one month, Marcus. For Sophia’s sake.”
“A family for one month,” he said. “I think it will be important to her, Olivia.”
“Yes,” she said.
“Let’s go down to breakfast then,” he said, extending his arm to her.
“My hair,” she said.
He smiled in some amusement. “It is lovely,” he said. “I like it long, though I always liked the curls, too. Go and have it dressed. I shall wait for you here, shall I?”
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