“I want this settled, Norah. You, my wife, in the eyes of God, my solicitors, and everyone who dwells about Rathcannon. And to introduce you, we’ll give a ball.”
“A ball? Oh, Aidan, I don’t think—I mean, I’m not certain—”
“Don’t worry. It’s nothing as grandiose as it sounds—simply a gathering of a few trusted neighbors, families of Cassandra’s friends. A little music, a touch of dancing, and a light supper. The girl has been plaguing me for months to have this kind of an entertainment, and Mrs. Brindle assures me it will be safe enough—a good way to let the girl dip her toes into the social stream to test the waters a bit before the overwhelming crush of London. This way the whole county can know you as Lady Kane, and that unruly little chit of mine can plan and plot and rig things up to her heart’s content.”
“I doubt Cassandra will be in a festive mood,” Norah interjected quietly.
“I’ll handle Cassandra. I’ll explain—” He stopped, his own cheeks tinging scarlet. Norah was certain he’d realized it would be impossible to explain to his daughter that the reason she had been barred from his room was that he had been delirious, crying out secrets she must never, ever, learn.
“I’ll handle Cassandra,” he repeated stubbornly. “She can be a most reasonable little soul.”
Norah nodded, then turned away so that he couldn’t see her eyes haunted by the memory of a teary-faced girl, blue eyes spitting hatred, broken sobs of helplessness and fury echoing from her throat. Why was it that she found it impossible to believe that this same girl would suddenly be brought to see “reason,” with her feelings of guilt and all of Norah’s supposed injustices still stinging her pride.
No, Norah assured herself, now she was the one being overly dramatic. Surely with time and effort, she and Cassandra could regain the closeness that had begun to develop between them during that disastrous supper which seemed an eternity ago.
Surely Cassandra would find it in her heart to forgive Norah for barring her from her father during his illness.
If she did not, Norah knew with sudden insight that the pain of the past few days might be only a taste of what was to come.
Chapter Thirteen
Norah sat, rigid, upon the carved pew, her back as stiff a rod of iron, her eyes hot and searingly dry, as the Reverend Mr. Chubbiston Rhoades ranged the sanctuary, his gold pocket watch never far from his hand. With each tick of the timepiece, the cleric grew more uncomfortable, marking each quarter hour that slipped past the time the ceremony had been slated to begin with a throaty harumph of displeasure.
But then, Norah thought with crushing pressure in her breast, it was incredibly difficult to hold a wedding when the bridegroom was nowhere in sight.
Had he changed his mind sometime after Norah had left the house in the carriage with Mrs. Cadagon, the Irishwoman assuring her that the master and young Miss Cass would soon follow? Had he been so tormented with ghosts of his last marriage that he’d been unable to lay himself open to such vulnerability again?
Or had Cassandra snatched the horse’s reins and sent the team racing off in the opposite direction from the woman she had decided to hate with the same fervor she had once given to adoring Norah?
Norah’s nervous fingers crumpled the gown she had chosen with such care early that morning—a simple ice-blue muslin, with lilies of the valley embroidered about the hem.
Her stomach lurched at the memory of how long she had lingered in rose-scented bath water, how many strokes she had brushed her hair, until it shone with unaccustomed luster. Most foolhardy of all were the tender white rosebuds she had plucked from Rathcannon’s garden to tuck into the dark curls of her hair.
She had wanted to believe she was almost beautiful—for just a moment. But a glance in the mirror had ended any such delusions. She would have gladly plucked the silly blossoms from her hair and donned her serviceable gray gown if there had only been time. But Aidan had made it clear that the Reverend Mr. Rhoades barely had time to pop into the church and fling out the wedding vows before the holy man had to bolt off on another errand. So she had rushed downstairs, to find, not her bridegroom, but only Mrs. Cadagon waiting there for her, the apple-cheeked Irishwoman’s face framed in a stiff green bonnet, her bright eyes troubled.
“Sir Aidan said that we were to go on to the church. That he’ll meet us there directly. Had a bit of a snag to untangle, he did, before he could break away.”
“Nothing serious, I hope?” Norah had asked, worried. “He’s not grown sick again?”
“No, no, nothin’ of the kind! ’Tis nothing to worry your sweet head about, Miss Norah. You wait an’ see, he’ll be at the church lookin’ handsome enough to charm the keys to heaven right out o’ St. Peter’s hands.”
Wait and see… Mrs. Cadagon’s words echoed through Norah’s mind. It seemed as if she had been waiting an eternity.
“Miss Linton?” The minister had gnawed at one fingernail until it bled. “I’m most distressed, but as I informed Sir Aidan, I have a baptism to officiate at two o’clock, several miles away, and from thence I’ve many more miles I must travel to preside over another wedding. Much as I regret it, I fear I shall have to leave.”
Norah closed her eyes for a heartbeat, sickened at the debacle this wedding had become. “Of course you must go, Reverend. I’m sorry for your trouble in coming all this way for nothing.”
The cleric’s withered cheeks reddened as sympathy welled up in his ageless eyes. Norah feared she would retch if she was the recipient of so much as another drop of pity. “I suppose I could delay a bit longer, if I knew that Sir Aidan…” He stopped to clear his throat. “Was not going to be further delayed.”
Was going to show up at all was more like it, Norah thought.
“There is no way to be certain when Sir Aidan will be able to tear himself away from—from whatever is occupying him. I shall look forward to seeing you at a more propitious time for all concerned.”
The little clergyman bustled over to retrieve his greatcoat, dragging it onto his ample frame. “I still feel most distressed to leave like this. I pray nothing is amiss with Sir Aidan.”
“I am certain it is—is just some trifle that can easily be managed. At least I have worked my way through the worst of my wedding jitters.”
The clergyman caught both her hands in his, and she battled to fashion her lips into some semblance of a smile. “Your bridegroom is most fortunate in his choice of a life-mate. Most brides I know would be wailing fit to bring down the rafters.”
Norah grimaced. “I’ve found that such assaults upon the carpentry don’t solve difficulties but only leave one with a raw throat and reddened eyes. Safe journey.”
The little man started to walk past her, toward the rear door, but he squawked when a bellowing voice snapped out, “Where the devil do you think you’re going, Chubbiston?”
Both wheeled, to see Sir Aidan storming in, his hair windblown, his eyes stormy, his jaw rock-hard with stubbornness and irritation.
“Sir Aidan! I was just—I mean, you knew from the beginning that—that I fear I have to leave!”
“You can leave the instant this wedding is complete.”
“But—but—”
“Aidan,” Norah began, her heart beating in a stricken rhythm. She had no idea what she had expected of this man on their wedding day. She had pictured him a hundred different ways, a score of shifting expressions on those handsome features. But never had she pictured him thus: harried and irate, confused and perhaps a little hurt, uncertain and yet wreathed with a stubborn resolve that would have made a far more formidable foe back down.
“Is everything all right?” she asked, swallowing hard. “Cassandra—”
“Cassandra has a headache,” he snapped in steely accents. “She sends her regrets.”
Norah’s heart sank. “I know how much it means to you to have her present,” Norah offered, stunned to find herself groping for any reprieve. “Perhaps we should postpone the ceremony until she is we
ll.”
“Cassandra wouldn’t hear of it,” Aidan said, his voice tinged with bitterness. “And I wouldn’t hear of inconveniencing the Reverend Mr. Rhoades any more than we have already done so. The man’s damned hard to corner.”
“But Aidan, he—”
“We won’t detain him long.” Aidan turned to the cleric, steely determination in his face. “Don’t waste time with fancy words, Chubbiston. Cut to the chase, and you can be on your way in ten minutes, I’ll wager.”
“You can’t whip out a marriage ceremony the way you—you cast out cards before a table is to be closed! These are solemn vows, Sir Aidan.”
“Fine. Make them solemn, short vows, and we can get this the devil over with.”
Norah started to object, but he was already clasping her hand, pulling her toward the altar, the Cadagons stumbling up in their wake. It didn’t matter that she’d placed roses in her hair, because Aidan barely looked at her, his green eyes distant and distracted, his hand clutching hers a little too tightly, as if he were afraid she would turn away and bolt.
Norah was half tempted to do so.
Many times had she listened to marriage vows being exchanged between others, husbands intoning solemn promises to cherish and to protect, while brides, their eyes shining, promised to love, to honor and obey the men who would share their lives, their beds, father the babes that would beat their way into life beneath their mother’s hearts.
It was a ritual as old as time, the mating of one soul with another, a time when life renewed itself in the promise of a future. But as Chubbiston Rhoades hastily stumbled over the lines of the ceremony, it seemed as if all the magic of this ceremony, all its majesty and mysticism, only mocked her from this sanctuary where so many other lives had been thus joined.
Every time her gaze strayed to her impatient bridegroom—his black coat rumpled, the knot of his cravat mangled beyond recognition beneath the strong jut of his chin—she couldn’t help but imagine how different he must have appeared the day he wed Delia March.
A youth, fire-hot with passion, his gaze devouring the beauty he would soon take to his bed. No suspicion would have darkened his face; that hard shell of cynicism, that faint curve of mockery that clung to his features now would have been absent. And he would have sought out his lover’s eyes time and again, clutched her hands with fingers that were hungry to touch other more secret places he could soon claim as his own.
The phantom of that other wedding ceremony painted cold shadows between Norah and the man standing so rigidly at her side. As did the absence of Cassandra. “Do you, Sir Aidan Kane, take this woman to—”
“I do.” He snapped it out so hastily that the reverend’s jaw fell open. “I’ve done this once before,” Aidan said. “I’m somewhat familiar with the rigmarole. I take her for my wife, to have from this day forward. To love and honor and cherish until death do us part.”
Norah’s eyes stung as the reverend turned to her. “Do you, Eleanorah Linton, take this man to…” He paused, almost expectantly, and Norah felt her cheeks burn.
“I haven’t done this before,” she said, trying to keep the quiver of rebelliousness from her voice. “I am not familiar with the… what did Sir Aidan call it? Rigmarole?”
She felt Aidan stiffen, saw him turn toward her, his gaze intense, but she kept her eyes resolutely trained on a stone-carved seraph that decorated one of the pillars supporting the roof beyond the altar.
“Oh,” the Reverend Rhoades blustered, searching again for his place in the prayer book. “Do you, Eleanorah Linton, take this man to be your lawfully wedded husband? To have and to hold from this day forward?”
Norah’s knees trembled, and she wanted to bolt toward the door that led out into the warm morning sunshine. But where would she be bolting to? There was nothing waiting for her in the world beyond, nothing save this practical haven Sir Aidan Kane had offered.
“Miss Linton,” the reverend began, but Aidan cut in.
“She heard you. Norah, will you have me?” he asked, looking down at her so fiercely she could barely breathe.
“I—I do. I mean, I will, I…” she stammered, but the minister seemed satisfied, so he rushed on.
“Do you promise to love, honor, comfort, and obey him, in sickness and in health, until death do you part?”
Love him? Norah’s heart ached. She already did. But what would it be like, living forever in this empty charade of a marriage, knowing she had given him all she’d promised here this day, while he did not love her?
“I do,” she said, so softly the minister had to lean forward to catch the words.
“Do you have a ring?”
Aidan snatched it from his coat pocket and slipped it onto Norah’s finger. “With this ring, I thee wed.”
Sacrificing yourself for your daughter, Norah thought, her eyes burning. To protect her, keep her safe.
“With my body I thee worship.”
You’ll come to my bed, show me—what was it you claimed? That passion is far sweeter than love and far less painful. But what if I’ve already surrendered love to you, Aidan? What if I cannot help myself.
“With all my worldly goods I thee endow.”
You will give me a home, gowns, all the things I could ever want. But will you ever be able to give me the only thing I truly want? Your heart, in return for my own?
What would Aidan even think if he could hear her secret thoughts? Norah wondered, her chest tight. Would he be faintly disgusted? Would he look at her with hated sympathy? Only in her wildest dreams would his eyes fill with the awed expression that had illuminated them when he’d touched the tears running down her cheeks.
“I now pronounce you man and wife,” Rhoades said, slapping shut his prayer book and making haste to where the license lay, quill and ink at the ready. “Sign, and all is official.” He scrawled his own name while glancing at his watch, then cast the pen down and started to bustle from the room.
At the door he stopped, flinging over his shoulder the words, “You may kiss the bride.”
Aidan had signed his name with a flourish, then handed the pen to Norah. The instant she was done, he caught her in his arms, brushing a quick kiss across her lips.
The haste of that gesture made Norah’s eyes sting.
“Norah, forgive me, but I need to go, to try to talk some sense into Cass.” As if suddenly aware he had betrayed something, Aidan’s cheeks reddened. Norah felt a little sick.
“What do you mean? Talk sense into her? You said she had a headache.”
“Ahem, well, she does. One caused by being the most infernally stubborn little wretch in Christendom.”
“You led me to believe that she had agreed to the marriage,” Norah said, raw with a rare flash of temper. “Do you mean to tell me that she is unhappy?”
Aidan glowered. “She’ll get over this mad fit of bullheadedness. I’m certain she will.”
“How could you?” Norah blazed. “How could you lie to me? Make me think that all was well, when she objects to our being wed.”
“If I had told you the blasted chit had locked herself in her room, what would you have done?”
“I would never have married you. Not until she had reconciled herself to the wedding!”
“Exactly. Reverend Rhoades is a busy man. Who knew how long it might be before I was able to collar the infernal fool again. And I won’t be staying at Rathcannon forever. I told you I wanted us wed as soon as possible. I did what was necessary to make certain we were.”
“You lied to me, before we were even wed. Of all the insensitive, selfish—”
Something flared in Aidan’s eyes—hurt, and the same stubbornness Norah was certain now showed in his daughter’s eyes. “I told you the first night you arrived that I change rules to suit me. I cheat when I have to. Now I have a girl barricaded in a tower room, an irate bride railing at me when she’d been warned of my nature, and a splitting headache from racing around to get this damned marriage taken care of. It’s finished. Let
’s get back to Rathcannon before—”
Norah’s chin bumped up a notch as what few webbings of romantic dreams she’d managed to cling to crumbled away into dust. “I would rather walk all the way to Rathcannon than to share a carriage with you.”
“Fine. I suggest you return to Rathcannon in the carriage with Mrs. Cadagon. She’d be much more likely to lend a sympathetic ear.” Aidan’s lips twisted in a grim sneer. “You and Cassandra plot and conspire to get me leg-shackled, then the minute the noose is around my neck you both change your mind. Then, somehow, this whole mess is my fault.”
“No,” she said, each word a sliver of ice. “This mess is doubtless my fault. After all, I’m the bride you are saddled with.”
Her words penetrated past the haze of frustration that seemed to hold Aidan in his grip. She could see him battle to rein in his anger. “Norah, listen to me. I didn’t mean to begin this way.”
“How does one begin a charade of a marriage? I’m certain I don’t know.”
“Norah—”
“Go to your daughter, Aidan. See if you can soothe the hurt we have both caused her.”
“Tonight I’ll make it up to you. I promise.”
“No.” Humiliation sharpened her words. “I would as soon spend tonight alone.”
Was it hurt that flashed in his eyes at her rejection? In a heartbeat, he shuttered it away. He sketched her a curt bow. “As you wish.”
“Until you choose to change the rules, at least,” she said. She fought the tears as he turned and stalked from the church. Norah chafed under the woeful gaze of the Cadagons, who hovered at the rear of the sanctuary.
Mrs. Cadagon came bustling up, catching Norah’s cold hands in warm, comforting ones. “Never you mind Miss Cass’s temper tantrums, dearie. The girl will be over it soon enough, and then you can forget all this unpleasantness.”
Norah looked down at her hand, the wedding band Aidan had slipped onto her finger glinting in the light streaming through the window. The only way she could forget this unpleasantness would be to forget her wedding. Her wedding that was not a wedding, she thought, emotionally exhausted. A broken little laugh escaped her as she glanced down at the ring.
Lords of Ireland II Page 93