The Earl's London Bride

by Lauren Royal

  “I’m not riding any horse.”

  He knew she was unhappy with him, but did she have to contradict him at every turn?

  “I won’t allow you to walk. It’s snowing, and you have no cloak. You’d freeze to death before you made it halfway.”

  “It’s snowing?” Shooting him a skeptical glance, she rubbed a circle of condensation off the window with her fist. She peered outside, wrapped the blanket tighter about herself, and leaned back into the corner. “It’s snowing.”

  Colin looked out the view hole she’d created.

  “Curse it, it’s getting worse than I expected.” Her mocking expression made him bristle. “It’s not my fault we’re surprised with a November snow. For heaven’s sake, we haven’t seen snow this far south in three years. How on earth was I supposed to predict such an occurrence?”

  “It was cold regardless. You could have waited for decent weather before insisting—”

  “I have my reasons for needing to get on with this.”

  “Why? So you can get rid of me once and for all?”

  “No!” he said too quickly. She’d hit too close to home.

  Her response was a stony stare.

  “Amy…I’m sorry this happened. I’ve already said I’m sorry for the way I’ve treated you.”

  She remained tight lipped.

  His hands clenched on his knees as he fought to control his tone. “We need to get to Greystone, and at the rate you’re moving this will be a full-blown blizzard before we even get out of the carriage.”

  Her icy mask fell, and she shrank further into the corner. “I cannot ride a horse.”

  “What?” His hands relaxed, and he rubbed them on his thighs. “Whyever not?”

  “I’ve never ridden a horse,” she confessed in a choked voice. “I cannot do it. I just cannot.”

  “People ride horses all the time.”

  “Other people.”

  “You’ve never been on a horse. What makes you think you won’t like it?”

  “I didn’t say I’ve never been on a horse. I said I’ve never ridden a horse. Papa put me on one once, in Hyde Park, when I was eight. I was up so high, and this thing under me moved, and I screamed until he pulled me off. I swore I’d never get on a horse again.”

  Colin couldn’t believe what he was hearing. They needed to be on their way, and now. “You’re not eight anymore, Amy.”

  “I cannot. I just cannot. The thing is ten times my weight, it has a brain all its own—why, it could buck me off, or run under a tree and make me hit my head on a branch, or—”

  “Now you’re babbling.” He reached for her hand to pull her out.

  Snatching it back, she burrowed even further into the corner and tucked the blanket tighter. “I’m sorry. If I cannot walk, then I’ll just wait here. I have a blanket, a book, and food. I’m prepared to stay until Benchley returns.”

  “This storm could last until morning,” Colin argued, though he hoped to good heavens it wouldn’t. “You’re coming with me, and you’re coming on the horse. I’ll hold on to you. You’ll be fine.” He flung open the door, grabbed her hand from beneath the blanket, and pulled her up and out of the carriage in one smooth motion.

  Glaring, she shivered in her blanket while Colin unhitched the horse. He watched her surreptitiously, his earlier annoyance rapidly turning to amusement. Imagine, an intelligent and educated young woman being scared of a perfectly harmless animal. Surely once she was riding, she would see it wasn’t frightening.

  When the horse was free, he motioned her over. “I suggest you ride astride—you’ll feel a lot more secure that way than sidesaddle.”

  “Sidesaddle?” She shot him an accusatory glare. “There’s no saddle.”

  “Up you go,” he said cheerfully, his laced fingers providing a foothold to boost her.

  “You go first.”

  “Amy,” he said with an exasperated sigh, “if I get on first, I won’t be able to help you up.”

  She huffed, then clenched her jaw and stepped onto his hands, swinging her leg over awkwardly.

  And nearly fell off the other side.

  Her screech pierced Colin’s ears even as he leapt to right her. Seated at last, her eyes wide with fear, she wrinkled her nose. “It smells terrible.”

  Her skirts were hitched up in disarray, and the look on her face was so comical that Colin had to bite his tongue to keep from laughing.

  “It feels warm,” she reported. “And scratchy. And very alive.” The horse took a small step backward, and she shrieked.

  “It’s all right,” Colin soothed. “He’s not going anywhere.”

  He turned back to the carriage, muttering to himself.

  “Wh-where are you going?” she yelled after him. “Come back! You cannot leave me alone on a live beast!”

  He leaned into the carriage to fetch Kendra’s basket of food. “I was just getting our dinner.”

  After swinging up easily behind her, he held the basket in one hand and Amy firmly against himself with the other. His arm reached almost all the way around her waist.

  “Better?”

  She nodded. He waited until she relaxed back against him, then urged the horse at a slow walk toward Greystone.

  They moved—an entire twenty feet.

  “Stop!”

  Colin didn’t. “You’re doing fine, Amy.”

  “No! I mean, we have to go back!” She twisted, trying to face him. “We left my trunk!”

  He reined in, swearing under his breath. “Oh, no. We’re not lugging that deuced trunk to Greystone. It’ll be here when we get back.”

  “No—it must come with me,” she insisted, sounding panicked. She looked up and back at him, bumping her head on his chin in the process. “I’ll get it myself if I have to.” To emphasize her threat, she leaned to the side as though she were determined to slide off.

  Colin clutched at her. “What on earth is in that trunk that makes it so important?”

  She gritted her teeth. “Everything I own.”

  The same answer she’d given before. He was certain she was hiding something from him, but then tears filled her eyes and he found himself climbing off the horse. He set the basket on the ground and headed back to the carriage.

  “Thank you so much,” she called to his back.

  It was the first civil thing she’d uttered to him all morning. He hadn’t a clue how he’d manage to carry Amy, the trunk, and their dinner on one horse, but he supposed it would be worth the effort, if she would act pleasant as a result.

  Another shriek rang out as he stepped into the carriage. “It’s moving! The beast is about to run away!”

  “Pull back on the reins,” he shouted.

  “The what? Oh, dear heavens, it’s leaning down! It’s going to roll over on top of me and crush me!”

  Alarmed, Colin backed out of the carriage. The horse had moved, all right—all of three feet. His head lowered, he was munching contentedly on a clump of grass by the roadside.

  “Dear heavens is right.” Colin hefted the trunk and made his way toward her. “Heaven save me, please.”

  “What did you say?”

  “I said I hope you’re pleased I’m saving your trunk.”

  When he heaved the small but heavy trunk onto the horse’s back, the poor animal turned its head to look at him dolefully. Colin sighed. He found it hard to believe the lengths he would go to in order to placate Amethyst Goldsmith.

  “All right.” He looked to her. “Now move back so I can ride in front of you.”

  “In front of me? How will you hold on to me?”

  “I cannot hold on to you and balance the trunk, Amy.”

  She tightened her knees around the horse’s middle, as though she expected him to haul her off. “I’ll balance the trunk.”

  He looked at the heavy trunk and back to her, drumming his free fingers against his thigh. The thing practically weighed more than she did. “I think not. Of course, we can leave the trunk here…”
/>   “No,” she capitulated. “I’ll move.”

  She inched back until Colin nodded. Keeping a hand on the trunk, he leaned to scoop up Kendra’s basket. “Here, you’ll have to carry this.”

  She gazed at him dubiously, but took it and wisely kept quiet.

  Still balancing the trunk with one hand, he managed to mount the horse without kicking her in the face, a feat he felt deserved her undying admiration.

  She didn’t even seem to notice.

  “Hold on to me,” he said.

  “I cannot see ahead,” she complained. “I can only see down. It-it’s a long way down.”

  “If you’d rather ride in front, we can leave the trunk here,” he suggested in the most pleasant tone he could muster.

  “No, no…I’ll be fine. Wait a minute, though.” She pushed the handle of the basket up to her elbow so she could place both arms around him. “I’m ready,” she announced.

  “Wonders will never cease,” Colin muttered. He urged the horse forward, torn between going slowly and freezing, or moving quickly and frightening Amy half to death.

  Mercifully, he chose to freeze.

  He would swear he felt Amy’s heart pounding against his back, even though he was insulated by his cloak, her blanket, and both their layers of clothing. Her hands, clasped together about his waist, were white knuckled with strain.

  “You have me in a death grip,” he complained. “The basket handle is digging into my side.”

  “Sorry.” Her arms loosened an entire half inch, then tightened again when the horse gave a snort.

  “Are you all right back there?” he asked with a sigh.

  He hadn’t the slightest idea what he’d do if she weren’t.

  TWENTY-EIGHT

  “I’M FINE,” Amy ground out between gritted teeth. She wondered how long it would take to ride a mile and a half. It felt like forever already. “But snowflakes are tickling my nose.”

  “Feel free to let go of me long enough to brush them off.”

  She shook her head violently, though of course Colin couldn’t see her.

  “Does it still seem a long way down?”

  “My eyes are closed.”

  That was the only way she could bear it. Even pressed against Colin’s wide, warm back, she felt unsafe. Her heart skittered, and her legs were getting numb from squeezing tight around the beast’s prickly body. It was ridiculous, and she knew it—even country bumpkins were comfortable sitting a horse.

  But telling herself that didn’t keep her from trembling.

  “Cold?” Colin asked, apparently feeling her body quake.

  “Yes.” Better to let him think that was the reason.

  “I warned you we needed to go quickly.”

  When the horse sped up, she yelped, and Colin scrambled to right the trunk, swearing under his breath. If she’d needed any more confirmation that she fit poorly in his world, she had it now.

  Resolved to stay calm until this torture was over, she squeezed her eyes shut tighter and began singing to herself. Perhaps by the time her song was finished, they’d be at Greystone.

  “‘I tell thee, Dick, where I have been; Where I the rarest things have seen; Oh, things without compare! Such sights again cannot be found; In any place on English ground; Be it at wake or fair.’”

  “You’ve a sweet voice,” Colin called back, amusement lacing his words.

  He was laughing at her. If she could only get past her fear and let go of him, she might be tempted to shove him off the horse.

  Instead, she continued singing.

  “‘At Charing Cross, hard by the way; Where we, thou know’st, do sell our hay; There is a house with stairs. And there did I see coming down; Such folk as are not in our town; Forty at least, in pairs.’”

  “Ballad Upon a Wedding,” Colin remarked. “The man who wrote it—Sir John Suckling—fought beside my father in the war.”

  “’Amongst the rest, one pest’lent fine; His beard no bigger though than thine; Walk’d on before the rest. Our landlord looks like nothing to him; The king, God bless him, ‘twould undo him; Should he go still so dress’d.’”

  “That’s the groom, who is said to be Lord Broyhill. And the bride was Lady Margaret—”

  “If you know the song,” she interrupted, irritated into finally addressing him, “the least you could do is sing along with me.”

  But he didn’t. There were fifteen verses to Ballad Upon a Wedding, and Amy sang them five times through before the horse finally stopped.

  “We’re here,” Colin said with an exaggerated sigh of relief. “I believe the basket handle has impressed a permanent indentation between my ribs.”

  “Thank heavens.” Amy’s eyes flew open, and she blinked against the daylight. “I meant thank heavens we’re here, not about your ribs.”

  A snort floated back, making Amy jump—but the sound had come from Colin this time, not the horse. He unwound her arms from his waist and reached back a hand. “Here, let me help you down.”

  When she landed on solid ground, her knees nearly buckled under her. Taking a deep breath, she looked around. She found herself on a circular drive in a modest courtyard, enclosed on three sides by a crenelated curtain wall. The living quarters of the small castle made up the fourth side. The entire structure would fit into a corner of Cainewood.

  She was enchanted.

  Colin hopped down from the horse and slid her trunk to the snowy ground. He gestured at his home. “It’s not like Cainewood, is it?”

  “No, not at all,” she said seriously. “It’s much nicer.”

  “Nicer?” he asked in apparent disbelief.

  She watched his gaze wander over the ruined portions of the wall and a huge roofless chamber that dominated the edifice. She followed along, seeing ancient weathered stones with stories to tell and a building the perfect size for one happy family.

  “Yes, it’s much cozier. Cainewood is beautiful, but I cannot imagine why anyone would actually want to live there.”

  “Try explaining that to the girl I’m marrying,” Colin muttered, leading the horse to one of the posts set around the drive.

  Still carrying the basket, Amy wandered back to the entrance and stared up in wonder at the massive oak portcullis gate. Outside the walls, she could see the moat was dry and had been for some time. A mosslike grass grew in its bottom, lightly dusted with snow.

  “Once upon a time, it was filled by the River Caine.” Colin’s voice startled her, nearby. He pointed out the river in the distance. “It runs all the way from the coast past Cainewood to here. In fact, the license to crenelate was granted by King Richard II to protect Greystone from pirates who sailed up the River Caine from the sea. It was originally built by a bishop.”

  Amy felt her beloved history books coming alive within these walls. “How long has it been in your family?”

  “Not at all, till recently. Its Royalist owners perished with no issue. Charles deeded it to me after the Restoration, when I was all of sixteen. I’m just now getting around to fixing it up.”

  At all of twenty-one, Amy knew. Somehow he seemed much more mature, much older. She supposed that was what came of being orphaned at six and growing up on one’s own.

  A ruined tower sat adjacent to the entrance, and she looked down inside it—a long way down.

  “The oubliette,” he explained. “It was secured with a heavy iron grille.” His voice sounded mysterious and deep as the pit. “Miscreants would be cast inside…and sometimes forgotten.”

  Suddenly shivering, she tightened the blanket around her body.

  With a grunt, Colin shouldered her trunk. “Come inside, where it should be warmer.” He motioned for her to follow him down a short passageway with an unassuming oak door at its end.

  He unlocked the door and entered, bending to set down her trunk. She followed in time to see him shove it against the wall with one booted foot.

  “There.” He glared at her accusingly. “I’m not looking forward to our riding back wi
th it, I’ll warrant you.”

  Her legs were still shaking, though she’d never admit it. She set the basket on the floor. “I’m not riding a horse back.”

  “Benchley cannot drive the carriage here with one horse.”

  “Then you’ll ride out with him and return with the carriage. That way you won’t have to carry the trunk on horseback,” she pointed out.

  “That’s true,” he conceded rather crossly. Averting his face, he turned to arrange some wood in the fireplace on the right.

  The vestibule was small and square, with an open-beam ceiling of oak. An oak staircase marched up the wall opposite the entrance. To the left, Amy saw an arched door. She walked over and tried the handle.

  “It’s locked,” Colin said, standing up. “The great hall is beyond, lacking half a roof at present.”

  She nodded, turning back to him. Behind him, the fire burned brightly, illuminating the dim chamber. Shadows danced on whitewashed, unadorned stone walls. The stone floor was polished smooth from centuries of use, and a fringed Oriental carpet rested in the center.

  “Is this where you sleep?” Amy asked. She knew his home was mostly unrestored, and many families lived in a room this size or smaller. Perhaps he had a pallet that he put in here at night.

  “Heavens, no.” He laughed and picked up the basket. “Come this way.”

  She followed him through an open archway and down a corridor. He paused at a doorway on the left.

  “This is my temporary bedchamber,” he explained. “Once the great hall’s roof is complete, the rest of the living quarters will be restored.”

  Amy stepped into the austere room. It held a wooden washstand, a dressing table with a mirror, and a large bed with a small table beside it and a chest at its foot. Carved in a twisted design, the bedposts supported a cream-colored canopy that matched the bedclothes and plastered walls. A gray stone fireplace and hearth echoed the gray stone that framed the three windows.

  She wandered to a window and drew in her breath in surprise.

  “You’re looking behind the great hall.” Colin’s voice came across the room from where he lounged against the doorjamb. “It’s officially called Upper Court. The main courtyard where we entered is called Lower Court.”