She knew he had. He might not have convinced his father to change course, but he’d certainly made his feelings known.
“In the end, it was futile,” Lucas said. “I had to finally admit this battle cannot be won. But I could, at the very least, make certain you were treated fairly in the marriage settlements.”
“A guarantee of pin money doesn’t make misery easier to face,” she whispered.
“Do you truly think you’ll be miserable?”
She met his confused gaze and seized a surge of courage. “Do you love me?”
He took her hand in his. “I’ve always loved you, Julia.”
“I don’t mean as an honorary younger sister or a one-time playmate,” she said. “Do you love me? Do you love me as a husband ought to love his wife?”
He didn’t answer. She didn’t truly need him to. She already knew the answer. She had heard his answer from outside his father’s library.
She slipped her hand free. “There are few things more miserable, Lucas, than daily living the death of a dream.”
“This was not my choice,” he said, a little defensive, a little pleading.
She stood and pulled her hood over her head. “We all make the choices we can.”
“Truly, Julia, I didn’t choose this.” He looked up at her from his perch on the rock. “I never would have.”
Did he mean he would never have chosen a surprise marriage he’d not been consulted on or that he would never choose to marry her? Both, she felt certain. This was a terribly crumbly foundation on which to build a marriage.
“Maybe you should have stayed on the Continent a little longer,” she said. “None of this would be happening.”
“Not yet, at least,” he added.
His resignation was not helping her outlook. She wrapped her arms around her middle and stepped down from the rock onto the leaf-strewn path.
He rose as well. “What do you mean to do now?”
“I am contemplating the very tempting possibility of simply not being here on our wedding day. I cannot be forced to marry you if no one can find me.”
“You’re running away from home?” He asked the question as if it were a great joke.
Perhaps she had begun the threat in jest, but the idea was proving increasingly appealing. The mail coach passed through Collingham on a relatively regular schedule. If she purchased herself a seat on it, she could be out of the county before anyone even knew she was gone. She would be alone, yes, with no idea where she would go or how she would support herself, but at least she wouldn’t be forced into a marriage she didn’t want by a father who didn’t seem to care.
“Julia.” Lucas sounded worried. “You cannot be contemplating this madcap idea in earnest.”
“Desperate circumstances require a degree of rashness.”
“Julia.” He reached for her, his expression one of near panic.
She stepped out of his reach. “I am going to take a walk.”
“To where?” he pressed.
“Only along the riverbank.” She sighed. “Even if I wanted to run away, I’m hardly in a position to do so right this moment.”
He did not appear appeased. “Please, promise me you won’t run off.”
Perhaps he was not the only one who had options.
“You’ve chosen your response to this mess of an arranged marriage,” she said. “I will choose mine.”
“Julia.”
She turned and walked away.
He didn’t follow. Her mind would not calm enough to contemplate why he wasn’t dogging her heels, demanding to know if she was truly going to attempt to flee home.
Too many things weighed on her heart. Her uncertain future. Her quickly disappearing dreams.
There would be no gentleman miraculously arriving in her life and loving her enough to never abandon her. There would be no one standing at her side, saying he saw her worth and value and that anyone would be honored to have her in his life. No. She would be forced to marry someone who had left her behind long ago, someone who planned to do so again and again, someone who thought her a weight and a poor option and a person who offered him nothing. Her own father didn’t care. Lord and Lady Lampton, who had been like an uncle and aunt to her all her life, didn’t care. Even Lucas had accepted the arrangement long before she had.
She did not actually intend to run away. But she needed to decide what choice she did intend to make.
Chapter Nine
Though Julia was tempted to take her dinner on a tray in her room that night, she opted, instead, to eat with her father. She didn’t do so because his rejection had broken her spirit. She didn’t do so because she hoped to regain his good opinion or change his mind on the matter of her future. Julia had mere days left in this home where she had once been loved. She meant to spend those days with her head high and her shoulders squared. She would carry herself as someone with worth, even if no one else saw that in her.
“This gown picked up a bit of mud along the hem,” Jane said, eyeing Julia as they began their pre-dinner ministrations. “Perhaps you ought to choose a different one.”
Though it was worded as a suggestion, no one hearing it would interpret Jane’s tone as anything but a directive. Though Julia recoiled a bit at being told what to do again, she agreed with the assessment of her current clothing.
Jane pulled open the doors of the armoire. “The light green, perhaps.”
“No. The gown at the very back.”
Jane reached in and pulled out a sky-blue polonaise with white pleated trim. Its pointed waist and wide, full skirts were a bit formal for a simple family meal but still lovely.
It was not, however, the one Julia had in mind. “Farther back.”
Jane replaced the gown and reached in farther. “This is the dress at the very back, but you can’t possibly mean to wear this.” She removed a gown in black satin with a gray- and lavender-striped overrobe. It was one of two gowns she had kept from her period of mourning after Stanley’s death. The other was unrelieved black.
“That is precisely what I mean to do.”
Jane shook her head. “Your father will object.”
“That is the dress I will wear to dinner.” Julia spoke more firmly in defense of her preferences than she had since Jane had been made her abigail. Perhaps she was tired. Perhaps she was angry. Perhaps she’d finally given up. “I will not be in this household more than a few more days. You can continue acting as my maid while I am here, or you can take up now whatever new post you have in mind after my marriage. I leave that decision to you. I can pull the bell and ask the housekeeper to send one of the other maids to dress me if you would rather.”
Jane stood a moment in surprise. Julia held her ground.
Jane laid the mourning dress on the bed. “Very well, Miss Cummings.”
Julia was dressed, sporting the colors of half-mourning, her hair styled very simply, no ribbons or bows or flowers. She was the very picture of a young lady mourning a great loss.
Nervous but determined, she made her way down the stairs to meet her father for their meal.
To say he was shocked upon seeing her would be a gross understatement.
Once he recovered his voice, he let his thoughts be known. “What is this, Julia? Theatrics will not change—”
“If you would rather not take your meal with me, I will not be so selfish as to keep you here.”
Again, his bushy brows pulled upward in surprise. His mouth moved silently for a moment, clearly unable to form the words his brain must have been attempting to piece together. After a moment, he settled on a conversational direction. “Why are you dressed in half-mourning?”
Julia shrugged casually. “It felt appropriate.”
“Julia—”
She held up a hand to stop whatever objection or justification he meant to make. �
��I will not argue with you about the marriage you arranged for me. You have made your position clear. I have made mine equally known. Let us pass a quiet and, if we are fortunate, peaceful meal.”
They spoke not another word until they had both been seated for some time and had begun eating.
“Lucas tells me the river was running fast today,” Father said.
It was, on its surface, an inane topic. Julia, however, felt a growing degree of unease. “When did you visit with Lord Jonquil?”
Though Father narrowed his gaze at Julia’s use of Lucas’s title, something she seldom did, he continued on. “He called not long ago. We had a very . . . illuminating conversation.”
“Did you?” She tried to hide her rising worry.
Father set his fork down and looked across the table at her. “I find myself both surprised and weary at having to say this to my grown daughter, but running away from home is a rather juvenile thing to do, Julia.”
The worry she’d felt disappeared on the instant, replaced by immediate irritation. “He came here to tattle on me?”
“I am grateful that he did.” Father took up his utensils once more.
“And why are you pleased to hear what I said in a moment of sadness and pain?” She hated that she wasn’t entirely certain he wasn’t pleased to know she was still stinging from his rebukes and dismissals.
“‘Forewarned is forearmed,’ as the saying goes.” Father took a bite, quite at his ease.
“You are arming yourself against my potential flight?”
“I know you are upset with me, and you have made clear you think I am being unkind and unloving in insisting you continue on with this match, but I care about you, Julia. I would not see you cast yourself onto the questionable mercy of the world. As tempting as you might find the prospect of running from what you perceive as an untenable situation—”
“My situation is unendurable.”
“Fleeing would only make things worse. For you even more than anyone else.” Father sighed, something he’d done a great deal in the last few days. “I mean to keep a close eye on you, Julia. The staff will as well. If you will not be wise, we must be wise for you.”
So much for her determination to walk about as the mistress of her own life and future. She was being treated as a child, as a problem, as a . . . a weight. Lucas, it seemed, was not the only one who viewed her that way. A mere week earlier, she would not have believed Father would be so dismissive of her worries and her happiness.
“I hadn’t actually intended to run away,” she said. “I was speaking hyperbolically in a moment of weariness.”
“You spoke forcefully enough for Lucas to be concerned.”
Julia dropped her gaze to her plate. Her father thought her an irritable child. Lucas ran about telling his father and hers what an unwanted and unmanageable handful she was. Those members of her family who might have stood in support of her were, instead, lying in eternal repose in the distant churchyard.
There would be no escaping what had been arranged for her. She’d known that ever since her discussion with her father earlier that day. If she were being entirely honest with herself, she would admit she’d known as much from the moment Lord Lampton had announced the betrothal at the Lampton Park ball.
She would be required to go through with this mess of an idea. As a lady, she had very little control over her own life. But she was not helpless or voiceless. She would find a means of being her own defender.
***
The day of Julia’s wedding dawned drizzly and overcast, confirmation that her approach to the day was an appropriate one.
She’d selected the dress she would be wed in, and she had relieved Jane of her duties when she’d vehemently objected to it.
One of the chambermaids helped Julia dress. She did so in silence, which was perfectly acceptable, preferred even. Julia had, the night before, gathered up all the tools and mixtures used to apply powder and placed them in a crate, then sent the pile with a footman to be disposed of. Her hair would be unpowdered and worn simply, a reasonable pompadour with soft, loose curls hanging down one shoulder rather than styled to the absurd height Society insisted upon. There would be no flowers or jewels in her hair. For once, she would appear precisely as she wished, not as others dictated.
A quick knock sounded at the door of her bedchamber.
“Enter.” She disliked the distrust she felt with the staff, but her father had admitted they were being required to spy on her. They no longer felt like part of her home but part of her misery.
Another of the maids poked her head inside the room. “Lord Farland is—” Surprise momentarily stopped the poor woman. She recovered admirably. “Lord Farland is ready to depart, Miss Cummings.”
Julia dipped her head in acknowledgment. She stood and stepped in front of her long mirror, making a quick assessment. Unrelieved black. No sparkle from jewelry, no softening from lace or ribbons. Nothing that would give anyone reason to misunderstand.
She made her way from her room, down the corridor, down the stairwell, to the ground floor.
Father was waiting in the entryway. His face fell when he saw her. That hurt too. She understood he was reacting to her choice to dress in the color of grief, death, and loss. It was, in fact, the reaction she’d wanted. But it still hurt. She’d once had dreams of approaching this day with excitement and a light heart. She’d imagined her father being happy for her, beaming with love for his “dear girl.” Nothing had gone as she’d hoped.
“Shall we, Father?” She was proud of the steadiness of her voice.
He simply nodded and offered his arm.
She was about to be married, and she had never felt more wretched.
Chapter Ten
“I have attended my share of weddings,” Kes said, “but this morning was the first time I’ve ever seen a bride dressed in full mourning.”
That had surprised Lucas. He would wager it had surprised a lot of people.
“And I believe this was also the first time I’ve ever witnessed a groom struggle not to laugh upon first seeing his soon-to-be wife on their wedding day.”
He couldn’t hold back his grin. “How could I not laugh? It was, in all honesty, hilarious.”
“Most gentlemen would not be so entertained by the sight of their bride entering the chapel dressed all in black,” Kes said. “Why were you?”
“I laughed because I knew why she’d done it. She also arrived with her hair unpowdered, which I sorted easily as well.”
He slouched a bit, trying to find a more comfortable position. The wedding breakfast was over. The guests had left. All that remained was for Julia to finish her preparations for their journey. Kes was keeping Lucas company while he waited.
“The Julia Cummings I grew up with was a force of nature. Seeing her make such an impossible-to-misunderstand statement this morning took me back years.” He chuckled lightly. “Lud, it was fun to see that Julia again.”
“‘Fun’ that she thinks of your marriage in the same terms most reserve for a death in the family?”
“I’m not much happier about it than she is,” he said. “We have many of the same objections. Added to her burden, though, is her anger with her father. He has been very stern with her. Also, she’s never lived away from here, never traveled, has known very little of Society beyond the environs of Collingham. I am certain she’s overwhelmed and likely a little scared.” It was, in fact, the reason he hadn’t been able to entirely discount the possibility of her making good on her half-hearted threat to run. He was infinitely grateful she hadn’t. “In time, she’ll find her footing.”
Kes shook his head. “You are not exactly the sort to wait about for things to happen. How long before your patience wears thin?”
“We’ll have some time at Brier Hill before I leave for Portugal.”
“Do you think it
will be sufficient?” Kes asked.
“That’s not for a few months yet. I’m certain Julia and I will have brokered some kind of peace between us by then.”
Father poked his head inside the sitting room. “Your mother and your wife are making their way down the stairs. Time to depart.”
Your wife. A decidedly odd thing to hear. That his wife was little Julia Cummings only made the situation all the stranger.
He pulled himself up from the chair and moved languidly to the door. If he gave the impression of not being on edge, Julia might feel a bit more at ease. One look at her face when she appeared at the first-floor landing, though, told him “at ease” was an unlikely thing.
The tension around her eyes and mouth, the stiffness of her posture, the tightness of her breathing had not improved since they’d taken their vows that morning.
“She looks lovely,” Father said, smiling up at his new daughter-in-law.
“She looks miserable,” Lucas countered. “Which is, of course, the ideal footing on which to begin one’s wedding journey.”
Mother walked down the broad staircase as well. Though she smiled, her eyes held concern every time she looked at Julia. The “blushing bride” was not inspiring confidence in anyone. Lucas had tried to warn his parents that their ill-conceived plan, with its foolish timeline, would cause no end of distress to those actually required to bear the burden of it all. If only they had listened.
Julia reached the ground floor. Lucas moved to her side. With a smile he hoped she saw as empathetic, he offered his arm. She threaded hers through his but rested her hand so lightly on his arm that she hardly touched him.
He leaned his head a little closer and spoke in a low voice, not wishing to embarrass her but wanting to offer something that might ease her discomfort. “We are traveling only as far as Havenworth today. You needn’t be in the carriage long, nor endure the questionable cuisine of an inn.”
She nodded but didn’t respond.
They stepped through the front doors of Lampton Park. The Brier Hill traveling carriage awaited them. Trunks and portmanteaus had been loaded into the boot. The driver sat atop, on his bench. A footman stood holding the door open. The step had been lowered. All was in readiness.
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