“go find her you dolt!” George comes over confused and looks at Edmund accusingly,
“What did you say to her? She was happy.” Edmund is snapped out of his shock by his brother criticizing him,
“what do you care Georgie? You are entirely incapable of taking care of a beautiful woman like her. She is above your status. Let the adults do the work.” He sneers. He won’t stand for his socially inept brother to talk down to him like that. “Stay here and look good for the family, if you can manage that.” He storms off after Vivienne, but when he gets to the house he finds out she never came back. He frowns and as he turns to look elsewhere Mr. Amor arrives. He steps out of the carriage looking down trodden.
“It is best you go home now. The engagement is off. Leave us be.” Edmund tightens his jaw and stalks off just missing the arrival of George.
George looks at the door and sighs. He shouldn’t be here, but she looked so sad. He knocks at the door and the servant tells him that Vivienne will not see anyone. He stands at the doorway for a moment chewing on his bottom lip before turning and heading around back. He sees the light is on in her workshop and smiles.
He walks over and knocks on the door before entering. Vivienne is sitting at her chair still in all of her finery.
“H-hey.” He says softly and pulls up a chair to sit by her. He puts his hand on her shoulder and smiles, “w-working on s-something b-big?” Vivienne looks up at him and wipes her face. Her make up is messed up from crying, but she tries to hide it as she flashes George a smile,
“Not really. It’s just… I am not getting out of this engagement am I?’ George frowns and looks at her,
“D-do you w-want to?” Vivienne nods at him and sighs looking at the metal bits on her desk,
“I just don’t want to get married. I have so much left to do.” She whispers and George’s heart drops. It’s not that she doesn’t want Edmund, it’s that she doesn’t want anyone. He nods,
“I-is it E-edmund? B-because he will l-let you w-work. P-promise.” He reassures trying to calm her down even though he knows that he can never be with her.
“I don’t know George. I don’t know if I can handle any of this at all. I just want to be alone.” George nods and sighs,
“w-well w-why don’t you sh-show me wh-what you’re w-working on?” She smiles and nods pulling out her notebook. George smiles back but his heart is falling out of his chest. He shouldn’t be surprised. Of course she wouldn’t love him.
Chapter 10
Vivienne sighs and looks at her broken contraption. She hasn’t left the workshop in days, hasn’t been able to focus, has barely eaten, and only spoke to her father when he told her the engagement was off. She merely nodded to him hollowly and Harry left feeling like a rotten father. He never should have pushed her to marriage.
Even worse Edmund had tried to see her multiple times, forcing Harry to turn him away. Vivienne just doesn’t understand. Why hasn’t George come? Edmund has come every single day, sometimes more than once, but not George. Did she do something wrong? She bites her lip and throws her notebook at the wall in frustration. With a huff she stands and shoves her shoes on. If he won’t visit her then she will have to visit him.
Harry looks at her shocked as she asks for a carriage, “are you going out today Vivienne?” Vivienne turns and looks at him,
“has George visited?” Harry scratches his head confused. George? He didn’t know any young men named George. “George Dickens. You know, Edmund’s brother.” Harry shakes his head,
“no. Only visitor was Edmund. Why do you ask? I didn’t know you were friends with his younger brother?” Vivienne shakes her head,
“Some friend. He has not even came to see me once. Maybe he is hurt I am not marrying his brother, but even still he could have told me to my face.” She storms out the door leaving Harry behind. Despite himself he smiles, had he known Vivienne felt like this about a man he would have never made a marriage for her to begin with. He chuckles to himself and then turns back to his reading. Young love he thinks to himself.
Vivienne goes straight to the mill knowing full well that George would be there. She storms passed the confused workers and sees him sitting alone and working on the same machine they had worked on together all those weeks ago. She puts her hands on her hips about to yell at him when she sees his frown. Suddenly all the anger drains from her, she isn’t really mad at him. She is just hurt. She sits next to him and smiles and puts her hand on his shoulder, “can I help?”
George jumps and looks at her eyes widening, “w-why are y-you h-here? S-shouldn’t…. E-edmund was l-looking for y-you…” he mutters and Vivienne only shakes her head. She picks up a tool and sits down,
“ I don’t care about Edmund, I care about you.” As the words leave her mouth she realizes how true they are. This whole thing hadn’t ever been about Edmund at all. Or even getting married. It was George. She sits beside him and after a few hours of work George leans back and smiles at her,
“Th-thanks. Th-this machine is r-really a t-two man j-job.” Vivienne smiles and nods leaving over and pressing her lips to his. She can feel his body stiffen and she smiles as she pulls away and strokes his cheek,
“I am ready to be married now.” George looks at her stunned. Why is she telling him this? Why did she kiss him if she was ready to be with Edmund? He looks away and nods,
“Edmund w-will be r-really happy. I w-will make s-sure he m-makes you h-happy too.” He wouldn’t let Edmund sleep around on Vivienne. She deserves more.
Vivienne only laughs and tips his face up to hers, “no George. I don’t want Edmund. I am ready to be married, but only if it’s to you.” George’s eyes widen, but before he can stop himself or say no he lunges forward and hugs her tight as he buries is face into her chest. She wants him.
Unreciprocated Love
~Bonus Story~
A Historical Arranged Marriage Victorian Romance
Scarlett Clarendon knew exactly what to expect out of her life, even if she didn’t like it. But when her betrothed passes away unexpectedly, she’s thrust into a new future, one that threatens to overwhelm both her dreams and her nightmares.
It isn’t that she is opposed to the match her father and his have arranged—at least she hadn’t been when she’d made a foolish declaration of love for young Lachlan years before.
But he’d made it clear then in no uncertain terms that he her feelings were not reciprocated. Now she’s trapped, stuck in a marriage with a man who doesn’t want her.
Or is it possible she has misinterpreted the man’s feelings from the beginning?
* * *
Chapter 1
Scarlett paced back and forth across her bedroom floor, her chest heaving, heart pounding and her blood boiling. She was ready to hurl the heavy pewter pot on the table across the room at the handsome, brutish, ogre of a husband who stood by the door, leaning casually against its frame. The grin he wore was so irritating she imagined his handsome mouth the target of her pewter weapon. Her fingers itched to reach for it, thinking he would never see it coming. Then again, just to irritate her he was probably even now at the ready, his arms only appearing relaxed, but prepared to thwart whatever attempt she made at knocking the oaf unconscious.
Just a few short months ago her life had been serene, almost perfect. And now…
She remembered back to when it had all started, the day her father announced she was to wed Sir Lachlan William Tamhas Mackenzie Wakefield, third Earl of Wendover, fifth Earl of Cromartie. For heaven’s sake, the man’s name was an even larger mouthful than her own Lady Scarlett Catherine Elizabeth Clarendon. What on earth were parents thinking when they bestowed such elaborate, longwinded titles upon their offspring?
It wasn’t so much of a surprise, though—the length of his name, that is. The betrothal, on the other hand, had been entirely unexpected. Her betrothal to his brother, the original Earl of Wendover and Cromartie, had been arranged many years before, but he had succumbed to s
mallpox just months before she had come of age and they were expected to wed. She’d mourned the Earl, but not the marriage. He had been kind-hearted and amiable, but she hadn’t a speck of interest in tying herself to the man in Holy matrimony. But then, Scarlett had no interest in marriage at all, however outrageous that might make her.
“And what if this one succumbs to illness as well?” she had railed at her father in objection. “There are no more brothers in that family to pass me onto…so what is it to be? One of his cousins? A grandfather, still living perhaps?”
“Come the fourteenth of June, you will marry the earl, daughter. I have made up my mind and the contract has already been signed,” her father had bellowed back.
“And if I refuse? If I will not let you force me into marriage with that wretched man?”
“Then I will have you confined to your rooms until the day and drag you to the altar myself!”
Their eyes blazed with the same stubborn anger that all Clarendons came by naturally. She was only fortunate her father was not a heavy-handed man or else she’d have gotten a lashing more times than she could count in her twenty years on God’s earth. He did not punish her for it because he knew full well from which parent she’d inherited the trait. Nevertheless, they’d railed at each other in anger more times than she could count. Her mother had long since learned to stay out of their arguments, knowing her soothing attempts to set things to right would only prolong the heated conflict.
She’d won a good number of their arguments by driving her father to exhaustion, but no matter how much she protested this time, the stubborn man would not be swayed. And on the fourteenth of June, she knelt at the altar next to the red-haired, giant of a man who would be her husband within moments. He was too big, and too strong, and what had the good Lord been thinking making a man so handsome? Didn’t He worry the man would become a conceited scoundrel, using his good looks to compromise the constitutions of young ladies everywhere?
Sir Lachlan William Tamhas Mackenzie Wakefield did not look anything like the man who had been his thin, willowy older brother. Was it even possible the two of them were related?
Yes. There was one thing that connected them, that told every onlooker they came from the same stock; they had both possessed the same blue-green eyes, a turquoise she had never seen anywhere else.
She stood when she was instructed to, and she spoke the vows as she was expected. But while she’d intended to maintain a cool detachment from the words, she could not stand there in the house of God and speak idle promises. Whatever else she was, she was not a woman who would lie directly to God. And so, by the conclusion of the ceremony, she’d tied herself irrevocably to the man who stood next to her. However much she hated the vile blackguard, he was her husband and would be so until the moment of her death. Or his—which at present did not sound like a wholly unpalatable idea. While still in the house of God, though, it was probably best she confined her thoughts to less sinful things than the gleeful prospect of her husband’s demise.
And she kept her thoughts as pure as possible on the ride to her parents’ home, sitting next to the man whose presence took up so much of the carriage it was a wonder her parents had fit into the crowded space with them. Though not custom, her father had insisted on riding back to the manor with them, probably concerned that he might find a widowed daughter by the time she arrived otherwise. The three of them kept up polite conversation the entire way, but she couldn’t force herself to chime in with little more than one-word answers. She wasn’t oblivious to the fact that following the customary wedding breakfast, there were only a limited number of hours until the wedding night would come…her wedding night.
Her mother had provided her with a rudimentary explanation of what she could expect from that, but she’d hastened away from the subject quickly, thoughts whirling in her head of the heavily muscled Lord Wendover crushing her slight frame beneath him. Death by bedding—the thought rose anew in her mind and she was forced to stifle a giggle, a hysterical response that no doubt arose from a hefty draught of fear of the unknown.
Aside from her vows, she’d barely spoken more than a handful of words to her husband, and she was expected to lie passively beneath him, letting him take his pleasure at leisure? Her hackles rose at the thought, but she tamped them down quickly. “…to love, to honor…to obey…” she recalled the marriage vows she’d spoken. She could not love him, and was quite certain he was full of himself enough that he would see to his own honor. But she could obey, no matter how much it made her skin crawl. She would submit to him because she’d made a vow to God to obey her husband. At least…she’d try.
Chapter 2
The wedding breakfast had passed in the same uncomfortable silence as the rest of the day. Oh, the room had not been quiet by any means. Family, friends and acquaintances were full of compliments to the host, well-wishes to the bride and groom, and plenty of the latest of London’s gossip—of course. But she had spoken to her groom no more than absolutely necessary, and he’d seemed content to join in all the conversations that had gone on around them, seemingly all but forgetting his bride sat there by his side the entire time.
It was of little concern to her. In fact, as the day had grown late and guests began begging their leave, she had wished fervently that he would forget about her completely. She was not to be so fortunate, though.
“Shall we retire to bed?” he asked her as she stifled her first yawn of the evening.
Her tiredness dissipated quickly at his proposal. “No, please, do not let me interrupt. I’m sure we can linger a little longer.”
“No, I think ye’ve had enough, my bride.” He rose then and she could do nothing to protest. Even if it weren’t for the cumbersome vow she’d made to obey, she would draw unwanted attention to herself if she protested her groom any further on their wedding night. She rose demurely and accepted the arm he offered, nodding to their guests as he made their excuses. And she tried not to blush from head to toe when she realized every guest left in the room knew precisely what the bride and groom were “retiring” to do.
Up the stairs, and behind closed doors, she strode to the window and stood there, her fingers worrying in front of her as she stared out unseeing at the property that stretched out behind the manor.
“Do ye intend to sleep standing up, Scarlett?” he queried after several long moments.
His wry humor jarred her from her stupor and she turned to him without thinking. He had doffed his jacket and stood there in trousers with his shirt unbuttoned. He wore the most irritatingly handsome grin that turned up the corners of his full lips, one side raised just slightly higher than the other, which only served to make him appear even more handsome.
“Sleep?” she squeaked, part in nervousness, part in response to the way his state of dishabille was affecting her.
“What else? Ye don’t really expect me to push the issue when ye’ve been making your distaste for your groom clear all day?”
“You mean you don’t plan to…I mean, that is to say…” She shut her mouth, realizing she was babbling ridiculously. Worse, it looked like he was stifling a laugh at her discomfiture.
“Why would I force a woman to bed me when I can have my pick of ‘em more than up to the task?”
Oh! What a lout! Her temper flared. “Why does it not surprise me that you’d run so eagerly to a whore?”
He looked momentarily taken aback by her crass observation, but it was his own fault. He’d been the one to start it.
He seemed to recover from his astonishment quickly. “I’d rather a whore riding me than a cold fish stiff as a board beneath me.”
“Well then, if you have no use for me, I will seek a bed elsewhere. Goodnight, Lord Wendover.”
“Not so fast, mo gràidh.”
He caught her by the arm as she endeavored to fly right past him. Though he didn’t grasp her hard, the contact sent a fiery jolt right through her body. And while she would have been tempted to shake off his loose hol
d on her, the strange sensation brought her to a sudden halt.
“It is our wedding night, and as such, a certain…intimacy is expected to take place between a bride and groom.”
“I thought you had no intention of taking me to your bed,” she sneered, a jilted anger she felt once before rising to the top.
“Aye, ye are correct, but I have no intention of making that known to the rest of the household. Ye’ll sleep here this night, and smile sweetly in the morning like a woman properly bedded. Do ye understand me?”
“And if I refuse to remain in such close proximity to a cad?”
“Then I’ll be forced to take ye, like it or not, to make sure there’s no doubt the job’s been done.”
“You wouldn’t dare!”
“Wouldn’t I? Truth be told, ye’d be better off if I did. I have no doubt ye’d like it, Scarlett. Ye’d like it a lot.”
The look in his eyes changed and his grasp on her grew tighter, not so tight it cut off circulation, but tight enough for her to realize she’d have to put up a substantial fight to escape his hold. And then his hand fell away. Where there had been heat, suddenly the place he’d touched her was cold. She felt off-balance, unsure, and she didn’t like the feeling one bit.
“I’m sure you’re quite wrong.” She stood up straight and raised her head, striding away from him as if neither his words nor his touch had left her frazzled in the slightest. Once she reached the bed, though, she hesitated. How on earth was she supposed to sleep in her gown? Since it was fastened in the back, there was no hope for her getting the dress off on her own. And there wasn’t the slightest chance she was going to ask Lord Wendover for his assistance.
So, she returned to the spot she’d taken up by the window, looking out while trying to concoct some miraculous way of removing her gown. And then she felt him there right behind her, his fingers at the back of her neck. He’d crossed the room so quietly, she wondered if he’d transformed himself into a cat to make the soundless crossing. His fingers worked nimbly at her buttons, but she yanked herself away from him.
Bad, Very Bad Shifters- The Complete Mega Bundle Page 82