Mary Balogh - The Secret Mistress

“Another secret,” she said. “You are the most divine waltzing partner in the world. No one else will ever know, and I shall not tell.”

She smiled back into his eyes. He twirled her again, and it seemed to him that he could not miss a step or tread on her toes if he tried. He led a charmed existence.

She threw her head back and laughed.

And it sounded as if he had hurled a silent challenge at fate, which in his experience did not like to be tempted. He stopped dancing just out of the beam of a branch of candles on the mantel inside the drawing room.

“Come,” he said. “It is almost as bright as day out here. Look at the moonlight on the lake. Let us go closer and feast on the sight.”

She slipped her arm through his and they proceeded across the wide, sloping lawn, which was actually darker than he had anticipated. But the moonlit water was like a beacon ahead of them and there did not appear to be any clouds overhead that might obliterate it at any moment and plunge them into total darkness.

The air was still almost warm.

He slid his arm free of hers and took her hand in his own, lacing their fingers together. And he drew her closer to his side so her shoulder leaned against his upper arm.

Last night seemed a bit like a dream. It had been real, though. A dream could not possibly be so vivid. He still could not believe he had done something so … bold. Or that he still did not regret it or feel any guilt whatsoever.

The water was as smooth as glass. There was not a breath of wind. Beyond the lake were the trees and the hill and the tower folly at the top of it. Its silhouette was visible even now in the darkness. Moonlight shimmered in a broad band across the water. It was not a silent scene, though. All around them insects were going about the business of their lives and making noise about it, darkness and night notwithstanding, and somewhere among the trees an owl hooted occasionally just to let the rest of the world know that it was there.

The sounds merely accentuated the calm serenity of the scene.

“Angeline,” he said, his hand tightening slightly around hers, his eyes on the water, “will you marry me?”

“Yes, Edward,” she said.

Just like that. And just like that they were betrothed and bound together for life.

It was surely the most moving marriage proposal and acceptance ever made. He smiled at the water.

He turned his head and she turned hers and their mouths met. Just like that. Their bodies did not turn. They did not wrap their arms about each other. There was no burning passion.

Only …

Well, only that thing beyond words.

Peace.

Rightness.

Love.

It was no use. There really were no words. And it absolutely did not matter. There did not need to be words.

He spoke some anyway.

“I love you,” he said.

She smiled softly in the light of the moon.

“I know,” she said.

Which was by far the most eloquent speech he had ever heard from her lips.

ANGELINE HAD CHOSEN pale yellow muslin for her wedding dress. Her initial choice had been a bright sunshine yellow, like her favorite old day dress, but she had ended up taking the advice of Cousin Rosalie and Miss Goddard, who had both accompanied her to the modiste’s and were in agreement with each other.

“The dress is to be worn on your wedding day,” Miss Goddard had explained. “And on your wedding day all the focus of attention must be upon you, not upon your clothes. And really, you know, Lady Angeline, you are worth focusing upon.”

“And you will be especially radiant on your wedding day,” Cousin Rosalie agreed. “A bright dress will be quite unnecessary.”

Miss Goddard had been at the modiste’s on her own account as well as to advise her friend, and she had chosen pale blue and a simple design. She was to marry Lord Windrow in Cambridge two weeks after Angeline’s own wedding. Cousin Leonard and the Countess of Heyward, now Lady Fenner, had married at his country estate two weeks ago. There was a flurry of weddings now at the end of the Season, as there always was, and there were more to come. Martha’s betrothal to Mr. Griddles had just been announced, and Maria was in imminent expectation of a declaration from Mr. Stebbins.

Angeline had resisted the urge to complete her wedding outfit with a flamboyant bonnet, though it had been a very strong urge. A wedding was a festive occasion, after all, and a festive bonnet ought to be … well, festive. However, all on her own, without even consulting the opinions of her cousin and her friend, she had decided upon a small-brimmed straw bonnet with a high crown, and had had it trimmed with white lace and white and yellow daisies and white ribbons. She had bought white gloves and white slippers.

And looking at herself now in the pier glass in her dressing room, she had to admit that she looked almost pretty. Except that the paleness of the garments accentuated the darkness of her hair and eyes and her dark-hued complexion. And there was nothing delicate about her features. But there was nothing she could do about any of that.

She wondered fleetingly what her mother would have thought about her today. Would she have thought the clothes tasteful? Would she have thought her daughter pretty? Would she have been happy?

“Mama.”

Angeline formed the name with her lips but did not speak aloud. She supposed there would always be a sort of wistful sadness in her whenever she remembered her mother and the fact that she had never measured up to her mother’s expectations. But she would use the memories in a positive way. When she had daughters, she would adore them from the moment of their birth, and she would shower them with love and approval no matter what they were like. They might be timid or bold, pretty or plain, it would not matter. They would be her daughters. And her sons would be her sons. Oh, she hoped there would be a dozen of each and that they would start coming soon. Well, perhaps not a dozen of each or even a dozen all told, but many of them anyway. She wanted to be surrounded by children. She wanted Edward and her to be surrounded by children.

“Oh, my lady.” Betty was sniveling. “You do look lovely.”

Angeline spun around and hugged her impulsively, turning Betty’s snivels to shrieks lest she crease Lady Angeline’s dress or drip on it. But before any such disaster could occur, the maid had to turn to open the door of the dressing room, upon which someone had knocked.

“Well, Angeline,” Tresham said, standing in the doorway and looking her over unhurriedly from top to toe, “you look unexpectedly … glorious.”

“Unexpectedly?” She raised her eyebrows.

And glorious? Tresham had said she looked glorious?

“I half thought of donning an eyeshade before knocking on your door,” he said. “I expected … something different.”

“Tell me again,” she said.

He raised his own eyebrows.

“How I look,” she explained.

“Glorious?” he said.

She blinked several times in quick succession. She would feel remarkably silly if she wept merely because her brother had paid her a compliment.

He stepped into the room and with one glance dismissed Betty.

“Angeline,” he said, “you know that I believe you could do considerably better for yourself. Leaving a man standing at the altar, especially of St. George’s with half the ton in attendance, would cause a scandal of astronomical proportions. But we are Dudleys. We could live it down. If you feel now that you made too hasty a choice, then tell me and I will extricate you before it is too late.”

She gazed at him, at the brother she so adored. He just did not understand at all, did he? Of course, she had never told him, and she would not tell him even now. Some things—even I love him—were just too private. And how could she say I love him because he is so different from you? That was only a very small part of the truth, anyway. It might have been the starting point of her feelings for Edward, but it was not anything close to the ending point.

But Tresham was prepared to let her embroil him in scandal. And it would be a dreadful thing indeed even for the Duke of Tresham to live down.

Tears welled in her eyes after all and threatened to spill over onto her cheeks.

Tresham loved her.

“Devil take it,” he said curtly. “I’ll send directly to the church. I’ll go there myself, in fact. Have Betty pack your things. I’ll take you back to Acton this afternoon.”

He had misunderstood her tears.

“Tresh,” she said, “I am marrying Heyward because I want to, because I expect to be happy with him.”

And it struck her suddenly that she had never called her elder brother by his given name—Jocelyn. He had been Everleigh—the Earl of Everleigh—until their father died when he was seventeen, and since then he had been Tresham. She wondered if he minded, if perhaps he too had felt some lack in his family life. But it was too late to call him Jocelyn now. To her he would always be Tresham.

He was looking at her very steadily with his almost black eyes.

“And I suppose,” he said softly, “that is all that really matters when all is said and done.”

He offered his arm and she took it.

She would not return to this room or to the bedchamber beyond it. Tonight she would sleep, appropriately enough, at the Rose and Crown Inn this side of Reading. Within the next few days she would be at Wimsbury Abbey in Shropshire. She would be the Countess of Heyward, a married lady, Edward’s wife.

Her heart and stomach performed a vigorous pas de deux inside her. She did not look back.

THEIR NIGHT TOGETHER at the Peacock Inn had not had consequences. Angeline had been able to assure Edward of that a month ago, and he was enormously relieved, for a hasty marriage by special license instead of by banns, and an eight-month child following after it, would tell their own story, and he would rather not have that story told even though he had never regretted that night. It had been something free and passion-filled and wonderful—and very private. Very secret.

He smiled at the memory of her eager, happy face poised above his as she had described herself as his secret mistress and sworn that she would use his name only in private. He had been Heyward to her ever since, for their betrothal had been conducted with strict propriety and they had hardly been alone in the six weeks since he had proposed to her and been accepted.

Tonight they would be alone together.

It seemed fitting that it would be at the Rose and Crown Inn. He had suggested it to her, and she had laughed and said that yes, it would be perfect. She had added that she would not even for a moment step alone into the taproom. He had replied, in all seriousness, that she had better not. And then they had looked into each other’s eyes and laughed.

Edward was aware of the church filling up behind him. No one was so ill-bred as to talk aloud, but there were murmurings and rustlings and whisperings. Beside him, George Headley, his best man, cleared his throat and attempted to loosen his cravat. Headley was more nervous than he was. He had been dreaming for a week, apparently, that he would drop the ring when the time came to produce it and would be forced to make an idiot of himself chasing it as it rolled endlessly from pew to pew.

Edward was not nervous. He was excited. He was doing his duty, he was pleasing his family, and he was pleasing himself all at once. He was a happy man.

Provided, that was, Angeline did not have a change of heart at the last possible moment. He would not put it past Tresham to try to talk her out of this marriage, of which he obviously disapproved. He did not like Edward, which was perhaps fair enough, as Edward was not particularly fond of him either, or of Lord Ferdinand Dudley, who had seemed to enjoy the Season in a particularly carefree and often reckless manner. But they would all be civil to one another, Edward thought—if Angeline did indeed marry him, that was.

He did not have a pocket watch and would not have drawn it out, he supposed, even if he had. But it seemed to him that she was late.

And he felt nervous after all. What if she did not come? How long would the congregation sit here before becoming restless and beginning to slip away? How long would he sit here before slinking away?