Harry nodded. “Many thanks. And I appreciate you not mentioning the goats again.”
“What’s wrong wi’ goats?”
Connor grinned as the marquis climbed up into the carriage with a wave. As the door closed, he saw Harry haul Fiona into his lap and silence her protests in a thorough manner that turned his brotherly stomach. It’d be a fair wager that he’d have yet another niece or nephew to add to the ever-increasing herd within the next year.
Dinton Grange would have its heir.
And a tribe of goats, too, if he had anything to say about it.
* * *
“It’s nice to have you back out in the country, Jane.”
With the social Season in London winding down and thetonretreating from the city for the summer, Piper’s dearest friend had finally returned to Meadowcroft a week past. The Langston estate bordered Dinton Grange. As a result, they’d been friends since the cradle. The past several months had been intolerable without her.
The past several weeks even worse.
“And I’m glad to see you looking like a lady once again.” Jane Langston smiled as they rode side by side through the wooded park surrounding the manor at the Grange.
Jane presented the perfect picture of a lady in her stylish powder blue habit with a matching hat set upon her blonde head. Then, her friend always appeared that way, even when they’d been children. Clean, wrinkle-free frocks and pristine bows in her hair while Piper ran about rumpled and dirty most days.
The riding habit Piper had chosen was one of her favorites. Crimson superfine with a black satin vest under the tailored jacket and a black silk tie knotted under the collar of her white blouse. Though the style was some years out of fashion and the buttons strained across her bosom, she did feel more the genteel lady than she had in quite some time. She wrinkled her nose at the comment.
“Once again? What do I normally look like?”
Jane wrinkled her nose right back. “Depends on the day. Death, for the most part.”
Amusement tugged at Piper’s lips. With her ebony hair, wearing unrelieved black tended to give her an air of tragic drama. Or so her friend had claimed in the years following the death of Piper’s father. These days, she mourned a different sort of loss.
Today, with a sense of freedom and revelry she hadn’t experienced in months, she’d set aside her usual mourning attire.
“I swear,” Jane continued, “it’s been years since I’ve seen you dressed like something other than a tragic widow, or worse, lowly housemaid. Whatever it was that inspired the change, I applaud it.”
“The last of the guests departed this morning, and Harry and his wife shortly after,” Piper told her friend. “I’m a free spirit today and accept your applause.”
The pair shared a grin.
Visitors rarely descended upon Dinton Grange, however, the past weeks had brought a slew of guests to the estate in celebration of the Marquis of Aylesbury’s nuptials, necessitating Piper’s absence from the house. She’d watched with a rush of relief from the fringes of the park woodland as the last convoy of carriages made its way down the drive and out the gates.
“I was hoping to see you at the wedding. I saved you a seat despite the difficulty in explaining it to my mother.”
Jane’s hushed remark held a hint of admonishment. Piper accepted the scolding without comment. It wasn’t the first she’d heard from her friend…the housekeeper, the cook, the butler, and any of the dozen others who likewise periodically saw fit to express their thoughts on the matter. Nor would it be the last. It had gotten to the point that their opinions rolled off her like water off a duck.
The subject of the reprimand wasn’t as easy to dismiss. Her brother had wed the Scottish Earl of Glenrothes’s sister at the parish chapel in Aylesbury almost a week ago. Though the church was small, it had been stuffed to the gills with townsfolk, friends, and the bride’s vast family. Harry had no family present. That fact had compelled Piper to the church, draped in her widow’s weeds and veiled to disguise her identity. The wail of the discordant organ music within had set the door handle juddering beneath her hand, setting her nerves atremble. Before they failed her.
“In my defense, I did go to the church. I simply didn’t enter.”
“If you’d gone that far, why not take the final step?”
A lifelong friend and confidante, Jane was the only one privy to most of Piper’s secrets. Most, though not all. It was difficult to explain what had held her back.
Why hadn’t she gone in to witness the wedding?
She’d been reconsidering every reservation that had kept her from her brother for the past two years since that day over a month ago when she’d gone into the village. The trip hadn’t been unusual, other than the day had been so fine she’d again boldly forsaken her mourning garb in favor of a muslin walking dress. She and Hilde, the cook at Dinton Grange, had just left the bodega when Piper heard her name called. It had been so long since she’d heard Harry’s voice, she’d involuntarily turned in surprise.
For an instant, all the alarm and resentment had been washed away by the joy in his eyes. By the hope.
He’d taken a step forward and that same anticipation resounded in her. Time stopped. Breath bated, heart stalled, she’d absorbed the changes two years had wrought in her brother and wondered what he saw in her. Wondered what words might fall from his lips.
