“Yet here we are,” she said sweetly, “entirely un-murdered.”
Timothy laughed, the tension finally cracking. “And I thoughtourcourtship was dramatic.”
“Your courtship involves mathematical equations and architectural debates,” Adrian pointed out, gesturing at the destroyed breakfast table. “Ours involved multiple compromising situations and at least one death threat.”
“At least,” Marianne echoed with placid amusement.
“Adrian’s violent tendencies aside,” Catherine interjected, having regained her composure, “I should go for the fitting. Marianne, will you come? I require an honest opinion—and Timothy, of course, must not see the gown yet.”
“It would be most improper,” Timothy agreed, though his expression betrayed his disappointment. His thumb brushed lightly over Catherine’s knuckles before he released her hand. “Ishall content myself, for now, with imagining how beautiful you will look.”
“I shall look like a meringue,” she said, laughing despite herself. “Madame Delacroix insists upon ruffles. An unconscionable number of them.”
“You will look perfect,” Timothy said simply, his gaze warm and steady.
“You haven’t seen the ruffles. They are feats of structural engineering. I suspect they violate natural law.”
“Then I shall admire them accordingly,” he said. “Perhaps we might calculate their volume together.”
“Everything is mathematics with you two,” Adrian muttered, though there was a smile in it. “You’ll be writing equations into your vows next.”
“Actually—” Timothy began, drawing a folded paper from his pocket.
“No,” Adrian said at once. “Absolutely not. Mathematical vows are where I draw the line. The Archbishop would expire on the spot.”
“They’re romantic mathematics,” Catherine protested, trying to peek. “You actually wrote them, didn’t you?”
“I may have,” Timothy admitted, colouring. “Something about how you’re the solution to all my equations.”
“That’s dreadful,” Adrian said.
“That’s delightful!” Catherine said at the same moment.
“It’s delightfully dreadful,” Marianne decided, amused. “Like those novels where the hero compares his beloved to a well-made plough.”
“No one does that,” Adrian said.
“Lord Byron once likened a woman to a contagion,” Catherine pointed out.
“That was metaphorical,” Adrian muttered.
“That was disturbing,” Marianne said.
***
After breakfast, which had devolved into an argument about romantic poetry versus mathematical precision that required Adrian to physically separate Timothy and Catherine when they started throwing toast points at each other, the ladies departed for the modiste while the men remained to review estate business.
The carriage ride through London’s streets was comfortable, the late October air crisp but not yet bitter. Catherine chattered nervously about everything and nothing, her hands twisting her gloves into unfortunate shapes.
“Do you think the cream silk too pale?” she asked for the third time. “I am so fair, I might vanish entirely. Also,is it presumptuous, given... everything. My past. Rome. The... incident.”
“Catherine,” Marianne said gently, stilling her fidgeting hands. “You may wear whatever pleases you. You are permitted happiness. You have earned it.”
“Have I?” Catherine turned to the window, her reflection faint against the city’s movement. “Sometimes I still wake thinking I am in Rome, alone in that dreadful pension, certain I will never see Adrian again. Then I remember I’m home—that I’m to be married—that Adrian approves, mostly—and it feels like a dream I’ll wake from. As if wanting it too much might break it.”
“It’s real,” Marianne said softly. “Timothy’s love is real. Adrian’s affection, hard-won though it was, is real. Your happiness is not conditional. It’s deserved.”
Catherine smiled faintly, though her eyes shone. “Is it very improper that I’m more nervous about the wedding night than the wedding itself?”
