The scene was as surreal as anything Luke had ever experienced, including the two nights he’d spent bobbing in the Atlantic Ocean, warding off sharks with Fernsby’s boot. The little church looked like the top of one of Amelia Broom’s hats, stuffed with flowers and streaming with ribbons and bunting. Candles blazed despite the sunny day. The pianoforte kept things lively, the music festive and familiar. Everything about the wedding felt like another man’s life; Luke had been mistaken for a war hero, and the masquerade went on and on.
Go along, he told himself, bracing when the music swelled.
Vicar Broom asked the congregation to stand and two curates pulled open the doors at the rear of the church.
See it through for her own good.
And then explain.
And then g—
Luke stopped justifying; he stopped thinking. Princess Danielle stepped into the rectangle of sunlight at the entrance to the church, Silas Dinwiddie at her side. They began as the outline of old man and young woman, blotting out the brightness. Then her silhouette sharpened into a fully formed woman, bursting with life and hope.
Oh my God, look at her.Luke’s first thought. Here, there was no masquerade. Seeing her was like being in another country, surrounded by a foreign tongue, and then hearing someone speak English. The sight of her was allied, and known, andhome.
From the moment he’d clapped eyes on her, he’d identified her as his princess. In the days that followed, he’d learned the feel of her hand on his arm, the smell of her hair, the way her brain confronted challenge and where her hopes lay. He knew how to haul her out of a pond. He knew how she tasted.
Princess Danielle had somehow become this fixed point in his life—suddenly, expectedly, undeniably. Linus Welty had been another fixed point—wasa fixed point. His dead crew had been a fixed point. The three points formed a triangle and Luke found himself sprinting from one to the other.
Luke closed his eyes against the sight of her, hoping he appeared overwhelmed with her beauty and not wrung out by his own inner conflict. The truth was, her beauty did overwhelm him. Her dress was very fine, the perfect combination of elaborate and elegant. Miriam Dinwiddie was bossy, and managing, and she’d concealed important secrets for years, but she had impeccable taste. The skirts fell from dense gathers beneath her breasts. The fabric was a gray-purple silk with crystal detailing that sparkled when she moved through the church. She wore a veil of sheer organza that streamed down her back, beyond the hem of her gown, and down the aisle.
And then there was the crown. It secured the veil, the myriad of stones twinkling and winking. The headpiece of a goddess. The beauty of her face was perfectly framed.Shewas perfect. And she was coming for him. It made no sense.
Luke watched her—everyone in the church was transfixed by her—and his heart thudded like he’d swum the English Channel. A feeling of profoundness, of permanence, descended over him. He was a man drowning in... infeelingshe could not name. Why name things that could not become real? He would leave her. Before he left, he would say things that would cause her to hate him. The only feeling he should experience now wasdread. Even so, he was imbued with warmth, with affection, with desire, with a sort of luminosity. He could feel himself... in a way... shining back at her.Him—Luke Bannock, reflecting her glow.It made no sense.
Immediately, his brain went to research, and knowing, and preparedness. His refuge for as long as he could remember. How could he have better understood this? Weddings, and brides, andthis? What book could he have read? What expert could he have asked? He’d always beaten back uncomfortable feelings byknowingthings, researching and understanding. But how could he research something he never expected?
With no warning, scenes from his life flashed through his mind. He was the bastard boy, running feral on the docks; he was an apprentice marine carpenter, learning boatbuilding from Linus; he was a self-taught smuggler, researching what and where to buy, and how and when to sell. He was the undeserving captain who survived while his crew drowned; he was a new landlord, while his oldest friend rotted in a cell.
He was a manipulator and a liar.
Luke had never wallowed—what was the point? But the contrast between Luke’s life and the life of the beautiful woman walking rapidly to him was so very stark. Even without the attack, and the tragedy, and trying to rescue Linus, he shouldn’t be anywherenearthis woman. He was a streak of black tar and she was neatly folded white linen. They were opposites—yes; but one would irrevocably damage the other.
If this had been an actual wedding and not a ruse, he might rally—he might revel in his good fortune and devote his life to being worthy of her. But this was not an actual wedding; and he must tell her things she would hate and then walk away.
In the end, the ceremony had one mercy: brevity. The vicar was anxious to pack the newly restored parish hall with revelers. Luke repeated vows, and stared into eyes, and slipped the sapphire ring, now paired with a gold band, on her finger. When it came time for a kiss, he leaned in and paused for one... two... three heartbeats—just to savor. To bask in her warmth. To revel in the closeness. Then he gave himself over to the charade and kissed her like he wanted to kiss her. Full on the mouth, with an intensity that elicited a cough from Vicar Broom and giggles from Amelia. She went a little slack in his arms, eyes closed, hands gripping, and Luke consumed her youth, and beauty, and what felt something like her love. He devoured it like a man taking his last meal.
And then it was over. The ceremony was passed in detached observation. In guilty wonder, he watched himself marry a princess.
At the breakfast feast, he was the imposter who spoke, and embraced, and laughed with his new wife on his arm. He went through the motions, pretending to learn the names of neighbors and praying her new family would not see him as a fraud. All the while, what he’d really wanted to do was tell her. Everything.
Also he wanted—and this was new, but too urgent to deny—for her not to despise him. In the end. After it was all said and done. If he returned.
But first things first.
“Do you mind if we invite Elise Crewes and her family to Eastwell Park after the breakfast?” asked Danielle, coming up to him with a slice of cake. “And Miriam and Whittle, of course. And perhaps the Brooms and Lord Fernsby?”
“To Eastwell Park?” Luke repeated, a fork halfway to his mouth.
“The staff is untrained for guests, of course,” she allowed, “and I’ve given the new housekeeper no forewarning, but I should like to show the house to Elise and Killian Crewes. Not for long, just a few hours? Sorry, I am loath to let my sister out of my sight, now that we’ve met. And they came all this way.”
What could he do but agree? “You should do,” he’d said, taking a bite of cake. It tasted like sand.
He stood by her side as she saw the last guest out of the parish-hall doors, and then they made their way to Eastwell Park. Luke drove his hired wagon with Princess Danielle beside him. Her two nieces and a youth called Lord Bartholomew rode in the bed of the wagon. Beside the princess sat the dog who’d traveled with the Creweses. The Dinwiddies and the remaining Creweses followed in their carriage.
Oh, the irony, Luke thought, steering the horses down the long, hedge-lined drive to Eastwell Park. He’d come to Kent for a quick marriage of convenience to a lonely exiled princess who pined for France. Instead, he was trapped in a wedding that would not end. The princess wanted nothing more than to settle in Kent. And, unless he was mistaken, she also wanted him. Unbelievably. Unaccountably. Remarkably.
He reminded himself that her loyalty to the village and the manor house was his chief advantage. He would abandon her, a liar and a user, but Eastwell Park would remain.
