‘Not literally.’ Meridith jumped to her feet. ‘I’ll tell you about that another time.’
Already hurrying towards the house, she added, ‘Or Alena will. Right now, I need to pack.’
‘I’ll ask Walter to have the coach hitched up!’ Diana shouted.
Chapter Fourteen
It was well after dark when Meridith arrived in London. Her excitement to arrive made the trip seem overly long, and as the coach travelled through town, she kept the curtain open, to see the lights, the traffic, homes, and eventually the park. There was much she would miss here, mainly her family and the zoo, but it wouldn’t compare to how much she’d missed Drake this past week.
And the week before that. When he’d been in Bristol.
What if he’d gone back there?
What if he wasn’t even in England?
She would just have to find out where he was and find him.
Whether it took hours, days, months, or years, she was going to find him.
When the coach stopped, she didn’t wait for the driver to climb down and open the door. She flung it open herself and climbed out.
Mr Kent opened the front door as she approached the house. ‘Lady Meridith, we weren’t expecting you.’
‘I know,’ she said, climbing the steps. ‘I decided this afternoon that it was time to come home.’
‘It’s good to have you home,’ he said. ‘I will have your luggage sent to your room.’
‘Thank you.’ She crossed the threshold into the house. ‘Is my brother in bed?’
‘No, my lady, he is in his study.’
‘And Lady Alena?’
‘She is upstairs putting Miss Mary down for the night.’
‘Thank you, Mr Kent.’
‘You are most welcome,’ he replied.
As the butler walked outside to oversee the retrieval of her luggage, she glanced at the hallway and then the stairway, not sure if she wanted to face Peter first or talk to Alena first, for she was going to ask her sister-in-law for some advice concerning how she should go about ‘mailing a letter’.
Quickly discerning that if she was going to be this undecided about every move, she’d never accomplish her mission, she chose the hallway.
Moments later, she knocked on Peter’s study door and turned the knob to open it at the same time he provided permission.
‘Meridith!’ He lifted his feet off the stool in front of the leather chair and laid his book on the nearby table at the same time. ‘What are you doing home? Is something amiss with Diana? Walter? The girls?’ He’d risen to his feet and was walking towards her.
‘Nothing is amiss,’ she said, closing the door. ‘They are all fine, but I’ve made a decision.’
‘Oh? What have you decided?’
Holding her chin up, her shoulders square, she said, ‘That I do want to marry Drake.’
‘Oh,’ he said hesitantly. ‘Well, I see. He’s no longer interested in a partnership.’
She’d assumed as much. ‘And you?’
‘It would have been an ideal business venture, but…’ He shrugged, then said, ‘It’s all out of my hands.’
