Page 43 of The Marquess’s Forbidden Bride

‘Shall we go?’ He offered his arm; she placed her hand on it. Encased in a bubble of contentment and cautious hope for the future, he gave himself over to the pleasure of walking beside her.

He felt a bit like a snowball placed on a sunny log himself.

He hadn’t wanted this drastic change in his life, but he would master it. His Parliamentary presentation was imminent. His friends would be in town. He’d be able to endure the inevitable balls and routs, knowing he could look forward to enjoying some intimate dinners with Emma—how delightful to have permission to call her ‘Emma’—then, soon, he would bring their friendship back into the open.

With him invested and everywhere accepted as marquess, the Strattons would simply have to recognise he intended to choose his own friends, whom they must treat with respect. Lady Routham could retreat to her husband’s country estate if she found the prospect too distressing.

After Parliament adjourned for the summer, he’d ask Hart to accompany him when he inspected the marquisate’s holdings. Master of large properties, Hart’s discerning eye would help him notice what he needed to pay attention to and advise him on what he needed to learn to manage them all effectively. Maybe by the end of this year, after a summer and autumn easing into his role as marquess and after a restorative stay at Harding Glen, he would finally grasp what had eluded him even in the army—the conviction that he’d found himself at last and now occupied the place where he permanently belonged.

A satisfaction that would be even sweeter now that Emma had confirmed he might pursue his relationship with her.

She often claimed she was no more ready to marry now than he was. While he didn’t intend to push her, as he worked toward fitting into his role, he would begin coaxing her toward a genuine courtship.

Chapter Fourteen

A week later, Emma and her maid were admitted into the grand foyer of Edmenton House, the Grosvenor Square London residence of the Duke of Fenniston.

‘Welcome, Miss Wellingford,’ the butler said, helping her off with her evening cape. ‘The Duke and Duchess and Lord Richland are awaiting you.’

After dismissing her maid, she followed him up the marble stairs to the drawing room.

Charles had promised in the note that followed hard upon the duchess’s dinner invitation that this would be a small gathering, where they could all relax and become acquainted. He added he was thrilled to introduce one of his dearest old friends to his new one.

Reading those words, delight and hopeful anticipation filled her. The same sense of eager anticipation, tinged with nervousness, had kept her on edge during the drive tonight. Knowing how much the duke and his wife meant to Charles, she very much wanted them to like and approve of her.

But she needed to calm the dizzy flights of emotion she’d been suffering of late. To be more careful and maintain a better guard over her enjoyment of and eagerness for his company. A guard, however, that became alarmingly feeble when they sealed bargains with those intoxicating kisses.

She found herself moving by barely perceptible degrees to care more and more deeply for the marquess, to the point that she’d agreed to consider their friendship might become more…someday. That veiled reference to courtship had alarmed her as much as it excited her, for there was no getting around the fact the lieutenant was now a marquess—the position alone representing all she’d always felt she did not want in a husband.

No matter how appealing the man—and oh, he was appealing! She savoured again the memory of his kindness, his wit—and those naughty, forbidden, delightful kisses.

She was nearly certain if she were to relax her guard, she could easily fall in love with him. Though he approved her passion for plants and wished to support her, he could have no idea of all the tasks required of a marquess’s wife. Would love be enough to compensate for what she would have to give up to become a marchioness?

But she might be making presumptuous assumptions, for though Richland had hinted at courtship, he hadn’t spelled out anything definitely. No need to try to force herself to choose unless or until he stated his intentions more clearly. And all he clearly indicated thus far was that he wouldn’t be ready to consider marriage until he’d fully mastered his new role.

Which meant she herself needn’t decide anything yet either, thank the Lord!

Still, she could not suppress the surge of delight when she entered the parlour and spotted Lord Richland by the hearth. The smile that sprang to his lips when he saw her so intensified that giddiness, she barely heard the butler announcing her.

She tried to damp down that excitement as she curtseyed. ‘Your Grace, thank you so much for your kind invitation. My sister, Lady Englemere, asked that I again tender her apologies that a previous engagement prevented them from accompanying me tonight. She promises to bid you to dine in the very near future.’

‘We shall look forward to it,’ the duke said. ‘I’m so pleased to make your acquaintance, Miss Wellingford.’

‘As am I,’ the duchess added. ‘Charles has been singing your praises so loudly, I could not wait to meet you.’

‘Oh, dear. I hope he hasn’t described me as too much a paragon, for I am nothing like, I assure you! I do thank you for arranging such an intimate gathering. I would be quite overawed to be present at a more formal affair in this grand house.’

The duke grimaced. ‘It’s a great old barracks, isn’t it? The only place worse is Steynling Cross, the country estate. Charles probably told you I’m more at home in the simple Scots manor where I grew up. I never developed a liking for vast hallways, grinning cherubs and gilding everywhere.’

‘You lived too many years in a tent,’ Charles said.

‘That, too. And happy to have had that tent, rather than a soggy pile of rocks.’

The duchess laughed. ‘One can always tell when he’s had as much as he can take of Sassenach ostentation. He lapses back into a brogue and tosses out one of his Scots grannie’s aphorisms!’

A mischievous sparkle in his eye, the duke said in a lilting drawl, ‘Aye, when a ewie’s drowned, she’s dead.’

While Emma tried not to look baffled, the duchess waved a reproving finger and Charles chuckled.