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“Go,” she said, waving him away.

When they were out of hearing, the boy whispered, “The cove you were askin’ about is at the toll house. Said he slipped out the back when he heard the shot. Terrible upset about ‘not getting it.’ Wants you.”

Preston. “Is he well?”

The boy shrugged. “Looks right to me.”

Thank heaven. Preston was safe. Millie and Neville were safe. Lenora was safe with his mother. And Willard was dead.

He lifted his brows. All in all a good night.

But the night hadn’t ended. He would deliver Preston to his father, clean himself up, and make that proposal.

And, in a few weeks, he would leave the Albany and move back into Asquith House. With his wife.

Not because Lenora was his responsibility, though she would always be that and more, but because she was his family.

His light. His life.

***

Hours earlier, Lenora had entered the back of Asquith House in a creased and crumpled dress. She was certain Lady Asquith would take exception. Still, she prepared to make her confession to the lady who had taken her and her sisters in at the most vulnerable time in their lives, teaching them all how to be formidable while maintaining grace.

Lady Asquith glanced up, squinted at Lenora’s blatantly post-coital appearance, but then immediately bid Lenora to sit.

“What’s happened, child?” she asked.

Beginning with a deep inhale, Lenora admitted all.

She started with where Asquith had gone and why, and then when back to the beginning. Lady Asquith listened with a spymaster’s focused attention.

The dowager chuckled at the blackmail committed in a yew maze and the man-shift, tutted at the arguments and misunderstandings, and, ultimately, sighed at the genuine tenderness her son had shown. But, as Lenora unburdened her heart, Lady Asquith never once lifted her quizzing glass.

When Lenora finished, Lady Asquith opened her arms.

“My daughter.”

Lenora cried a good cry into her future mother-in-law’s shoulder, feeling the chain of that quizzing glass against her cheek. Every comforting pat on her arm deepened the solace that can only come from one who is family, either by blood or by bond.

When she had fully spent, she righted herself.

“There now,” Lady Asquith said. “Gather your courage. It’s going to be a long night.”

The dowager then penned a note to send round to D'Acre House. Lenora watched her compose the brief, authoritative letter with admiration.

“I’m writing,” Lady Asquith explained, “that you visited at my request, but have fallen suddenly ill and will be spending the night. As the physician Adrian sent over the other day is returning in the morning, that should suffice.”

Lady Asquith sprinkled pounce on the note to help the ink dry.

As she folded the paper, she continued, “now, when you return to your sister’s, you must pretend to be ill.”

Lenora sighed. “That won’t be a problem. I feel as if I could sleep for days.”

“Tut.” Lady Asquith pressed her seal into a dot of wax and summoned a footman to deliver the letter to D’Acre House. Then, together, they settled in.

The dowager produced a deck of cards. Lenora joined in game after game of piquet until the candles burned low and the fire needed banking.

She lost every hand.