The Unintended Bride (13 page)

Impatiently, Grandmama — could she ever dare call her that, as Arthur had suggested? — said, "Well? What do you have to say for yourself? Are you proud to have followed your sister's lead and tricked a good man into marriage?"

The woman was small and delicate, with snow white hair. Alarmingly, she had color high in her thin cheeks. Her voice rose to a shrillness that she would no doubt have deplored in anyone else. Her outrage was obvious to anyone in close proximity. Unfortunately — or perhaps fortunately, considering the possibility of eavesdroppers‚ the only one so close was Hero, the source of her great displeasure.

Knowing that she would gain nothing by further alienating the woman she would soon be sharing a home with, Hero said quietly, "My sister and her husband are quite happy together, I assure you. As for myself I realize that you are disappointed in the way matters turned out. But I promise to make your grandson a good wife."

Disdainfully, the woman sniffed. "Good wife? Arthur needs a great wife, my dear. A strong woman to bear him sons. To support him in his quest. Can you say that you are up to such a challenge? Can you help him fulfill his destiny?"

His destiny? Knowing she should not ask, nevertheless, she could not help herself "What destiny shall I help him fulfill, exactly?" Did his grandmother know about the book? Had he confided in her and was that quest the one she spoke of or was there yet another?

His grandmother did not answer. Instead, she glanced at the dance floor and said, "That destiny, of course."

Hero looked over to where, she saw, Arthur and Gwen were now dancing. They did make a perfect-looking couple. Gwen was small, and her blond hair shone in the candlelit ballroom. The best she could offer was some measure comfort for the future. "She will make a good match, even though it will not be with Arthur."

"They were destined for each other, stupid girl. Look at them!"

She watched them dance again for a moment.

"They do dance beautifully together," she assented reluctantly. Perhaps she should have run away rather than let her family persuade her that marriage would be the right thing to do.

"He could have been a great man if he had married her. She was the key to his destiny and he threw her away for you!" In disgust, Arthur's grandmother flipped her fan in rapid strokes and turned away from her grandson's new wife.

With relief, Hero watched her walk away to join friends of her own. There was little choice but that she would have to live with the woman. But, for now, she would simply be thankful that she had been rescued from further tirade.

She turned back to watch her husband dancing with the woman his grandmother called his fate. It was not possible to tell whether Arthur mourned the loss of his long-intended bride. He danced with Gwen as he did with any other woman — politely attentively, respectfully. She might have taken that as a good sign. But it meant nothing. So he danced with Gwen politely. Just as he had danced with her earlier that evening. Indeed, just as he had danced with his grandmother. But he had told his own wife that he would not come to her bed. No man who loved a woman would treat her so.

As her eyes focused on the couple, she noted that if Arthur seemed his usual self, the same could not be said of his partner. Gwen was quite unhappy. Her porcelain skin was flushed with heat and her eyes were reddened slightly. She had obviously been crying, though she had tried to cover the signs.

Hero sighed. Could no one have what they wanted tonight, then? All because she had to accompany Arthur on his quest to the bookstore. All because she had been fool enough to follow him up the stairs, too bound up with curiosity, and the thrill of being with the forbidden man who made her foolish heart beat too fast to think of the consequences of her actions.

Of course, she would not have gone — he would not have gone — if it were not for the note. Or, more properly, the mysterious person who had written the note. She had to wonder if that person was now laughing to see the hasty wedding. Or was he, perhaps, chagrined? There was no way to tell what had been intended. Hadn't the note Simon received suggested that she would be found with Gabriel Digby? That was a puzzle that had yet to be solved.

Could the note sender have achieved his goal?

Would the tantalizing hope end now for Arthur? In the week spent preparing for the wedding, there had been no more notes. Arthur had tried to hide his agitation from her, but she felt the tension of waiting as keenly as he.

He had joked that the prankster was through with them. Somehow, though, she did not think that the note sender was finished his game. The only way to be certain was to do as Arthur intended and find out the identify of whoever was behind the cruel hoax. The thought of what could be next had made her toss sleeplessly in the night. That, and the thought of marriage to Arthur:

Arthur refused to discuss the possibility of future notes, or the possibility that the manuscript might still exist, no matter that the note writer had not shown it to him. He seemed to feel that he would hear no more — or so he said. She was glad to know that he intended to find out who it was. But still, she intended to see the quest through. After all, it was what had forced them together forever in the first place. Such a little thing to have made such a change in her life. Without the notes, they would not have been married. But she had meant what she said to him tonight.

She intended to accompany him on his quest. If they were married, they might as well share everything — including unlikely adventures and strange notes that moved them like pawns on a chessboard.

The question that his grandmother had raised revolved in her thoughts — was Arthur moving away from his destiny or toward it? And did she have a destiny herself?

She felt a headache coming on at the thoughts that swirled in her mind. The air suddenly seemed stifling. She moved to the balcony and stepped outside to the raised terrace. The gardens of the London town house were small, but still carried a refreshing scent on the breeze.

Other couples came and went, looking for a brief respite from the dancing that crowded the room indoors, a cool breeze, a breath of fresh air, just as she had. She sat, secluded, in the shadows, watching the stars in the sky, listening to the whispers. The future seemed so uncertain, she took comfort in the steadfastness of the night sky.

Once, she thought that one of her sisters approached, but she was too lazy to turn her head to see, and the person walked away without saying a word. She noticed a faint, familiar scent but could not rouse herself from her reverie to place it in her memory.

Gradually, she realized that there were no more whispers, laughs, or footsteps. Everyone had gone inside — to dance, to eat, to talk. The quiet was unsettling, and for the first time she realized how dark it was in her little corner. Even the stars seemed to have deserted her.

Suddenly, she felt vulnerable. Felt a need to escape back indoors, where her sisters were. Where Arthur was. As she stood, she heard someone again come up behind her. Nervously, she turned. She saw no one there. Instinct urged her inside, where there were lights and music and people. She rose, intending to indulge her nerves, though she often did not.

Before she could, however, she felt a sharp push at her back. For a brief moment she fought for balance, and then, losing the battle, she toppled down the granite stairs that led into the garden. Dazed and stunned, she lay for a moment without moving, until she heard someone calling her name.

Juliet. And then Miranda called too.

"Here I am," she answered. Her voice sounded shaken and weak to her ears. "I'm here," she called more loudly as she struggled to get to her feet.

"Oh, my dear!" Miranda found her. "What happened?" she asked as she helped her back to the bench she had been sitting upon earlier. Juliet disappeared back into the ballroom for a cup of punch.

"I fell," Hero said, not wanting to suggest that she might have been pushed. She could so easily have been mistaken in the shock of the fall. Really, who would want to push her?

Miranda clucked sympathetically. "No wonder, someone has put the torches out over here. It is a lucky thing you didn't break your neck."

"Yes." Hero began to shiver. "I must look a fright." She had scraped herself in several places, and the sting of the scrapes were making themselves known now that her shock was lessening.

Miranda cradled her protectively in a sisterly embrace. "Let us wait out here for a little while, and then you can go in through the library entrance and up the back stairs so that no one will remark on your condition."

Hero nodded, unwilling to allow Arthur's grandmother to see her like this. No doubt the woman would see it as a further sign of her unsuitability to be Arthur's wife.

Her sister took her arm in her hands and examined it carefully, flexing both the elbow and the wrist, probing at the rapidly developing bruises. "No bones seem to be broken. I will send the maid to get you ready for bed and ask Katherine to apply some salve to your cuts and scrapes."

Bed. The very word made her remember that tonight was her wedding night. She wondered if Arthur would be gentle, or if he would be as passionate as he had been for that one kiss in the bookshop? It could not bode well for her that he had earnestly assured her that he would prefer she stay in London.

As if her worried thoughts had summoned him, Arthur appeared on the balcony. His expression was concerned. It was only her weakness that made her wish it held more.

His gaze fell upon them, and he came to her and knelt by her side to look into her eyes. "Are you injured? Juliet said you had a fall."

"I am perfectly well. just a bit clumsy." With his face so close to hers, all she could remember was the attic and his kiss. She wondered if he could see what thoughts turned in her brain. Even now feeling the pain from her injuries, her main thought was only that tonight she would share the same bed as Arthur. As her husband.

Miranda stood. "Arthur, sit here with her while I fetch a cloak from inside."

He looked at her, shaking with either the cold or a reaction to her fall, and protested, "Shouldn't we get her inside?"

"I'm going to take her in through the library doors so that she does not have to go through the main room," Miranda answered, and then she left them alone.

He made no move to sit next to Hero as Miranda had instructed. He liked kneeling before her, looking into her face. He touched the torn sleeve of her gown. She shivered again, and he put his arms around her gently and pulled her to rest against his chest. "What happened?"

She leaned against him, not answering, and he savored the feel of her in his arms. There was no one to shake a head at their actions. He was perfectly within the rights of a husband to comfort her when she was in distress. This, of all things, was what made the marriage endurable. He could touch her, she could touch him. They could pass their strength and comfort to each other in a way they had not been allowed to before.

After it became clear to him that she would not answer, he took her chin in his fingers and turned her to look into his eyes. "Tell me what happened," he ordered gently.

She hesitated before answering. "It was the oddest thing. I thought for a moment that someone had pushed me." She sighed and closed her eyes. "No, that can't be right. I must have imagined the feeling of a hand at my back. There was no one else out when I fell."

"Are you certain?"

"Yes." She started to nod, winced, and then thought better of it. "I turned to see because it felt as if someone was there, staring at me. But there was no one."

He was not quite as convinced. After all, his grandmother and Fenwell Delagrace were furious. "Where were you?"

She patted the stone bench upon which they sat, describing her examination of the stars, and the sudden unease that had made her rise to go back into the ballroom.

"And you saw no one there? Could there have been someone deep in the shadows?"

"I think I would have sensed anyone standing there." She tried to discount the shove. "I must have imagined it, just because I hate to be so clumsy. I'm sorry to be such an embarrassment. Gwen would never have fallen down the stairs on her wedding day."

He smiled. "No, I doubt she would — I doubt she will. " Gwen had been upset this evening when he danced with her. But not upset with him. Instead she was suffering from the aftereffects of a tongue-lashing by her father. Apparently, Fenwell Delagrace blamed her for letting Arthur slip away.

"I am so sorry," Hero began to cry, burying her head against his jacket. "So sorry for this whole mess."

"Don't cry." He moved to sit beside her, to comfort her, but when he sat down, there was something else on the stone seat. Rising again, he turned to stare at the bench.

"What is it?" Hero had stopped crying when he had made a sound of surprise. She watched him, tears still shining in her eyes.

His lips pressed tight together, he pulled a piece of very brittle paper into the light spilling from the ballroom. "What is this?"

She removed her spectacles so that she could dash the tears from her eyes and look at what he held. "I don't know, I haven't seen it before."

He read it with difficulty in the poor light. "I entrust you, my friend, with this precious manuscript. I know you will know how to care for it, until the time comes that the true King reclaims it — "

He read the last again, and then looked toward her once more as he said in disbelief, "It is signed, "'Yours ever, Sir Thomas'" He held it out to her.

"Another hoax?" she asked as she took it from him. The paper was fragile, and she used care as she examined it. Read the handwriting. Looked at the bench where it had lain. "How did this come here — "

"You did not see it when you first sat down?"

"No, it was not there then, I am sure of it," she said, shaking her head and wincing again. "I always make certain to sweep the bench clean of leaves and berries so that I do not ruin my gown .... "

She stared at the spot where the note had been as if it might give up a secret to her. And then she gasped, "I remember — I thought that Juliet or Miranda had come out to join me, and then decided to go away without saying a word."