Chapter 54
It was not the custom to invite great numbers of people to celebrations of marriage.
These were considered close family matters, not vulgar occasions on which to go running about the lanes and byways dragging out distant cousins and disagreeable old aunts.
Mr Severin had as few relatives in England as anyone could wish for: essentially none – his blood father had now taken ship, and while his adoptive father had had cousins, they’d never forgiven Max for walking off with a fortune and an estate that they’d counted on as theirs, and so they were hardly on visiting terms. He was to be allowed a friend or two, in compensation, or the pews on his side of the aisle of the small Norman church would be empty.
But there were an awful lot of Constantines.
Most of them were bridesmaids, it seemed.
He understood from Allegra that there hadn’t been time to make up matching gowns for them, which Max feared might become a long-lasting source of grievance.
He’d taken their measure already; these people liked to argue.
Even the smallest sister, Bianca, had a great number of startling opinions, and was not slow to express them.
Mr Constantine was vague and benevolent, as he knew already, and the oldest sister, Sabrina, was lovely in her tranquillity, which was probably just as well because she was the most heavily pregnant woman he’d ever seen.
Her husband, Da Costa, seemed an amiable sort of fellow too.
It was hard to say, really; the rest of them hardly gave him a chance to speak.
There were an indeterminate number of small Da Costas, probably boys – in his defence, he was unfamiliar with small children, though that seemed set to change, and they were still in short petticoats, so it was difficult to tell – who spoke constantly, loudly and precociously, or screamed if they were too small for that.
It was sheer anarchy, unlike anything he’d ever experienced before. He loved it.
It had been a puzzle to choose whether Gil or Tom should be his best man; they’d always been a trio, ever since Oxford.
They tossed for it, and Tom won, so Gil had the responsibility.
He lost the ring, as might have been expected, but found it again just in time.
It all passed in a blur. That didn’t matter, because there was Allegra at his side, and they claimed each other.
Either the children had stopped yelling, or he couldn’t hear them any more, which seemed a useful skill to develop.
They celebrated with a lavish wedding breakfast at Mr Constantine’s small Tudor manor house, but soon enough Allegra and Max caught each other’s gaze, and made surreptitious moves to slip away.
It seemed quite likely that nobody would notice their departure; there was some sort of family altercation in progress, with flushed faces and raised voices, or perhaps they always behaved like that when together. He might ask later, or he might not.
Kent and Surrey were, of course, adjacent, and his own estate was not so very far away, as the crow flew, but the roads left something to be desired, if one chose a direct route along the coast. It was wiser, though further in terms of miles, to head inland until one struck the better-maintained London Road for Dover.
Some men would have chosen to drive themselves, seeking speed, in a travelling curricle with frequent stops to change the exhausted horses.
These men were fools. Max contemplated the prospect of several hours with his bride in a closed carriage with the blinds drawn down, and found it good.
It was a luxurious modern vehicle, shiny, wonderfully sprung and only just delivered from the coachmaker.
He’d consulted her, of course, and she’d agreed.
He’d known she would. She’d said with a wicked glint in her eyes that it would be the next best thing to the kitchen table.
‘This is a wonderful coach,’ she said now, sitting back in her corner, smiling invitingly at him.
They’d left her father’s land, there was no one to wave to, not a Constantine or an old retainer in sight, and as he’d drawn down the blinds on his side, she had done the same on hers.
Her fingers were busy with her bonnet strings, and then with the buttons of her raspberry-pink pelisse.
He had his coat off, and was working on his waistcoat. Next would be his cravat.
‘You have no idea, my dear Mrs Severin. It’s very ingeniously designed. The seats pull out with the greatest ease and join securely with those opposite. Effectively, the coach is one big bed.’
‘Are we doing that now?’ She was unlacing the ribbons of her silk sandals, which ran a surprisingly long way up her calves.
She wasn’t wearing stockings, which was wonderfully shocking.
So much bare leg. Seeing him watching, seeing how he liked it, she began to do it more slowly.
Touching herself, caressing her own skin.
He liked that too, as she had reason to know.
‘We’re not doing that now. We’re doing this first,’ he told her, sinking to his knees. The floor was covered in a sheepskin rug, soft and luxurious. It could have been spiked with needles; at this moment, he didn’t care. He sat back on his heels and looked up at her, barefoot, flushed as she was.
He reached out and, with hands that were not entirely steady, folded back her muslin skirt upon her lower thighs.
Then her petticoat, and the one below. ‘You have very pretty feet,’ he said, and bent and kissed them, his lips hot on their high arches.
But they weren’t his ultimate goal. After he’d paid them sufficient tribute, which he could see she enjoyed, he hoisted them ruthlessly over his shoulders, which made her giggle, and leaned forward.
‘Pretty knees, too.’ His mouth was there, tracing up the curve of her inner thighs, paying attention to each inch.
She encircled him, soft flesh and the intoxicating scent of her in the semi-darkness, and it was all he’d ever dreamed of.
His hands were on her hips, pushing the fabric further up, and hers were locked in his hair, urging him on.
Her curls were dark and abundant, and he buried his face in them.
Inhaled her. The carriage jolted in some pothole, and her strong thighs tightened about him.
Imprisoned him, but he was history’s most willing prisoner.
She didn’t need to worry; he wasn’t going anywhere but deeper.
The coach could overturn or catch fire and he’d still be here.
He slipped his hands under her buttocks and lost himself in her, in the glorious tastes and sounds of her pleasure as he kissed and licked and explored. She did cry his name, and then again.
He pulled the bed out and secured it in place – it really was the matter of a moment, even when one was not in a fit state for following complicated instructions – and they lay upon it, closely entangled, and then as close as they could be.
He’d worried that this first time would not be perfect for her, but he went slowly and she met him with trust and growing passion.
It was Max’s turn to cry out. The motion of the carriage rocked them, and when it stopped, presumably because the horses were being changed, they had no attention to spare for that.
The doors were locked from the inside, and nobody bothered them.
It was better than the kitchen table could possibly have been.
At the next change, they stepped down and tidied themselves, taking some time, and stayed for a meal, which might have been dinner or even breakfast, who could say?
It must be obvious to everyone who saw them, the inn servants, what they had been about to emerge so dishevelled, but Max said ‘my wife’ more often than was strictly necessary, and Allegra, blushing adorably, said ‘my husband’, and everyone was kind to them and only laughed a little.
They chatted idly for the latter part of the journey, saying whatever came into their heads without worrying whether it made sense or not. There were things they still had to discover about each other, and it was wonderful to think that they had nothing but time to do so. Family things.
Allegra’s sister Viola had not attended the wedding – the notice had been too short and she had written to express her regrets.
There was no real reason why they shouldn’t have come, since Viola’s husband was a duke who could call up a carriage at a moment’s notice to go anywhere he pleased, or do the same for his wife.
The problem was, he didn’t please. His little sons would no doubt have enjoyed spending time with their cousins, and Viola her sisters and her parents, but Edward was close to a recluse and…
they did not come. The Duke had never visited Mr Constantine’s modest Surrey estate and it was no great surprise that he’d not chosen to do so now, nor permitted his wife to do so.
‘Viola saved me,’ Allegra told Max, nestling sleepily in his arms. ‘I don’t think you and I would have been free to find each other without her intervention.
We’d never been close as children, but a couple of years ago she let me see just how unhappy she was, and she did it on purpose so I would not make the same mistake she did.
She gave me the strength to push back at Mama.
I received no conventional congratulations from Vee on our engagement; that’s not her way.
She has written instead and asked me if I chose you freely, if I loved you and if you made me happy, and I told her yes, yes, and yes, you did, you do.
After that, it didn’t matter that she wasn’t at the wedding, and God knows nobody misses Edward.
I owe so much to her and I have told her so.
You’ll meet her soon, and the boys, I hope. ’
He kissed her hair. ‘Your grandfather couldn’t be there, however discreetly. That was a pity.’
‘I suppose he could have, if he’d wished.
But Sabrina, Viola and the girls don’t know about him yet, and Mama doesn’t want them to.
She still clings to her ambitions for great matches, I suppose.
She’s incorrigible. He told me he doesn’t mind; he has no use for organised religion, apparently, or public ceremony. He likes you – can you tell?’
Max chuckled. ‘I have gone from having no father figures in my life to what seems like a great number of them. And I like all of them, even him, though he terrifies me too.’
He did not need to raise the blinds and look out of the window into the gathering dusk; he could tell by the change in the sound of the wheels on the road that they had arrived. He hadn’t realised before now that he knew such a tiny detail deep in his bones.
‘A little less than twenty years ago,’ he told his bride between lingering kisses as the coach rolled up the long drive, ‘I came here in a carriage, just as now, with a woman who loved me. Then, I was frightened – frozen into a sort of misery, I suppose, and only able to anticipate bad things. But I was wrong to be so apprehensive. It hasn’t always been easy, but this is home.
And I hope it will be yours, and that you will come to love it. There are good people here.’
Max unlatched the door and jumped down, into the light that spilled out welcomingly from the many windows and the open door, where his staff waited to greet them, and Allegra stepped out into his arms and let him carry her inside, into their future.