Epilogue
“Oh, Frances, you’re strangling me.”
“I am not.” Frances peered around Lavinia’s shoulder, her brow knit in concentration as she attempted, for the third time, to coax the flower crown on her head into obedience. “If you would stop craning your neck, you might survive the ordeal intact. And so might the lace.”
Lavinia, already listing forward from the weight of pins and frippery, stifled a laugh. “I should have eloped. Alone. With only the cat as witness.”
Frances snorted, but her eyes shone in the glass as she met Lavinia’s gaze. “Scandalous. The duchess-to-be absconding with a notorious duke. You would be the toast of the penny press.”
“I would have settled for toast,” Lavinia muttered, but even she could not suppress the fluttering in her chest as she stared at the reflection. The woman in the mirror was not the anxious, miserable daughter of Pembroke. Nor was she the penniless etiquette tutor.
She was every inch a bride, and the amethyst pendant at her throat shone with her mother’s memory and pride.
“It’s beautiful, isn’t it?” Frances whispered, brushing her fingertips over the jewel. “You look like Mother did, the day of her painting.”
Lavinia could not speak. She only nodded, blinking so her vision would not ripple and ruin the effect.
Frances bit her lip. “Shall I fetch the flowers? It’s nearly time.”
“I suppose you must.” Lavinia steadied her nerves with a smile. “Go on.”
Frances grinned, hugged her around the middle, nearly upending the flower crown in the process, and darted from the room, her footsteps echoing down the marbled hallway.
Left alone, Lavinia allowed herself the smallest sigh. If her hands trembled on the edge of the dressing table, it was nobody’s business.
She ran a thumb along the pendant, its warmth settling her more than any rational thought. She tried to recall every moment that had led to this one: the ball, the storm, the laughter, the heartbreak. Even the bruises were precious now, proof that she had survived.
The door creaked. In the mirror, Moira’s shape appeared behind her: a tartan shawl thrown over one shoulder, face set in a look Lavinia could only describe as determinedly sentimental.
“May I come in, lamb?” Moira’s voice was gentle, but brooked no argument.
“I do not think you could be stopped,” Lavinia replied.
Moira came to stand behind her, hands on her shoulders. “You know,” she said, “your mother once told me she prayed you’d find a life that was all your own. No matter what the world thought of it.”
Lavinia met Moira’s eyes in the glass. “I suspect the world is thinking a great deal today.”
“Let it.” Moira gave her a squeeze. “She’d be proud of you. And so am I.”
Lavinia cleared her throat. “If you cry, I shall be forced to join you.”
“Bah, these are happy tears.” Moira let go, but not before pressing a kiss to her temple, careful not to disrupt the crown. “Now, are you ready to face the mob?”
“If by mob you mean Nancy, Hester, and Fiona—” Lavinia glanced at the door, which already rattled with the approach of a trio. “—then no. Not even a little.”
Too late. The door banged open, and in they swept, Nancy in a flurry of ribbon, Hester with an armload of something blue, and Fiona tripping over the hem of her own dress.
“There you are!” Nancy swept in and kissed both Lavinia’s cheeks, then hovered a step back, as if she might begin an impromptu inspection. “You are radiant. Are you nervous? You must be. I am nervous for you.”
“I am not nervous,” Lavinia lied.
“You are the color of flour,” Hester observed, dumping the blue bundle onto the bed. “And your hands are shaking.”
“I am not—” Lavinia began, but Fiona cut her off.
“That is perfectly normal,” said Fiona, her voice steady for once. “Before I married, I was so nervous I forgot how to spell my own name. Isaac found me rewriting the place cards with every possible permutation.”
Lavinia could not help but laugh. “Fiona, your name is four letters long.”
“Exactly,” said Fiona.
Nancy clapped her hands. “This is a moment for joy, not panic. Shall we sing? I am sure the walls of Evermere have never heard so much happiness in one room.”
Hester eyed the full-length mirror. “Do not sing. You’ll shatter the glass, and Lavinia still needs to see herself as she becomes a duchess.”
Moira beamed at them all. “You see? Who needs family when you have a cohort of wild women?”
Fiona patted Lavinia’s hand. “We are all so very proud.”
For a moment, the room was thick with emotion, threatening to spill over into sentimentality. Lavinia tamped it down with a sniff and set her jaw.
“Thank you. All of you. But if you do not let me out of this room, I will never marry at all.”
They bustled her toward the door, Nancy fussing over the angle of the veil, Hester fluffing the train, Fiona making small, panicked adjustments to the bouquet. In the chaos, no one noticed Frances slip back in, arms full of flowers and a streak of dirt on her nose.
“They’re ready,” Frances declared. “We’re to go at once.”
“Very well,” Lavinia said, and tried to ignore the way her knees wobbled.
The church was small, just as Lavinia had requested. She would have preferred a drawing room, but Lady Montfort had issued a decree: if Lavinia was to be a duchess, she would do it with the dignity of at least three generations. She supposed this was a compromise.
The pews were filled with a patchwork of friends, found family, and the odd cousin who had drifted in on the tide of gossip. The air was full of the scent of lilies and lavender, which Frances and Sophia had over-enthusiastically arranged in every available vessel.
Near the altar, the Duke of Sappherton stood and beside him, Tristan. The Duke of Evermere. The man who had, until recently, made an art form of ignoring his own feelings. Today, however, he looked ready to devour the sun and the moon, just to see what came next.
Lavinia watched as Sophia, beaming with pride and clutching her basket, began the walk down the aisle. She had not tripped. Not even once.
The second time she passed down, she was followed by Whisper, who had slipped in behind her and now stalked the aisle with an air of utter authority.
Frances caught up to Sophia halfway and together they paraded to the front, each throwing petals in a manner that suggested they were auditioning for a new Olympic sport.
At the sight of the cat, Sappherton’s eyebrows rose. He turned and murmured to Tristan, who grunted but did not take his eyes from the back of the church.
Lavinia reached them, and Tristan took her hand, then leaned down and spoke with his voice pitched for her alone. “It’s not too late, you know. We can flee to the continent and live as reclusive philosophers.”
“And disappoint the beau monde?” She chuckled. “Never.”
The words of the ceremony blurred in Lavinia’s mind. She remembered only the bits that mattered: the feel of Tristan’s hands in hers, the tremor in his voice as he promised to love her all his days, the heat behind his eyes that made her knees threaten to buckle.
When it was her turn, Lavinia did not recite. She spoke the words as if they had been written just for her and for him.
There was a moment, just as the vicar pronounced them husband and wife, when Sophia broke ranks entirely, darted up the steps, and threw her arms around both of them.
“Father, I told you Lady Lavinia belongs with us,” Sophia giggled.
Lavinia hugged her, and in the corner of her eye, even Lady Montfort was dabbing at her nose with a lace-edged handkerchief. Frances was crying too, though she pretended it was only the flowers making her eyes water.
The applause was honest and loud, and for the first time in her life, Lavinia did not wish herself invisible.
Tristan drew Lavinia ever closer to him. “Would you allow me to steal you away?” he asked.
Lavinia pretended to consider. “You may try.”
Without warning, he swept her up in his arms, and the guests gasped. Then there was a burst of laughter from Sappherton, and a few outright cheers. Tristan turned to face the assembly and announced, “The Duke and Duchess will join you shortly in the manor.”
Lavinia, caught between shock and delight, wrapped her arms around his neck.
“You are making a scene,” she said.
He grinned. “That was the intention.”
He carried her across the ground and back to the manor, then crossed the front hall, up the grand staircase, and toward the private wing of the house.
When they reached the door to the duke and duchess’s chambers, Lavinia tried to wriggle free. “You may put me down now.”
“I will consider it,” Tristan said, “once I am convinced you will not run away.”
“I would not have made it past the cat,” Lavinia replied.
“Clever woman.” He set her down, but kept an arm around her waist.
They stood for a moment, staring at each other. The world was very quiet.
He reached for the amethyst, running his thumb over the jewel, and then kissed her, soft at first, then with the sort of force that made her remember exactly why she had agreed to all this madness in the first place.
They broke apart, laughing, and he rested his forehead against hers. “Are you ready for this?” He gave her a look that said everything.
“I am only sorry it took me so long,” she said.
“So am I,” he whispered, and kissed her again for good measure.
Together, they pushed open the door. And if they were a little late returning to the party, no one dared comment on it.
The family—such as it was, such as they had built it—waited below. There would be laughter, and chaos, and probably more cats.
But for this moment, they belonged only to each other, at last.