Chapter 8
“She had spent her whole life keeping her hopes from rising. Yet when she took the risk of optimism, even in the face of failure, she’d been surprised by what she had found: something no one could diminish.”
Adelaide, Chapter 3
Leaving for London had been disastrous, even after months of targeted preparations, and with Miss Kelley’s assistance for three of them.
The entire family had alighted into two carriages and hadn’t realized until their caravan had stopped to walk Olivia’s terrier, that they’d left Lawrence behind.
The irony was not lost on anyone (though Noelle had been eager to point it out) that while their brother had been abandoned to his own devices, Olivia’s allotted animals seemed to have been accounted for.
While Jasper and Kathleen argued over whether to send someone behind for him, she kept her thoughts on the matter to herself. Noelle even heard herself say something noncommittal like: “I’m sure I have every faith in the two of you to sort out Lawrence’s fate.”
Noelle had been sandwiched between her niece and one of her nephews in Henry and Kathleen’s carriage, while Moria and Olivia (and Olivia’s critters) had been assigned to a carriage with Jasper and Miss Kelley and Finn.
“I’m not sure who got the worse bargain. You or your sisters,” Henry Fleming mused, good naturedly, handing Noelle his handkerchief as his son sneezed onto her dress.
“I would be assisting with managing children either way, my lord,” Noelle answered, to which he let out a raucous laugh. Kathleen cut her a look as she settled a fussy one year old onto her lap.
“Hand him over to me,” Henry told his wife, “Try to close your eyes and get some rest, my love.”
His fingers idly traced her shoulder as he pulled her closer against his side, settling the not-quite-a-baby against his chest with his other arm.
He closed his eyes as he placed a kiss atop Kathleen’s head.
Noelle occupied herself with rolling green scenery outside the window.
It had been no secret that her widowed sister had made a second, love match several years ago when Henry hadn’t yet been a Marquess, only a good man (that Noelle could see why her sister loved.)
Only, Noelle knew realistically she could never publish her novel, and have this kind of intimacy with a supportive man.
She was invited back to the present by a soft, chubby hand that squeezed hers, curling up on the upholstered seat next to her and laying its curly head on her lap.
One day soon she would have to choose. This kind of familial happiness, warm and soft and both turns chaotic and blissful…
or some future she could only picture in blurry outlines and hazy shapes?
“Can’t fall asleep, Aunt Noelle. Tell me one of your stories?” A small voice said in a stage whisper.
“Of course, darling. What kind of story would you like?” she said, sweeping the little girl’s dark hair back from her tanned brow.
“A princess one?” the little girl asked groggily.
From Noelle’s other side, the little girl’s twin brother groaned.
“I didn’t know princesses wrote stories.” Fitz had said to her before.
And, “That’s the problem with you, you think too much, Princess.”
But when Noelle looked back down at her niece, her mouth hung open, her eyes were closed tightly.
Noelle supposed the story would have to wait.
As the little girl slept in her lap, Noelle decided to use the silence in the carriage to catch up on rest.
She had hardly slept the night before; anxiousness had turned into restlessness that had turned into inspiration.
She’d stayed up for hours editing the ending of her novel until she’d been pleased enough with the result to finally greet sleep.
When Noelle closed her eyes in the carriage, she found the image of him, all broad shouldered and golden haired and ocean-colored eyes, there to greet her. She tried to shoo that persistent image away, but it was just as resistant to taking a hint as the dratted man who bore said image.
They’d argued in the library, and she wasn’t entirely sure what they’d quarreled over, and then he’d given her his sole focus while they’d danced.
He’d stood so close to her on that archery pitch, cheering for her successes…
but how did he really feel about her writing?
It was impossible to hide the way her body betrayed her at his nearness.
He was physical perfection itself, but often he spoke and the alchemical spell she had been under was reversed.
The mere minutes Noelle thought she had been riding in the carriage must have been hours.
She opened her eyes, seeing that it was the golden hour.
The wheels of the carriage slowed to a stop at a coaching inn.
The stone walls of the inn and the line of carriages were flanked with the bright glow of an early English spring sunset.
The door was wrenched open unceremoniously as Noelle shielded her eyes to the light with one hand.
The others in her carriage immediately roused and readied themselves as well.
Noelle looked around for her glasses. Kathleen handed them to her.
Noelle placed them in the pocket of her dress Moria had sewn in as a hiding spot.
Olivia stepped aside as a footman brought out the mounting block.
The Marquess of Thorne exited on his own.
His wife held out her hand; but he grasped her arm and draped it around his neck, hauling her into his arms for a moment to remove her from the conveyance deftly before placing her gently on the stone drive.
His hands grazed her widening stomach, and he leaned down to place a kiss there.
Noelle choked down her discomfiture with such an obvious display of affection between the two of them, and helped to retrieve all three children from the carriage.
“I am happy to see you all!” Olivia cried excitedly, looking at them and then her nieces and nephew as she held up an orange tabby cat, “You’ll never guess who was waiting on us at the inn!”
“Lawrence?” Kathleen, Henry, and Noelle all asked at once, inquiring as to the forgotten brother’s whereabouts.
“Who?” Olivia asked, confused, then descended into giggles as she took the groggy-eyed child her brother-in-law held out to her into her arms, “I’m kidding, of course. Yes, Laurie is here. Poor dear. Rode part of the way on horseback; but don’t worry, the viscount found him and brought him along.
And,” Olivia held up the kitten again, handing it to Noelle who’d just finished replacing her bonnet, “Salome!”
“The viscount?” Noelle asked, looking up from the gravel drive where she kneeled, coaxing the kitten back into its basket. No answer came, Olivia had dashed off to welcome the others.
“Don’t get too excited, it’s only me,” His voice sounded above her as a pair of boots came into view.
As she stood, her eyes followed the entirety of him, from polished boots, breeches that hugged those lean, muscled legs to perfection, to his traveling coat that stretched around his wide shoulders, and finally that face.
Was she imagining the sun setting right behind him, wreathing him in amber light?
One of her hands reached for him, and before she could pull it back, he had it trapped in his, planting a kiss on her gloved hand.
She’d barely had time to redon her gloves and hat before exiting the carriage, and she must look a fright after falling asleep in the carriage.
He assuredly read her thoughts as he said, “I’ve never seen your hair half down before. It’s always pulled back into a braid or…” he placed a curled lock of her brown hair around one of his fingers, “one of those…ridiculous coiffures.”
Instinctively, Noelle looked around her to see who might bear witness to their exchange. Only Jasper had gone inside, the rest were in some state of busy-ness accounting for everyone and all their belongings; conversing, asking questions, arguing, and barking orders.
A quick head count determined that Moria was not with the others, perhaps she’d gone inside with Jasper?
No, for she saw Moria, bonnet swinging between her shoulder blades, as she disappeared in the direction of the nearby mill pond and large willow tree.
Hours in a carriage with Olivia’s incessant prattling and critters, Jasper and Bridget’s secret pining and glances, and a small child; Noelle couldn’t fault anyone for needing a moment of solitude after such an ordeal.
Noelle felt Fitz’ eyes burning focus onto her, just her. As though everyone assembled in front of that coaching inn could wait.
“I’m sure there was a compliment in there somewhere.” She said, looking away from him to the kitten she was still holding. He scratched the kitten behind the ears, Salome closed her eyes and purred. The minx.
“I meant to say,” he spoke, his voice low, “Something about your sunlit hair half down, framing your face, your lovely pink cheeks, looks criminally attractive to me. It’s a sin women’s fashion requires all those horrible pins, when this,” his eyes swept over her hair, her face, her bonnet,
“is doing things to me.”
Her heart was spinning like a girl in a brand-new dress, but she merely tilted her chin up to him and said, “You make it sound as though my looks are causing you some affliction.” He let go of her hand and took her chin between his thumb and forefinger as he assessed her with narrowed blue eyes.
“Mmm,” came a low rumble that sent shivers up her spine and beyond. “I believe you’re right. I think it might be incurable.” If one of her siblings overheard, she wasn’t sure their years-long friendship would save him from the fallout.
Noelle let out a laugh. “You are rather convincing, my lord. For a second, I almost believed you.”
His throat bobbed, his eyes narrowed. “I’m many things, my bonneted cynic,” he lowered his voice again, she had to lean in to hear him. “Ridiculous, fool hardy, selfish at times…but I never lie.”
“I heard you rescued both Lawrence and Salome?” she asked instead, looking away from him at the sunset’s reflection on the mill pond near the inn.
“If that’s what Lawrence wants you all to believe, I’m fine playing the hero to his damsel in distress.”
There was that taunting dimple of his waving at her like a red flag dancing in front of a bull.
She swallowed, looked back at the direction Moria had gone, found her absent, and turned back to him.
“You mean you and Lawrence made a secret plan to be traveling companions?”
Fitz lifted a finger to his lips.
“Viscount Ludlowe,” Kathleen called from behind them, “I’m so grateful you came along to find Lawrence,” the kitten mewled pointedly from Noelle’s grasp, so she added, “and this one, of course.”
“It was my honor,” Fitz said, scraping a dramatic bow. Noelle saw a glimpse of him from their youth, boyish and full of charisma; but more worldly and much more tempting now.
“However did either of you wind up with the kitten?”
Henry asked the young man, joining them with two small children in tow, the smallest of the three Flemings having been handed off to Miss Kelley who sat just inside at the window rocking him in a chair.
Jasper stood behind her fussing over the baby.
Noelle didn’t comprehend how no one saw this domestic moment between her brother, the Earl, and his ward’s governess, and raised no alarms.
Noelle wasn’t going to be the one to do so at any rate.
She was happy keeping tabs on all the members of her family, though they seemed to be multiplying, even if she kept her observations to herself.
They were allowed a few moments of happiness.
Fitz cleared his throat. “You’ll have to ask Lawrence to tell you that one, Lord Thorne.”
Lawrence called from over his shoulder. “Why don’t you do the honors, old friend?”
Fitz looked to Noelle with widened eyes, as if searching for help.
“His lordship was just regaling me with the tale,” she started, looking to all of them, “Lawrence overslept, and upon finding we’d all vacated Brookevale Park and left him behind, he heard a sad, foreboding wailing,” she looked to her brother, who seemed to be concealing a laugh,
“In his stupor from over-imbibing in the village tavern the night before, he thought he’d discovered a ghost in the manor. Somehow, as he trudged through his haze,” Lawrence stepped on her foot, but she soldiered on.
“He realized that it was Olivia’s kitten, and that said sister would be despondent if she realized she’d left Salome behind. After all, our youngest sister is the only one of us he actually likes.”
“As you can all see why,” Lawrence added with a dramatic flourish of his hand.
Noelle continued on unfazed, “So he hitched up a horse, with herculean effort in his dyspeptic state, as one can imagine. And yet, through his determination, rode after us with the kitten mewling her protests from inside his saddle bag.
It was when he stopped to cast up his accounts into an outcropping of bushes somewhere undefined along the Great North Road, that Lord Ludlowe heard the familiar sound and stopped to ask if Lawrence needed assistance.”
The others wore a variety of expressions, but it was Fitz’ chewing on his bottom lip to stifle a laugh, and boring into her with those frostbitten blue eyes that made her grin like an idiot.