A Simple Lady (29 page)
Authors: Carolynn Carey
Tags: #Romance, #Historical, #Regency, #Historical Romance
“She what?”
“If you recall, your lordship, they are both stout young men. Her ladyship said they might come in handy.”
“Good God. Well, hurry man. Get my pistols while I escort my wife into the house.”
But Elizabeth had no desire to be escorted into the house. “I want to come with you,” she said, her chin jutting out stubbornly. “Mary may need me.”
“Now, Elizabeth,” Jeremy began in a cajoling if impatient tone, just as Elizabeth was saying “Please, Jeremy,” in an equally cajoling tone. Neither heard the hackney arriving until Mary, with the assistance of her two healthy young footmen, was stepping into the street.
“Jeremy, dearest, you have found her. Thank God,” the dowager said, her face wreathed in smiles.
“Mother! Where have you been? Surely, you did not, as Larkman suspects, confront Gerald yourself.”
The Dowager Marchioness of Kenrick squared her shoulders. “And why should I not, pray tell? If I had been firm with Gerald many years ago, perhaps he would have grown up differently. Unfortunately, I left it too late. Now I have had to exile the boy to the continent for the rest of his life.”
“You what?” the marquess asked, his expression vacillating between horror and anger. “Mother, do you realize the danger you were in?”
“Bah!” the dowager responded. “I was in no danger. I had two strong young men with me, plus this.” She drew from the folds of her cloak a handsome and deadly dueling pistol.
Kenrick blanched. “Mother, if I may be permitted to make a suggestion, please place that thing slowly and carefully on the pavement. It has a hair trigger.”
Mary merely grinned. “It is also unloaded. At least I assume it is.” Before Kenrick could open his mouth to object, she had pointed the pistol toward the sky and pulled the trigger. A resounding boom and an acrid puff of smoke were proof that she had assumed too much.
“Oh dear,” she murmured while excited and apprehensive shouts began emanating from several of the nearby houses. “Perhaps we should continue this discussion inside.”
“An excellent idea, ma’am,” Kenrick muttered with a sigh, grasping his mother’s arm firmly and leading her toward the house. Elizabeth, fighting back a grin, followed.
“So Gerald admitted hiring an accomplice to shoot Homer Smithfield in the back and to start the fires at Oak Groves?” Kenrick asked his mother in some amazement a few moments later.
“Yes, dearest, he did. He would have done almost anything to remain your heir. He even admitted to hiring someone to shoot you when you were on your way to be married. He had not known then that your bride was supposedly simpleminded and that your marriage was to be in name only. You see, he really did not want you dead. He merely wished to remain your heir. That way, he had none of the responsibilities of the rank but all of the advantages of an heir presumptive. Tradespeople were quite willing to sell to him as long as he might someday be expected to step into your shoes.”
“So the troubles at Oak Groves were designed to keep me and Elizabeth apart so we would not have an opportunity to produce an heir to supplant Gerald?”
“Exactly. He realized that the two of you had resolved your initial problems and were becoming fond of each other. It was only a matter of time, he believed, until your marriage became more than one of convenience. He could not allow that to happen and so devised his plan to lock Elizabeth away.”
Despite the fact that she was seated on the small settee in Mary’s sitting room with her husband’s arm wrapped protectively around her, Elizabeth could not suppress a shiver.
Kenrick immediately pulled her closer into the comfort of his embrace. “We are distressing Elizabeth,” he told his mother.
“Then we must instantly change the subject,” Mary declared. “As a matter of fact, I have been remiss in not mentioning to Elizabeth that her parents are asleep in an upstairs bedchamber.”
“What?” Elizabeth shouted. She would have jumped to her feet had not Kenrick’s embrace been so firm.
“I am sorry, my dear,” he said. “In the excitement, I forgot to mention their arrival. It seems they were again concerned about your stay in London, fearing you were not competent to handle the frenzied pace of city life.”
“Well, they will not worry about that in the future,” Mary announced. “Elizabeth, dearest, I believe I was able to enlighten your parents on several important aspects of your character. In fact, I scolded them rather severely, but they did not appear to hold that against me. Your mother was so relieved to learn that your mind is sound and that you were being freed from your incarceration in that terrible place, she became quite friendly. I was pleased to learn that both she and your father love you very deeply.”
Mary paused to consider her last words before continuing. “Perhaps I should have said that your parents love you as deeply as they are capable of loving anything that is not located between the covers of a book. Unfortunately, they do not have a smidgeon of common sense between them and needed someone to clarify for them the wonderful extent of your capabilities, which I believe I was able to do.”
Elizabeth was too stupefied to do more than stare at her mother-in-law in wonder, but Kenrick was soon chuckling. “Well, Mother, you have been rather busy, have you not?”
“Yes,” the dowager answered simply. “As a matter of fact, I find I am a bit fatigued after all of my activities. I think I shall retire to my bedchamber for a nap. No, Jeremy, do not stand. Elizabeth looks quite comfortable resting in your arms, and I do not want her to be disturbed. I will see both of you later.”
Kenrick watched, smiling, while Mary hurried from the room and closed the door firmly behind her. “My dear and quite amazing mother possesses all of the subtlety of a rampaging bull, does she not?” he said, grinning broadly.
“Absolutely,” Elizabeth agreed, smiling happily as she rested her head on Kenrick’s shoulder. “Still, I wish she had not rushed out of the room so quickly. I had hoped to hear more about what transpired between her and Gerald. I worry that he may have tricked her into believing he will go away and leave us alone.”
“Oh, I don’t think you need to worry about that, my dearest Elizabeth,” Kenrick said, resting his cheek on the top of her head. “We’ll let Mother continue to think that Gerald has departed for the continent but I intend to see him on board a ship headed for America. With his personality, he should prosper there. And, God willing, we can put him and his schemes out of our minds and forget completely how close he came to sabotaging our future.”
Elizabeth nodded, although she knew it would be a very long time before she could forget the horrors of the previous day and night. Kenrick obviously assumed the same.
“If I may be permitted, my dearest wife,” he whispered softly into her ear, “I shall endeavor to substitute joy for your unpleasant memories. Perhaps we may even, in a few months, have a son or daughter to help you forget.”
Elizabeth blushed but did not hesitate in her reply. “I would like that very much, Jeremy,” she whispered before lifting her head from his shoulder and turning her face toward him in an open invitation to be kissed.
Kenrick did not immediately take advantage of her offer. Instead, he reached to very gently trace the outline of her lips with his finger while gazing into her face with his devotion written clearly in his eyes for her to read.
“I love you, Elizabeth,” he said at last.
“And I love you,” she whispered before she initiated their kiss, touching him softly, inexpertly, but with a candor that left no doubt that she wished to be kissed in return.
Kenrick appeared happy to comply with her wishes, and in less than two minutes, Elizabeth was finding that as her passion soared, her frightening memories were already beginning to fade. This was really going to be quite simple, after all, she decided.
A Note from the Author
Dear Reader:
Thank you for reading
A Simple Lady.
I hope you enjoyed this adventure in Regency England and will want to read more of my Regencies.
You might also be interested in my contemporary series, which is set in Barbourville, a fictional small town in Tennessee. If you’re new to the Barbourville series, you might want to start with the prequel,
Celebrations of Joy,
although any of the books can stand alone
.
The first in the series is
A Summer Sentence,
which was a finalist in the National Readers’ Choice Awards, the HOLT Medallion contest, and the Gayle Wilson Award of Excellence contest, as well as placing first in the traditional category of the Romance Writers Ink contest. Others in the series have won or placed in prestigious contests.
The Forgotten Christmas Tree
took first place in the 2014 HOLT Medallion contest, and
At Home in Barbourville
was an Award of Merit winner in the 2015 HOLT Medallion contest.
I hope you’ll like my Facebook author page (http://www.Facebook.com/carolynncareybooks). I also enjoy emails from readers. You can contact me through my website (carolynncarey.com). And like all authors, I appreciate honest reviews on Amazon or Goodreads!
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