The Wedding Affair (Rebel Hearts series Book 1)
Read The Wedding Affair (Rebel Hearts series Book 1) Online
Authors: Heather Boyd
Heather Boyd
The Wedding Affair
A Rebel Hearts’s novel
LLD Press
www.facebook.com/HeatherBoydRomanceAuthor
Table of Contents
The life she wants is the love he lost.
Coming face-to-face before her wedding with the scoundrel who broke her heart and destroyed her trust could not be more awkward or ill timed for Sally Ford. When she agreed to give her hand and fortune to London’s most eligible earl, she did so believing she would learn to love him after they tied the knot. Her betrothed has no idea she was engaged to Captain Felix Hastings six years ago, or that she gave her innocence to the ambitious officer.
When Felix answered the summons from his superior he never expected to face Sally Ford, the woman who'd believed a lie and labeled him a fortune hunter before calling off their engagement six years ago. In his determination to clear the air about the past, pride clashes with the truth as every argument and stolen moment reignites a passion that has never waned. Giving in could destroy everything they've both worked so hard to achieve, or will fate offer them a chance to begin again if only they can forgive?
First Edition, May 2016
Copyright © 2016 by Heather Boyd
ISBN: 978-1-925239-14-0
All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced nor used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for use of brief quotations in a book review.
This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be resold or given away to other people. If you are reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return it and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used facetiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or locales is entirely coincidental.
Editing by Victory Editing
Cover and Formatting by LLD Press
The Rebel Hearts Series
Book 1: The Wedding Affair
Book 2: An Affair of Honor (July, 2016)
Book 3: The Christmas Affair (coming soon)
Dedication
For Anne, who never fails to straighten out my babbling. You have the patience of a saint (a naughty one) and my gratitude for your words of wisdom.
For Michelle, who makes the world brighter with every word she writes, no matter the medium. Thanks for being my dearest friend.
And for John, my beloved and long suffering husband. Thank you for making me lift my game every single day. Love you. Always and forever.
Chapter One
April, 1815
Newberry Park, Essex
I
will be betrothed today.
The familiar refrain brought Lady Sally Ford intense satisfaction as she hurried toward Newberry Park’s white drawing room were her future waited to be taken up.
The two footmen flanking the drawing room doors opened them smartly, allowing Sally to make a grand entrance to meet with the earl whom she intended to give her hand in marriage. She noted the occupants arrayed in the afternoon’s final sunrays—her mother and her future mother-in-law.
But no potential groom.
Regardless of the lack of future husband, Sally dropped into a perfect curtsy because she could not afford to make a bad impression. She had spent many additional minutes before her looking glass, making sure her dark hair was perfectly arranged and her lips slightly pinked thanks to a brush of tinted beeswax. She wanted to have kissable lips when she agreed to become a bride.
Sally’s mother, the Countess of Templeton, rested with her feet upon a padded stool and a scrap of fine cloth over her brow.
“Good afternoon, Mama. Lady Ellicott.”
Mama started upright at the sound of Sally’s voice. “Sally, what are you doing here? I thought you would be gone for hours yet.”
Sally smiled but did not want to be drawn into a conversation about the estate immediately. “Where else would I want to be but with our important guests?”
Lady Ellicott, her beau’s formidable mother, had also been drowsing in a comfortable high-backed chair but smiled somewhat warmly in return. A round woman with a pale face, Lady Ellicott met her gaze and held it a touch longer than Sally found comfortable, no doubt assessing her yet again.
Sally had grown used to the feeling and the scrutiny over the past weeks. She straightened her spine a touch more, determined not to fail to meet the lady’s high standards. She felt she had almost won her over to approving the match.
Almost, but Lord Ellicott had not yet asked for her hand.
“My dear girl, how lovely you look today,” Lady Ellicott murmured as her son stepped into the room from the terrace.
There he was.
Adam Belmont, Lord Ellicott
. The man she would give her hand and fortune to if he would but ask. “Is she not the most arresting woman of all, Ellicott?”
“She is a beauty.” Ellicott strode across the room, lean and handsome, smiling widely as he approached. He raised her outstretched hands to kiss them, his warm brown eyes dancing with feeling. “Good afternoon, Sally.”
She had given him leave to use her given name a week ago, but the familiarity was still something of a shock.
The sound of her first name tumbling from his lips should have excited her happier emotions. It was an intimacy she did not give lightly to anyone outside her family. Sally waited for anything resembling a heated awareness of him to affect her senses. After all the time they had spent together, shouldn’t she feel something, at least anticipation for the pleasure of his kiss? When her heart and body failed yet again to stir, she smiled demurely. The marriage was more important than fleeting pleasures anyway. He was her future. “Thank you for the compliment. Have you had a pleasant morning shooting with Uncle George?”
“Yes, quite pleasant.”
Her uncle George had lost a foot years ago, but that did not stop him from hunting on the estate several times a week. He was a high stickler though, and she felt confident he would only paint her character in the best light. “I am sure he enjoyed having the company of another man with him.”
Ellicott laughed, and his eyes lit up with mirth. “I imagine so. The chatter of a dozen women can be so overwhelming.”
Sally smiled, but the jibe hit a little too close to the bone. Newberry Park consisted of wives or spinsters for the most part. “There are only ten Ford women on the estate to amuse three often exacting men. It is an exhausting job indeed keeping that trio and guests in line, I might tell you.”
“I do not wonder why you are hardly ever in London. They do not dare let you out of their sight for long because they are afraid of letting you go.” Ellicott kissed her hand again and looked deep into her eyes. He doted on her as much as almost-courting couples were allowed within the bounds of propriety in public, and in the brief private moments they had been granted she had found much to admire in him. He was very free with his compliments, and she felt them all sincere.
He needed a bride with a fortune to bolster his estate’s finances but was not so overwhelmed with debt to be considered an out-and-out scoundrel about it. Her dowry and connections were important to him. He was smart enough to keep up his end of a lively conversation, and he was active enough not to allow his figure to run to fat anytime soon.
Overall, a worthy catch for any husband-hunting woman from a good family.
Unfortunately for Sally, her head might say yes to marrying him, but her body and heart remained watching from the shadows. That lack of feeling was probably for the best. If there was any chance of love between them, Sally was convinced it would surface once they were husband and wife and without anyone, such as her nine female relations, watching everything they did and said together.
Finding quiet moments with Lord Ellicott had been a challenge during the week of the Ellicotts’ stay. Not one to let a little obstacle such as propriety overset her plans at this late stage of their courtship, she allowed him to take her hand in his and place it upon his arm. “You are too kind.”
“Not at all, for it is the honest truth.” He led her across the room and stopped, poised equally between their mothers. He cast his eye over them all and smiled. “Beauty runs in the family. In both families.”
“True, but a woman’s good looks must be cared for as if they were her greatest achievement,” Lady Ellicott remarked, casting a stern look in Sally’s direction. “I trust you rested in a dark room this morning. It works wonders for the complexion.”
“I did hope to, but unfortunately there was a matter that required my urgent attention, so I had no choice but to go out for a little while.” A fat fib if ever she had told one. She had wanted to escape the house and find a useful outlet for her nervous energy. Pretending to be demure was difficult.
Lady Ellicott exchanged a glance with her son that hinted at disapproval. In her brother’s absence, Sally had involved herself in the running of the estate more than most unmarried women her age usually did. She enjoyed the challenge but made certain to hide her activities from important guests who would disapprove.
She glanced at her mother, seeking a diversion from conversation of Newberry, and saw annoyance in her expression, which she usually did not reveal so openly. Countess Templeton possessed a stubborn disposition and yet disliked disagreements. In her early fifties and mother of six children, five of whom still lived, there were ample signs of what had been considerable beauty in her mother’s dear face. Determined that her mother and Lady Ellicott not fall out today of all days, Sally crossed the room and perched at her mother’s side.
“Good afternoon, Mama,” Sally said warmly, then pitched her voice low as she continued. “There were poachers in the northern field last night, but no sign of them now or the last dozen sheep of that flock. I have had them moved closer to the rest.”
“If you think that best,” her mother said approvingly.
What Sally did for her family likely amounted to work by an outsider’s standards, but she did it with love and pride. Lady Ellicott could not seem to abide the concept of a woman employed and had already expressed her disapproval in many subtle ways. Today Sally was not so lucky.