The Regency Season Collection: Part One. Кэрол Мортимер

hand, those long fingers closing over hers. Julia felt hot and cold and as disconcerted as the first time Jonathan had kissed her. This was a man, a young man, a man of passion, and something deep inside her responded to him.

      She felt her lips part, her heartbeat stutter, then the grip of his fingers lifted and the illusion of intimacy fled.

      ‘Had you some other plans for the day after tomorrow?’ Will persisted.

      Safe, protective irritation took the place of whatever insane emotions she had just been experiencing. The man is completely focused on what he wants without a thought for me. It is a very good thing he is going away, Julia thought, otherwise we would be falling out for certain.

      ‘I haven’t said yes yet,’ she protested. He just looked at her. ‘Oh, very well! Yes! But I do not have a thing to wear.’ His eyebrows shot up. ‘Except this.’ She swept a hand down to encompass her skirts. ‘I can hardly marry a baron in a creased, stained walking dress and old cloak.’

      ‘Then go shopping tomorrow. I will give you money. There are no shops of very great fashion in Aylesbury, not even for ready to wear, but you will find something adequate and you can always go up to London shortly. Just hire a town house, if you wish, Julia.’

      She had a sudden, welcome, thought. ‘Everyone calls me Julia, but for the licence you must have my first name. Augusta.’ She saw his face and almost laughed. ‘I know. It was the name of my mother’s godmother and they were in hopes of some generous present from her. No one ever uses it—in fact, I doubt anyone recalls it now.’ Even if they saw any mention of the marriage in some newssheet, no one would think that Augusta Prior, making an excellent match to a baron in Buckinghamshire, might be Julia Prior of Wiltshire, fugitive.

      ‘But what of your cousin?’ she worried. ‘I cannot help but feel we are cheating him.’

      ‘If I had married as planned, I could have an heir due shortly and Henry’s nose would be permanently out of joint. Or if I had not been caught in that blizzard I might be in excellent health now. What we are doing is ensuring that when he does inherit he will have an estate in fine heart and, I trust, the maturity to appreciate it.’

      Julia prodded herself with the thing that was troubling her conscience, deep down below the worry and the fear. ‘And I am being rewarded for sin,’ she muttered as she sat down again. She had eloped with a man, slept with him out of wedlock and then, however unintentionally, killed him. She could not absolve herself from blame—if she had not done that first shocking thing, then Jonathan would still be alive.

      ‘Sin?’ Will Hadfield must have ears like a bat. ‘Running away to save your virtue? And fleeing from physical abuse—I saw your wrist.’

      Her fingers closed protectively around the yellowing bruises. Eyes like a hawk as well. ‘It was poor judgement,’ she argued. ‘I had no plan other than escape. Goodness knows how I would have found a respectable way of supporting myself.’ She had to remember the story she had told him, act in character. ‘I should have thought of something else, something less shocking.’

      After a moment she added, ‘All you know of me is what I told you. I wonder that you trust me with this scheme of yours.’

      ‘But my judgement, my dear Miss Prior, is excellent. I have watched you and listened to you. I have seen how you look at the land, how you talk to the people. I have heard how you think things through and deal with problems. I have every confidence in you—after all, once you are safely married to me, you will not be a target for predatory young men.’

      He blithely ignored her sharp intake of breath and continued before she could reply. ‘Will you go shopping tomorrow? I will send a maid with you and a footman for your parcels, and Thomas the coachman will deliver you to the Rose and Crown where you will find a private parlour and reasonable refreshments.’

      ‘Thank you, I shall do as you advise. It seems you have thought of everything,’ she added, managing with an effort not to allow her ungrateful resentment at his masterful organisation to show in her voice. It would serve him right if the archbishop refused to give him a licence and he found himself saddled with a fallen woman with a price on her head and a very large pile of bills.

      And then her conscience pricked her. Will Hadfield was doing this because he was driven to it, he had been kind to her and now he was helping her out of danger in a way that was little short of a miracle. She wished she had known him before he had become ill, wished she could know him better now.

      Or perhaps not. Even ill he was dangerously attractive. She did not want to grow to like him, to be hurt when he left, to agonise more than she would over the fate of any chance-met stranger.

      * * *

      ‘You have known my nephew for how long, exactly? I do not think I quite caught what dear William said.’ Mrs Delia Hadfield had doubtless heard perfectly well everything that had been said to her and her façade of vague sweetness did not deceive Julia for a moment. The widow, she was certain, was aghast that her husband’s nephew had married and was consumed with a desire to discover everything she could about the circumstances.

      Julia saw that Will was seated on the far side of the room, deep in conversation with the vicar. She could hardly expect him to rush to her side to rescue her. ‘It seems only days,’ Julia parried with an equally sweet smile and sipped her champagne. ‘But it was something we simply felt compelled to do.’

      ‘And we had thought him so happy in his engagement to Caroline Fletcher. Of course that could never be once he was so ill, but I had no idea dear William would prove so fickle. Such a suitable girl. So beautiful.’ The widow’s smile hardened and her eyes narrowed. She thinks she is sliding her rapier under my guard.

      People were watching them, Julia could feel their curious stares like a touch. The salon was a long room, but even with the windows open wide on to the terrace overlooking the dry moat it was crowded with the wedding guests that Will had managed to assemble at such very short notice. She dared not let any of her true feelings show, but the recollection of the last time she had been in a press of people was making her heart beat faster and her skin feel clammy.

      She made herself breathe slowly and shallowly. These people laughing and talking were nothing like that avid crowd and no one looking at her would guess that the new Lady Dereham in her pretty gown and elegantly coiffed hair was a fugitive with a deadly secret.

      ‘I thought I loved another, you see...’ Julia let her voice trail off artistically. ‘And then...’ Really, where did I get this ability to play-act! I have been reading too many novels. Desperation, I suppose. ‘Then we found each other again, when Will’s betrothal had been ended and I had realised that there was no one else for me but him,’ she finished. ‘So romantic, is it not?’

      ‘So William knew you some time ago?’ Mrs Hadfield was intent on pursuing this mystery.

      ‘I would rather not talk about the past,’ Julia murmured, improvising frantically. Will had assured her no one would ask awkward questions. He might have been correct so far as he was concerned, for she was sure he could depress vulgar curiosity with one look, but she had been an idiot to take his word for it and not prepare a careful story.

      ‘I was sadly disillusioned in the man I thought I loved and that made me see Lord Dereham’s qualities in a different light.’ Set against a scheming, mercenary rake who tried to force her, she was certain even Will’s undoubted faults would be preferable.

      ‘Lady Dereham—or may I call you Cousin Augusta?’ With an inward sigh of relief she turned to Henry Hadfield, Will’s cousin and heir. She could see the relationship in the height and the straight, dark brows and something about the way his mouth curved when he smiled, but there was no strength of character in the handsome, immature, face. She tried to imagine those features superimposed on Will’s strong bones and experienced a slight shock of...what? Attraction? Not desire, surely, not after what she had experienced.

      The momentary feeling passed and she was able to concentrate again. It would not do to let her guard down with either of the Hadfields. Henry had not quite worked out