“And you’re going to just leave me here on the street?”
“You’ll be fine.”
“I know I’ll be fine,” Milly shot back, “but Mother will question it.”
Blast it, she hated when Milly was right. They had gone out for a sweet and were meant to return together. Milly was seventeen and perfectly able to walk three storefronts on her own, but their mother always said that proper young ladies did not walk anywhere alone.
Lady Crowland had not been amused when Amelia had asked her if that included the water closet. Apparently, proper young ladies did not say “water closet,” either.
Amelia looked quickly over her shoulder. The sun was hitting the window of the dress shop, and it was difficult to see inside through the resulting glare.
“I think she’s still in the back,” Milly said. “She said she planned to try on three different dresses.”
Which meant she’d almost certainly try on eight, but still, they could not count on it.
Amelia thought quickly, then said to Milly, “Tell her that Grace had to leave straightaway, so I didn’t have time to come in and inform her of the change of plans myself. Tell her Grace had no choice. The dowager needed her.”
“The dowager,” Milly echoed, nodding. They all knew the dowager.
“Mother won’t mind,” Amelia assured her. “She’ll be delighted, I’m sure. She’s always trying to send me over to Belgrave. Now go.” She gave her sister a little push, then thought the better of it and yanked her back. “No, don’t go. Not yet.”
Milly looked at her with patent aggravation.
“Give me a moment to get him out of view.”
“To get yourself out of view,” Milly said pertly.
Amelia jammed down the urge to shake her sister senseless, and instead gave her a hard stare. “Can you do this?”
Milly looked miffed that she’d even asked. “Of course.”
“Good.” Amelia gave her a brisk nod. “Thank you.” She took a step, then added, “Don’t watch.”
“Oh, now you ask too much,” Milly warned her.
Amelia decided she couldn’t push the matter. If their positions were reversed, she would never look away. “Fine. Just don’t say a word.”
“Not even to Elizabeth?”
“No one.”
Milly nodded, and Amelia knew she could trust her. Elizabeth might not know how to keep her mouth shut, but Milly (with the proper motivation) was a vault. And as Amelia was the only person who knew precisely how Lord Crowland’s entire collection of imported cigars had gotten soaked by an overturned teapot (her mother had detested the cigars and thus declared herself uninterested in finding the culprit)…
Well, let it be said that Milly had ample motivation to hold her tongue.
With one final glance in her sister’s direction, Amelia dashed across the street, taking care to avoid the puddles that had accumulated during the previous night’s rainfall. She approached Wyndham-still somewhat hoping that it wasn’t actually he-and, with a tentative tilt of her head, said, “Er, your grace?”
He looked up. Blinked. Cocked his head to the side, then winced, as if the motion had been unwise. “My bride,” he said simply.
And nearly knocked her over with his breath.
Amelia recovered quickly, then grabbed his arm and held tight. “What are you doing here?” she whispered. She looked about frantically. The streets were not terribly busy, but anyone could happen along. “And good heavens, what happened to your eye?”
It was amazingly purple underneath, from the bridge of his nose straight out to his temple. She had never seen anything like it. It was far worse than the time she had accidentally hit Elizabeth with a cricket bat.
He touched the bruised skin, shrugged, scrunched his nose as he apparently considered her question. Then he looked back at her and tilted his head to the side. “You are my bride, aren’t you?”
“Not yet,” Amelia muttered.
He regarded her with a strange, intense concentration. “I think you still are.”
“Wyndham,” she said, trying to cut him off.
“Thomas,” he corrected.
She almost laughed. Now would be the time he granted her use of his given name? “Thomas,” she repeated, mostly just to get him to stop interrupting. “What are you doing here?” And then, when he did not answer her: “Like this?”
He stared at her uncomprehendingly.
“You’re drunk,” she whispered furiously.
“No,” he said, thinking about it. “I was drunk last night. Now I’m indisposed.”
“Why?”
“Do I need a reason?”
“You-”
“’Course, I have a reason. Don’t really care to share it with you, but I do have a reason.”
“I need to get you home,” she decided.
“Home.” He nodded, tilting his head and looking terribly philosophical. “Now there’s an interesting word.”
While he was talking nonsense, Amelia looked up and down the street, searching for something-anything-that might indicate how he’d gotten there the night before. “Your grace-”
“Thomas,” he corrected, with a rather wiggly sort of grin.
She held up a hand, her fingers spread wide, more in an attempt to control her own aggravation than to scold him. “How did you get here?” she asked, very slowly. “Where is your carriage?”
He pondered this. “I don’t rightly know.”
“Good God,” she muttered.
“Is He?” he mused. “Is He good? Really?”
She let out a groan. “You are drunk.”
He looked at her, and looked at her, and looked at her even more, and then just when she’d opened her mouth to tell him that they needed to find his carriage immediately, he said, “I might be a little bit drunk.” He cleared his throat. “Still.”
“Wyndham,” she said, adopting her sternest voice. “Surely you-”
“Thomas.”
“Thomas.” She clenched her teeth. “Surely you remember how you got here.”
Again, that moronic silence, followed by, “I rode.”
Wonderful. That was just what they needed.
“In a carriage!” he said brightly, then laughed at his own joke.
She stared at him in disbelief. Who was this man?
“Where is the carriage?” she ground out.
“Oh, just over there,” he said, waving vaguely behind him.
She turned. “Over there” appeared to be a random street corner. Or it could have been the street that ran around the corner. Or, given his current state, he might have been referring to the whole of Lincolnshire, straight back to the Wash and on to the North Sea.
“Could you be more precise?” she asked, followed by a rather slow and deliberately enunciated: “Can you lead me there?”
He leaned in, looking very jolly as he said, “I could…”
“You will.”
“You sound like my grandmother.”
She grabbed his chin, forcing him to hold still until they were eye-to-eye. “Never say that again.”
He blinked a few times, then said, “I like you bossy.”
She let go of him as if burned.
“Pity,” he said, stroking his chin where she’d touched him. He pushed off the stone wall and stood straight, wobbling for only a second before finding his balance. “Shall we be off?”
Amelia nodded, intending to follow until he turned to her with a weak smile and said, “I don’t suppose you’d take my arm?”
“Oh, for heaven’s sake,” she muttered. She slipped her arm in his, and together they walked off the high street and onto a side alley. He was setting the direction, but she was providing the balance, and their progress was slow. More than once he nearly stumbled, and she could see that he was watching his steps closely, every now and then taking a deliberate pause before trying to navigate the cobbles. Finally, after crossing two streets and turning another corner, they reached a middling-sized, mostly empty, square.