“Am I allowed a say?” Mrs. Westcott asked. “I can see it was downright foolish of me to dream immediately of a grand ton wedding at St. George’s on Hanover Square. Poor Wren. We might as well cast you into the lions’ den and be done with it. And Lizzie is quite right. Alex would hate the fuss too.”
“I would,” he said. “I am sorry, Mama. You would love to plan a grand wedding, I know.”
“There is always Lizzie,” she said. She was frowning, apparently in thought. “I suppose over time you will inevitably meet our family, Wren, as you did us on Easter Sunday and Jessica yesterday. There are the Westcotts on the one side and the Radleys on the other. Almost everyone is here in town this spring. Would you be prepared to meet everyone at once—on your wedding day? It would still be a small wedding, just not quite as small as you intend. Or there is another possibility. You could have your private wedding and meet the family here afterward for a wedding breakfast. What do you think?”
What Wren thought as she felt pins and needles in her hands and flexed her fingers was that her life could easily spiral out of control if she was not very careful.
“Mama,” the earl said, “I have assured Miss Heyden that I will never pressure her to meet anyone she does not choose to meet or do anything she does not choose to do. She is afraid that marrying me will force her into an unwanted social role as Countess of Riverdale. I have assured her that I will have no such expectations.”
But Mrs. Westcott was right. It was absurd to think of marrying the Earl of Riverdale and never meeting any of his family apart from his mother and sister and one cousin. Wren closed her eyes briefly.
“The letter you wrote last evening has already been sent to Hinsford Manor, I suppose?” she said to Mrs. Westcott in an apparent non sequitur that had them all looking rather blankly at her.
“Yes,” Mrs. Westcott said. “It went out at noon.”
“Will you write again?” Wren asked. “You told me you doubted they would come without some specific family event with which to entice them. Will a wedding suffice? Will you invite them to come for our wedding—next week instead of the day after tomorrow? A family wedding, which will not be threatening to them but for which their presence will be much appreciated by the whole family—and by the bride? Yes, I will meet the two sides of the family on my wedding day. And after that, I may well shut myself away at Brambledean and never meet anyone else for the rest of my life.”
Elizabeth, she was aware, had tears in her eyes and looked as though she were biting her upper lip. Mrs. Westcott was still frowning. The earl was gazing very intently at Wren.
“It may just work,” Mrs. Westcott said. “We can but try. Wren, my dear, I am going to love you to pieces. Be warned.”
“Wren,” Elizabeth said, “will you write to Cousin Viola and Abigail too and send the letter with Mama’s?”
“I will,” Wren said. But what had she started? It was too late to unstart it, however. At the very least she had committed herself to a family wedding one week hence. She had never felt more terrified in her life.
The butler appeared in the doorway at that moment to announce that dinner was served.
The Earl of Riverdale offered Wren his hand, his eyes intent upon hers. “Thank you,” he said softly. “Do not think I am unaware of the magnitude of what you have agreed to and what you have suggested. I honor you. I only hope I can be worthy of you.”
And here she went, tearing up again. This was becoming a nasty habit. She set her hand in his. “But I may well flee before our wedding day,” she said just as softly.
“Please don’t.” He chuckled.
And so the chance of getting married quietly within two days of the Earl of Riverdale’s proposal, almost before she had time to think about it in order to have second and twenty-second thoughts, had disappeared, entirely through her own fault. She was going to have to wait a whole week. Worse, she had agreed that the Westcott and Radley families would be invited to both the wedding and the breakfast afterward at Westcott House. She had even agreed to St. George’s on Hanover Square as the venue, the church attended by the fashionable world during the spring, though the congregation would be small. There was no point, after all, in seeking out an obscure little church on some equally obscure back street, as the Duke and Duchess of Netherby had done last year, since there was to be nothing secret about their wedding.
Their betrothal was announced in the morning papers two days after their walk in Hyde Park—Miss Wren Heyden to Alexander Louis Westcott, Earl of Riverdale. On the society pages, no less, where the whole fashionable world would see it and half that world, no doubt, would mourn the loss of the earl from the ranks of eligible bachelors.
The afternoon brought a steady stream of visitors, all of whom Mrs. Westcott and Elizabeth entertained in the drawing room while Wren cowered in her room, writing to Philip Croft to tell him how gratifying it had been to see for herself the displays of their glassware in fashionable London shops. Elizabeth tapped on her door, however, just when she thought everyone must have left.
“Cousin Louise and Jessica and Anna are still here,” she said. “They know how reclusive you are and will understand if you do not come down, but Jessica begged me to come and ask you anyway. It is entirely up to you, Wren.” Her smile held a hint of a twinkle. “I know that such a lead-in is usually followed with a but … In this case it is not, however.”
Wren sighed and set down her pen. “Do they know?” she asked. “Has Lady Jessica told them? Or you or your mother?”
“About your face?” Elizabeth asked, coming right into the room. “No. Why would we?”
Why indeed? Wren thought as she got to her feet. She was beginning to be a bore even to herself. So she had a very unsightly birthmark covering most of one side of her face. So what? Anyway, she was curious to meet the famous Anna—full name Anastasia—who had grown up in an orphanage only to end up a duchess with a fabulous fortune of her own. The famous Anna, who all unwittingly had caused havoc within the Westcott family.
“Lead the way,” she said with a huge sigh that only made Lizzie smile more.
Within minutes there were two more people to add to the growing list of those who had seen her without her veil. And though Wren suspected that Lady Jessica had indeed told them about her birthmark, neither her mother nor her sister-in-law paid any attention to it or—perhaps more significant—studiously avoided looking into her face. The Dowager Duchess of Netherby, Cousin Louise, was a handsome lady, somewhat on the stout side, probably in her early to mid-forties. The duchess—Anna—was slight of build and pretty and exuded a sort of smiling serenity that intrigued Wren when she considered all the woman had gone through in the last year and a half. They were polite and amiable and kind. Anna thanked her particularly for suggesting that the former countess and her daughter be invited to the wedding and for writing in person to add her persuasions to Mrs. Westcott’s.
“Perhaps they will come for such an occasion,” she said. “I live in hope. Abigail is my half sister, Miss Heyden, and I long to see her again almost as much as Jessica does. And Aunt Viola is as much a part of this family as anyone else and ought to be here for Alex’s wedding.” She paused then for a moment before saying, “I am so sorry you have no one of your own to be with you. You must be missing your aunt and uncle more than ever this week. However, this is a welcoming family. I know that from personal experience. We will all be your cousins. Lizzie has the advantage of us, of course. She will be your sister.”