Page 20 of Not a Chance in Hell (The Chances #6)

April 25, 1840

T here were hundreds of them.

“You put that back right now, I haven’t finished with it.”

“You’re never going to hit the post. I don’t want to wait for—”

“Ouch! You did that on purpose!”

“You got in the way! What was I supposed to do?”

Arthur had never been on a battlefield. He knew that was a fairly fortunate thing—he had a great deal of things to feel fortunate about, and not ever having to brandish a weapon in true anger was one of them.

Still. Even without having to fight for queen and country, he had a relatively good idea of what the viciousness of battle looked like.

And this? This did not compare.

A woman younger than Lilianna wrenched the croquet mallet from the man’s grip and brandished it like a sword. “I told you what would happen if you touched my balls, Michael!”

“Erm,” said Arthur helplessly, gesturing in their direction.

“You were taking too long, you arrogant monster!”

“Erm, Lilianna?” he said again.

The sunshine was pouring down on the vibrant lawn, though if he were any judge, there would soon be some sort of massacre upon the green. The numerous Chances whose names all intermingled with one another’s were crowding now, some taking the young woman’s side and some taking the young man’s.

And it was getting heated.

“—boil your own head in—”

“Lilianna?” Arthur attempted again.

“I beg your pardon?” said Lilianna breezily, turning away from an older couple who must have been an aunt and uncle, and smiling. “Ah, I see Gwen and Michael are at it again.”

“—come any closer and I’ll—”

“They look like they could really hurt each other,” said Arthur, a little unsure.

True, he did not come from a large family, but he was quite certain that sisters were not supposed to gesticulate like that.

“They might do, I suppose,” said Lilianna without a hint of concern. “Those are two of my cousins. They’ve been fighting like that for—oh, what would you reckon, Uncle Frederick?”

“Since birth?” the older man said in a quiet voice, a wry smile across his high forehead. “It alarmed us at first, but to be honest, we’ve just got used to it. They never actually hurt each other.”

“Well…” said the woman beside him who had to be his wife. She was long-limbed and possessed an elegant beauty—even with the fine lines on her face and the silver in her hair—as if she had been carved from marble into an ancient Greek statue.

“Only the once,” Lilianna said hastily. “What’s a broken wrist between family?”

Arthur tried to smile. “Ah. Right. Yes.”

There were very few situations in which he found himself that he felt completely overwhelmed, but as it turned out, meeting one’s future wife’s entire family in a rambunctious house that sprawled over many floors and appeared to hold more family members than he knew what to do with was one of them.

Dear God, there was so much to take in. Over there, a pair of aunts, he was almost certain, nattering away on a picnic rug that had been spread under a wide oak tree. There were two gentlemen on horseback riding about the place, one of which was a brother of Lilianna’s but Arthur could not see from here which one. There were a trio of cousins laughing about in a secretive circle, evidently discussing something hilarious, and one who was sketching alone in a notepad, brushing off any attempt one made at conversation. Two more cousins— dear God, how many cousins did she have?— appeared younger, him reading a book, her embroidering something that looked strangely like a mallet cover.

And there was the noise of the croquet lawn.

“Look, let’s just start over again,” said the broad-shouldered gentleman whose mallet appeared to be the offending one in the circle of Chances. “Then we can—”

The derisive laughter from his elegantly attired sister made Arthur wince. “You would suggest that, just as you were losing!”

“You aren’t going to… I don’t know,” said Arthur helplessly to Lilianna. “Intervene?”

She raised an imperious elbow. “What, and lose an eye?”

“Careful, there!”

It was fascinating, Arthur had to admit. He’d met the Aylesbury branch of the Chance family before and considered them all rather sedate and calm, other than Frank. Nothing wrong with that, of course. But still. Calm. Quiet.

It was only now that he had been introduced to the whole plethora of Chances that he realized why. Clearly, it took a great deal of calm to remain in a family like this.

Chaos. It was chaos!

“How—how many cousins do you have again?” Arthur asked quietly as her aunt and uncle disappeared back into the house, the heat of the sun apparently too great for them.

Lilianna’s eyes twinkled. “Twelve, at the last count. Why?”

“Twelve,” he repeated faintly.

How she managed to keep track of them all, he did not know. It would take keeping an intricate list of parents, dates of birth, and personality traits for anyone to keep sane and maintain an understanding of them all.

At the very least.

“I don’t know what you’re worried about,” Lilianna was saying. “They all like you.”

“Ah,” said Arthur, his shoulders relaxing.

“Most of them,” she said lightly before stepping away, her light-green gown flowing behind her.

He blinked. “‘Most of them’?”

She was laughing by the time he’d caught up with her, and Arthur nudged her gently with his shoulder. “Now, was that nice?”

“No, but it was hilarious—the look on your face!” Lilianna grinned.

Their mingled laughter joined with the shouting of the croquet lawn and the remonstrances from the two aunts who clearly did not see the point in getting up to adjudicate the onslaught, preferring to stay on the ground in the shade and yell from their comfortable seats.

Arthur couldn’t blame them. He’d never met a family for such… such noise, and excitement, and at the end of the day, they would all be pleasant to one another and pass the port.

It was unheard of.

The last four and twenty hours had been a whirlwind, and not one he could have imagined.

“Look, Lilianna,” Arthur said quietly as they rounded the croquet lawn and reached the graveled terrace on the south side of the impressive house that was Stanphrey Lacey, the seat of the Duke of Cothrom, Lilianna’s oldest uncle. Except that the man was now the “dowager duke,” they seemed to call him. He had gone against all expectations and made his son, his heir, the next duke, before his own demise. The other brothers had taken notice, from what he’d gleaned at dinner last night, and were considering doing the same. Apparently. He’d got that right, hadn’t he? The Chances were certainly like no family he had known. “When I said I would visit your family, I did not expect… this.”

“May I borrow her?”

Arthur blinked. Another cousin, one whose name he had already forgotten, had appeared as if out of nowhere.

“I said , may I borrow her?” The dark-haired woman raised an eyebrow as he spoke. “Is he always this slow?”

“Often,” Lilianna said with a giggle.

Instinctively, Arthur pulled his future wife to his side, clasping his arm around her shoulder as though she were going to be forcibly removed from his presence.

Only then did he feel ridiculous.

What did he think was going to happen? They were here with her family. There was no possibility anyone would harm her.

Still. The idea of Lilianna leaving him to talk to someone else, even for five minutes, was not one he could countenance with joy. It had been only a week, after all, since they had come to this fresh understanding, and to lose any time with her felt like a bereavement.

Now that he had her, Arthur never wanted to let her go.

“No,” he said stiffly. “No, you may not.”

The cousin’s eyes widened. “Why not?”

“Because we are heading inside to have an important conversation with my parents,” Lilianna said smoothly.

Arthur’s head jerked round. They were?

“Of course you may borrow me after that,” Lilianna was saying. “But you know how it is with Papa.”

The cousin rolled her eyes. “My father is exactly the same. He is most tiring. Adorable, obviously, but tiring. Good luck!” She scampered off, skirts flying as she threw herself into the melee on the croquet lawn. “I thought Gwen was winning. Why have we started again?”

A chorus of groans and shouts echoed up from behind them. Arthur turned his head to watch but was forced to straighten up as Lilianna pulled him through the open French windows and into the resplendent drawing room.

“Your parents,” he said resignedly. “Right.”

Arthur’s hopes sank. It wasn’t that he did not like the Marquess and Marchioness of Aylesbury. Given the circumstances that they found him in just a week prior, kissing their daughter fiercely in full view of the whole world, it was a miracle that they had shared a civil word with him.

An important conversation. It sounded ominous.

“So,” he said bracingly as Lilianna led him into the hall and along one of the maze-like corridors that typified the place. “Your parents. Precisely what is it that we needed to discuss?”

Their wedding. Their marriage. His past conduct. The way he had hurt the woman he so loved…

Lilianna pushed open a door and did not answer. “In.”

Arthur threw back his shoulders, ignoring his future wife’s giggle. “Right.”

He stepped into the room.

It was empty. At least, it was empty of people. It appeared to be a music room, a chaise lounge placed near a large pianoforte with a harp in one corner by a large bay window and a trio of violins carefully placed on a rack mounted on the wall. There were several bookshelves packed with what appeared to be sheet music, and a small set of comfortable-looking sofas and armchairs where it looked like performances were given.

“A… A music room,” Arthur said aloud.

“Precisely,” Lilianna said, closing the door behind her with a snap.

“And your parents are?”

“Far from here, I would hope,” she said darkly. “My mother has been nothing but trouble since we announced the engagement. Did you know there is apparently a wrong way to announce an engagement?”

“Erm—”

“And a wrong way to select bridesmaids, too, which is of course the way I wanted to do it,” Lilianna said with a roll of her eyes. She strode across the room and stood beside a sofa. “Aren’t you coming?”

Arthur hardly knew whether he was coming or going with this family. Did they ever do anything by halves?

“What do we need to discuss?” he asked urgently, dropping his voice in case they swiftly entered the room. “With your parents. What will we be discussing?”

Lilianna grinned as she dropped onto the sofa behind her. “Nothing.”

Arthur blinked. “‘Nothing’?”

It was rather like being forced to learn a new language, staying at Stanphrey Lacey. It had sounded like such a pleasant idea: a country retreat, the opportunity to escape the busyness and gossip of Bath and London, and yes, spend some time with Lilianna’s family.

Her family . He had presumed, evidently wrongly, that she had meant her parents and siblings. If Arthur had known that every Chance who had any possible connection to them would also be in residence at Stanphrey Lacey, he may have brought his cousin along, even if so eminently about to become a mother. For his own protection.

“I don’t understand,” Arthur said slowly, lowering himself to sit beside Lilianna on the sofa. “I thought you said…”

“You dolt,” Lilianna said, not for the first time, and as far as he could make out, not for the last, either. “I just wanted time alone with you! My family are… well-meaning—”

“Yes,” Arthur agreed hastily.

“—and inquisitive—”

“Most definitely,” he said, perhaps more heartily than he should have done. The youngest Chance cousins were only eighteen, and he’d been forced to answer a great deal of questions about himself that only the na?ve could get away with.

“—and imposing,” Lilianna finished with a laugh. “I want you to myself, just for ten minutes.”

Arthur reached out an arm and she slid swiftly against his body, tucking her head on his shoulder. “Just ten minutes?”

“You never know with my father. He can sniff out two people attempting to hide like—well. That is not a story the family likes repeating,” Lilianna said, her voice thrumming against his. “And I need you, Arthur. You. Just ten minutes with you will set me up for the week.”

Pride rushed through Arthur as his hand pulled tightly around her, tugging her closer to him.

Just ten minutes.

It would not be long before they would have all the ten minutes. When they would be married, and no one would be able to get in the way of—though from what Arthur had learned about Frank in the last few days, perhaps when left with just the marquess’s family, even she would find a way to intrude.

The minutes ticked by, a clock or metronome or something on the pianoforte whiling the minutes away. Arthur’s pulse slowed, the coziness of having the woman he loved pressed up against him, her feet tucked up on the sofa under her skirts, taking him into a state of relaxation he had not experienced in…

He couldn’t remember when.

Arthur pressed a kiss onto Lilianna’s forehead. “Have I told you that I love you today?”

“Not nearly enough,” came the breathy response as she chuckled against him. “But you can tell me now, if you wish.”

Tilting her head up, she met his eyes with hers, and a jolt of need throbbed through Arthur’s core. Trying not to be attracted to Lilianna was like attempting to tell the sun not to shine. You just didn’t do it.

“You know I’m going to kiss you,” Arthur muttered, “if you look at me like that.”

“Why do you think I’m looking at you like this?”

She tasted of sunshine and glory and passion and need, and Arthur could have wept. Having her in his arms was like nothing else he had ever experienced. God, he felt weak whenever they were together, weak for her. He could feel the pent-up need in Lilianna exploding out as she almost crawled into his lap, straddling him with layers of cotton and desire pooling around him.

Arthur tried not to place his hands on her buttocks, drawing her closer. He tried not to moan in the kiss, deepening it as he nibbled on her lower lip, knowing it would always elicit a whimper of lust. He tried not to think of the growing stiffness between his legs.

He failed at all three.

“We should probably stop,” Lilianna murmured, breaking the kiss only momentarily to murmur her terrible suggestion.

“I will if you will.” Arthur gasped, burying his head in her breasts and wondering how on earth they were going to stop themselves from ravishing one another again before the wedding.

It had been her idea. Something to heighten their need for each other, Lilianna had said.

As though their passion needed any heightening.

Eventually, though, Lilianna pulled away and slipped regretfully to the side back onto the sofa. “We can’t.”

“Oh, we can,” Arthur growled, reaching for her. Parents be damned, cousins be damned, servants be damned—

“We shouldn’t.”

He groaned. “That’s a different statement.”

“Both are true,” Lilianna pointed out, her hair mussed in that delicious way that always made Arthur want to pull all the pins out and see the mass of locks descend past her shoulders.

Arthur sighed, glancing down only momentarily to his thighs. Well, he knew what effect all that kissing would have on him. He’d just have to hope that it would calm down before he had to step outside this room.

“Do you ever… I mean, do you ever wonder?” Lilianna asked quietly, leaning an elbow on the back of the sofa.

Arthur raised an eyebrow. “Care to be more specific? I mean yes, have I wondered anything, ever? Of course I have.”

She brushed the back of her fingers across his cheek and Arthur stilled. Her presence was unlike anything he had ever experienced. Worshipful and almost constantly irritated. It made his stomach tighten and his pulse jump every time they touched.

“I meant,” Lilianna said softly, “do you ever think… that we may not have found each other?”

Dread curdled in him. Yes. Too often . In the dead of night, when he sometimes awoke having forgotten that all was mended and they would be married within days. They had procured the special license necessary, cost be damned, and soon…

“You mean, if you had not forgiven me?” Arthur asked quietly.

“If we had not forgiven each other.”

“If you hadn’t invited me to stay in your empty house, and seduced me?”

Lilianna smiled. “If you hadn’t continued proposing to me every five minutes.”

“If you hadn’t thrown yourself in my arms,” he countered. True, he had put himself in just the right position to catch her, but he couldn’t admit to doing all the chasing.

“Yes. That.”

Arthur swallowed. Yes , he wanted to say. Yes, it frightens me. Of all the ladies of the ton , of all Society I could have encountered—God, I’d gone out that night to find a wife and I had told myself that it did not matter who it was.

How stupid I was.

“We were meant to be,” he said aloud, curling his fingers around her waist, not to pull her closer, but just needing to touch her. “Meant to be.”

Lilianna chuckled softly. “Despite everything.”

“Perhaps because of everything,” Arthur said with a shrug. “My cousin seems certain that you are the only woman in Christendom who would have me, anyway, so I’m afraid you’re stuck with me.”

Another laugh. “I like your cousin.”

“Yes, she’s passable, I suppose,” he mused, joy fluttering in him. “I like yours. I like your brothers, too, and your sister. I like your family, all of them, despite the rabble and chaos.”

“They are not —”

A scream interrupted their conversation, echoing around the gardens and somehow filling the house.

“How could you break my mallet?”

“Now you won’t be able to cheat, you cheater!”

It was followed by a roaring chorus of defending one and attacking the other. Arthur’s eyes widened. “Is that it, then? Has war been declared?”

“It appears so,” Lilianna said dolefully. “I suppose I should go out there and help my aunts adjudicate.”

“Yes, I suppose so.”

Neither of them moved. Moving, Arthur knew, would mean leaving this little sanctuary they’d found. A moment of calm, of peace, before the next round of chaos.

“Your family is a rabble,” Arthur said softly as a scream echoed from the direction of the croquet lawn.

“Yes, they are, rather,” Lilianna agreed with a chuckle. “But don’t worry. I am in no hurry to add to the rabble.”

Arthur swallowed, his mouth suddenly dry.

Well, it was natural to think about, wasn’t it? And his cousin was due to have her baby apparently at any moment, which was a new level of fear Arthur had not thought it possible for him to possess.

And so the mind wandered. Wandered to the potential child that could enter his life from a different quarter. A part of him, and a part of Lilianna. A child, their affection in physical form.

“You told me you wanted heirs,” she said quietly.

“I do,” he said. “But I can wait—forever if need be. If that’s not something you want, you needn’t worry. My cousin can have the next earl. I’ll have you.”

“I do want them,” she whispered. “Children. Someday. With you.”

“God, I love you,” Arthur said suddenly.

Lilianna raised an eyebrow. “Where did that come from?”

“What, a man can’t say he loves his betrothed?”

“Not without cause, not like that,” she said with a laugh. “What was that all about?”

Arthur could have attempted to put it into words. He could have said how he could hardly believe he had his very own Chance, a member of a family that was wild, yes, but had welcomed him with open arms. How he was dazzled by her every moment he was with her. How she made him want to be a better man, a better person. How his life would never be the same now that she was in it, and he was so happy, so painfully happy.

“Thank you,” he said instead. The other words could wait. He had a whole lifetime to say them. “Thank you, for loving me.”

Something shivered across Lilianna’s face and she leaned forward, kissing him briefly on the lips before settling back.

“Of course,” she said simply. “I don’t think I could stop loving you now, even if I tried.”

“Don’t,” Arthur said hastily.

Lilianna giggled. “I’ll bear that in mind.”