Page 30 of The Broken Marchioness (Lords of Inconvenience #3)
EPILOGUE
A llan pulled himself up into the carriage as quickly as he could, wrapping his arm around Frederica and pulling her into his side. The coach set off at once, moving along the cobbled road as he consoled her.
“I’m so sorry. I knew it would be hard, but I didn’t even think they’d be as resistant as they were.” He filched inside his pocket and pulled out a handkerchief, hurrying to find something with which she could dry her tears.
When he presented it to her though, he abruptly realized she was not crying at all. She sat straight, raising her face out of her hands, laughing. She laughed all the more when she saw the handkerchief in his clutches.
“You think I am crying?”
“What was your first clue?” He pointed out with a smile of his own.
“How can I cry now? I can’t stop laughing!” The sound kept on coming. She even rested a hand on her stomach, trying to calm that sound, though it was seemingly impossible.
Baffled and in awe, Allan just watched her. He couldn’t remember when he had last seen Frederica laugh with this amount of gusto — maybe not ever. He smiled as he watched her, resting her head on the back of the coach bench as she kept on laughing.
“Care to bring me in on this jest, so I can laugh with you?” he asked.
“I just can’t believe this feeling. I know, I know it’s mad to react like this.” She shook her head at her own behavior. “Yet I cannot help it.”
She sat forward, turning to face him fully. “For so long, every time I have been in my parents’ company, I have felt this overwhelming agony. It has been… unbearable.” Her eyes were alight now. “I always feel this pit in my stomach, that I am disappointing them or am about to disappoint them.”
“That’s an awful way to spend your days.”
“That’s just it. It is.” She nodded fervently. “Then just now, that pit disappeared. Poof, it vanished. Suddenly, I wasn’t just looking at my parents, whom I have tried to please for so long. I was looking at two people. Two people who were desperate for advantage and good opinion, who didn’t want to see anything bad happening in front of them.”
She scrunched up her nose, deep in thought. “It’s quite pitiful really, isn’t it?”
“They are, yes.” He nodded happily with her. “So, you feel free?”
“I feel ridiculously free.” She sat forward, peering out of the window. “In fact, let’s do something mad.”
“Mad? Like what?” he asked.
“Like something my parents never would have approved of.”
Allan laughed and promptly suggested all sorts of mad things they could do, but all would require preparation. He even suggested they take a trip together, somewhere beyond London or Cornwall. She happily agreed to such a suggestion. Although they could not accomplish such a thing at that moment, and she still wished to do something now.
When the carriage pulled up at their house, Allan was still in a daze as he stared at her happy face. This was as he had wanted to see her for so long. Now, she was smiling so much, he couldn’t believe his luck.
“I know what we’ll do,” Frederica spoke with sudden determination and opened the door.
Allan raced to follow her, jumping down from the carriage. He quickly thanked the driver and the footman then moved to follow Frederica. Only, she didn’t go to the house. Instead, she went straight for the garden, making her way around the house.
He had to run to catch up with her, reaching her just as she stepped through the garden gate and into the rose garden.
“What are we doing?” he asked, coming to a stop beside her.
“Being free.” She reached for her hair and suddenly unbound all the tendrils that were fastened at the back of her head.
Allan couldn’t help but watch her. So far, he’d only seen her hair loose once before. Being already deeply attracted to her, the sight of unbound hair was teasing him madly.
Next, she reached down and slipped off her shoes.
“Anything else coming off?” he teased her, enjoying the way she smiled up at him.
“This is something of which my parents would never have approved. Walking through the garden in your bare feet? Your hair undone? Well, that would be unthinkable, wouldn’t it? So unladylike!”
He laughed at her exuberance as she next pulled off her stockings.
“You can keep taking off more things by the way,” he said, earning a tap around his arm and much laughter from her.
Once she had finished, she stuffed her hair pins and stockings into her shoes then walked through the rose garden. Allan shed his tailcoat and kicked off his boots too, rushing to join her.
“Now, where is your favorite spot in this garden?” she asked, looking around with her hands on her hips.
“That’s an easy one.” He took her hand. “It’s over here.” Entwining their fingers together, he led her across the garden. They walked past rose bushes where she frequently stopped and smelled some of the flowers that had the best scents before walking at his side again.
Overawed to have her beside him, he kept on looking at her as they made their way to his spot — the marble bench that overlooked the garden. They sat down together, leaning against one another as they peered at the garden.
It was a moment of peace. Birds chirping in the air, a butterfly dancing nearby, and the distant murmurs of the house and the staff that were preparing for dinner.
“What’s happening in there?” she asked.
“They’re making dinner. I’ve invited Stephen, Dorothy, Gerard, and Charlotte around. They’re bringing the children, of course.”
“Oh good.” She rested her head on his shoulder, smiling.
“This is how I’ve always wanted you to be, you know? This happy.” He brushed his fingers over her arm, soothingly. “I’m so glad you’ve found this happiness now.”
“As am I.” She lifted her chin into the air once more. “But we could add to this happiness.”
“How’s that?” he said softly.
“Maybe our friends aren’t the only ones who should have little children running around. Imagine a little version of Allan running through this garden?” Frederica suggested, waving her hand through the nearest rose bushes.
Allan wrapped his arm around his wife, feeling now that his smile would never disappear.
“Keep saying things like that, Freddie, and we won’t be sitting in this garden for long.”
She giggled and moved her head up towards him. As Allan pressed his lips to hers this time, it was not as chaste as their other kisses had been.
There, on that bench, secluded from the world around them, Allan realized that the night he had gone to that assembly hall, he had been gifted the greatest thing that could have ever happened to him. It might have taken a while for him to see it — traveling to the continent and returning before he had met Frederica again — but she had been worth the wait.
The End?