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“O blessed sunlight,” she sang. “How your warmth doth shine!”
And then Daisy stepped forth.
Richard turned sharply to Iris. Her mouth was hanging open. “No no no,” she finally whispered, but by then Daisy had launched into her violin solo, presumably a musical representation of sunshine.
Or death.
Daisy’s performance was cut blessedly short by Lady Pleinsworth, who rushed onto the stage when she realized her two youngest children were hopelessly stuck together. “Refreshments in the other room, everyone!” she trilled. “We have cake!”
Everyone stood and applauded—it was a play, after all, no matter how startling the finale—and began to file out of the drawing room.
“Perhaps I ought to help,” Iris said, casting a wary glance at her cousins.
Richard waited while she approached the melee, watching the proceedings with no small amusement.
“Just remove the pillow!” Lady Pleinsworth directed.
“It’s not that easy,” Elizabeth hissed. “Her horn goes right through my shirt. Unless you want me to disrobe—”
“That will be enough, Elizabeth,” Lady Pleinsworth said quickly. She turned to Harriet. “Why is it so sharp?”
“I’m a unicorn!” Frances said.
Lady Pleinsworth absorbed that for a moment, then shuddered.
“She wasn’t supposed to ride me in the third act,” Frances added petulantly.
“Is that why you gored her?”
“No, that was in the script,” Harriet said helpfully. “The horn was supposed to come off. For the purpose of safety. But, of course, the audience wasn’t supposed to see that.”
“Iris glued it to my brow,” Frances said, twisting her head in an attempt to look up.
Iris, who was standing at the edge of the small crowd, immediately took a step back. “Perhaps we should get something to drink,” she said to Richard.
“In a moment.” He was having far too much fun to leave.
Lady Pleinsworth grabbed the horn by both hands and pulled.
Frances screamed.
“Did she use cement?”
Iris’s hand wrapped around his arm like a terrified vise. “I really need to go now.”
Richard took one look at Lady Pleinsworth’s face and hurriedly guided Iris out of the room.
Iris sagged against the wall. “I’m going to be in so much trouble.”
Richard knew he should try to reassure her, but he was laughing too hard to be of any use.
“Poor Frances,” she moaned. “She’s going to have to sleep with that horn on her head tonight!”
“She will be fine,” Richard said, his laughter still peeking through his words. “I promise you, she will not walk down the aisle at her wedding with a horn on her head.”
Iris looked up at him in momentary alarm, and he could only imagine what was racing through her imagination. And then she burst out laughing. She laughed so hard she doubled over right there in the hall.
“Oh my goodness,” she gasped. “A horned wedding. It could only happen to us.”
Richard started to chuckle again, watching in amusement as Iris’s face turned red from her exertions.
“I shouldn’t laugh,” she said. “I really shouldn’t. But the wedding—Oh my heavens, the wedding.”
The wedding, Richard thought, and it all slammed back to the forefront of his mind. Why he was here tonight. Why he was with her.
Iris wasn’t going to have much of wedding. He needed to get back to Yorkshire too quickly for that.
Guilt pricked along his spine. Didn’t all ladies dream about their weddings? Fleur and Marie-Claire used to spend hours imagining theirs. For all he knew, they still did.
He took a breath. Iris wasn’t going to get her dream wedding, and if all went according to plan, she wasn’t even going to get a proper proposal.
She deserved better.
He swallowed, tapping his hand nervously against his thigh. Iris was still laughing, oblivious to his suddenly serious mien.
“Iris,” he said suddenly, and she turned toward him with surprise in her eyes. Maybe it was the tone of his voice, or maybe the fact that it was the first time he called her by her given name.
He put his hand at the small of her back and led her away from the still-open doorway to the drawing room. “Might I have a moment of your time?”
Her brows came together, and then they rose. “Of course,” she said, somewhat haltingly.
He took a breath. He could do this. It wasn’t what he’d planned, but it was a better way. This one thing, he thought, he could do for her.
He dropped down to one knee.
She gasped.
“Iris Smythe-Smith,” he said, taking her hand in his, “will you make me the happiest man alive and consent to be my wife?”
Chapter Seven
IRIS WAS STRUCK dumb. She opened her mouth, but apparently it wasn’t to say anything. The back of her throat tightened and closed, and she just stared down at him, thinking—
This can’t be happening.
“I imagine this is a surprise,” Richard said in a warm voice, stroking the back of her hand with his fingers. He was still on bended knee, gazing up at her as if she were the only woman in all creation.
“Ahdebadeba . . .” She couldn’t speak. She well and truly could not speak.
“Or perhaps it isn’t.”
No, it is. It really is.
“We have known each other but a week, but you must be aware of my devotion.”
She felt her head shaking, but she had no idea if that meant yes or no, and either way, she wasn’t sure which question she was answering.