Page 47 of Unforeseen Affairs (The Sedleys #6)

Charlotte craved an escape—something that had become nigh impossible since her irritating injury.

Really, she craved the company of one person in particular, but solitude would suffice for the moment if she could get it.

But perhaps… well, someone had fetched Harmonia from the railway station, someone her father did not care to mention in front of her…

Walter, the frazzled black and white spaniel, ambled forth, his milky eyes searching the sitting room for the most obliging lap. He moved in Charlotte’s direction, then paused to sniff out something interesting on the intricately woven rug just before her.

“Walter! No, no, no! You naughty beast!” Cousin Bess scolded. “Outside, outside!” She paused, then looked toward Susanna and Charlotte. “Oh, that does remind me, I forgot to mention—the new photographs arrived. They’re quite satisfactory this time, I think. I’ll have someone fetch them—”

Walter began to circle.

An escape route suddenly made itself clear.

“No! Naughty, naughty! Oh, Susanna, be a dear and pull the bell cord—”

“No need!” Charlotte stood up, carefully holding her freshly bandaged arm so as not to gasp in pain and prompt any overwrought sympathy or concern. “I shall take him outside.”

“But—” her father objected.

“It’s nothing, really.” Charlotte tried to think of how Colin might respond to seeing her unexpectedly. She smiled, hoping it did not look as awkward as it felt. “I find myself… desirous of fresh air.”

The others—save Dr. Collier, who was fiddling with the clasps on his bag—stared at her as though she’d just sung them a song.

Still forcing a smile, Charlotte nodded in confirmation, then bent down to scoop Walter up with her uninjured arm before he desecrated the fine carpet. As she made to depart before anyone could stop her, she heard her father make one more attempt.

“Now, I say—”

“Ajax,” cut in Susanna, a hint of warning in her tone, “they’re going to be married. What, then, is the problem?”

Charlotte smiled to herself, this time without a hint of falseness. They were going to be married.

And she couldn’t be happier for it.

“So the holes, then, are they tunnels?”

Colin crossed his arms in thought, staring at the once-lovely lawn before him, which was now dotted in several places with shallow pits.

A pack of ragged, muddy children—some far muddier than others—roved about, armed with trowels and hand rakes, all of them barefoot.

A mess of boots and stockings was piled haphazardly not far from where they stood now; no sooner had the Sedleys’ nanny excused herself to direct the Rickards’ nanny to the house than all the children had raced to shed their footwear.

Colin supposed he ought to have said something, but it was too late now. Instead, he had begun bracing himself for a well-deserved dressing-down.

“No!” shouted a young boy of about five, filthy up to his elbows. “They’re not tunnels! They’re barrows!”

“Barrows?”

“Aye,” the boy said solemnly, before setting back to his digging.

“What Lucius ought to have said is ‘Yes, sir.’ We’re digging for a hoard,” said a punctilious, slightly older girl with long dark hair and sharp dark eyes that reminded him so much of Charlotte.

She was the least muddy, though Colin supposed her mother would be cross to see the condition of the hem of her dress.

“Thalia!” called Georgiana. She was the only child whose name Colin already knew, as he had just escorted her and her parents from the railway station. “I think this is a better place to start.”

The dark-haired girl, Thalia, wrinkled her nose before bouncing off after her cousin.

Colin looked down to watch two smaller lads with a matching shade of ashy blonde hair—Mr. and Mrs. Hartley’s sons. They seemed content to sit in one nearby pit, slapping their hands against the bottom and cackling with delight as they sent showers of mud into the air.

Colin stepped backward to ensure he was out of range.

He’d only agreed to Mr. Hartley’s request to accompany his groom to Blackburn in the hope that he might catch a glimpse of Charlotte.

Her family had kept her locked away for days, and while he knew it was right and proper, he loathed being apart from her.

Getting away from the manor did have another bright side, though.

Baron Methering had been trying to cajole Colin into joining his daily hoplitodromos run, a punishing trek about the grounds of the manor in full armor.

Just like the Greeks, lad , the baron would puff as he hoofed past with an ancient, crumbling buckler on his left arm and a dented armet upon his head.

Pinnacle of human form, the Greeks . Colin felt he could politely decline the sporting-mad baron only so many times, so he was happy for the ready-made excuse on this occasion.

He wasn’t accustomed to this kind of life, as a country grandee who whiled away his days upon a sprawling estate.

But he would endure anything if it meant that he and Charlotte could soon begin their next adventure together.

Not upon the waves; he’d privately decided that time had passed.

But life was still wide open before him, rich with possibilities, which tempered the loss of the sail.

Colin raised a hand to his head and gently prodded at his temple, worrying about what sensation he might uncover there.

His head had felt woozy at moments throughout the day, but he prayed it would not be too much of a bother.

Steady on , he assured himself, watching as the two girls began loudly debating who got to use the large shovel, the one whose handle was nearly equal to them in height.

Soon they’d be his cousins, he realized with a smile.

Suddenly a high-pitched yip cut across the landscape from behind him.

The two mud-spattered Hartley boys began yelling at the top of their lungs.

The third boy, Lucius, set aside his trowel and climbed out of his ditch.

The girls, Thalia and Georgiana, halted their bickering and spun about, then charged in Colin’s direction with alarming speed, squealing all the while.

Colin turned around to see what the children were running toward, and a profound happiness spread throughout him at the sight.

Charlotte was walking across the lawn, with a small, scraggly dog laboriously leading the way in front of her.

She looked as remote and otherworldly as she had the first time he’d ever set eyes on her, standing at the threshold of the library in his family’s London house.

Her iridescent gown recalled the early morning sky, when the first hint of sun began to temper the black of night.

Even with her broken wrist dressed and held in front of her in a sling, she somehow appeared wiser than a mere human, with a prescience he still didn’t quite understand.

What he did understand, though, with unquestioned clarity, was that he loved her. And that he could not live without her. Colin had been led away from what he had once thought his life was meant to be, and he did not regret it one bit.

The children reached Charlotte and swarmed about her, shouting out the items they had dug up so far (a rusty button, an old jar, a strangely shaped rock) as well as the ancient treasure they still hoped to uncover (gold coins, swords, more gold coins).

The dog, furious at being ignored, leaped repeatedly among them, alternately barking and snapping until Georgiana finally bent down to pick the beast up with an imperious shush .

Charlotte kept her expression neutral while listening intently to the overstimulated children. Her calm demeanor, though, did not transfer to the pack of Sedley offspring, and instead roused them to shout louder and more insistently. Finally Charlotte nodded and replied simply, “Well done.”

At that, the children dispersed and returned to their work, chattering excitedly about what other treasures they might find for Cousin Charlotte.

His heart full, Colin waited and watched as she continued her approach toward him.

“Those two are my brother and sister,” she said by way of greeting, nodding first toward the five-ish looking fellow called Lucius, then to the sharp, meticulous girl with familiar eyes, Thalia.

“I see,” Colin answered, wondering how he might maneuver her behind a tree, or somewhere else out of view, and steal a kiss…

“And there will soon be a third,” Charlotte mused, watching the children scramble about as they dodged clods of mud thrown by the two younger boys. “So it goes.”

“So it does,” Colin agreed.

“The dog is Walter. He ought to have died by now. Quite some time ago, I’d say.”

Colin almost laughed, but something in her voice gave him pause. He turned to look at her.

She wasn’t just watching the children, he realized, but also something far in the distance, upon the horizon.

He followed her eyes, but found nothing aside from the warm, inviting Lancashire fells.

“The two younger ones, they’re my cousin Marcus’s. Edmund and Lewis.” She didn’t move to look at the mud-spattered pair, but their babyish laughter trilled pleasantly nearby. “They’re named after their forebears.”

She fell silent, and Colin let it stretch out. A gentle breeze rustled the leaves overhead. Walter barked as the girls giggled and picked up a nursery tune.

Colin reached for Charlotte’s hand. She allowed him to take it, and he laced his fingers through hers. They stood like that for a while, watching the sky, not speaking.

“It feels strange sometimes, doesn’t it?” she finally said in a low voice.

“What does, darling?”

“Just being alive.”

He instantly knew what she meant, of whom she spoke.

“Any one of us could be gone in the next breath.” She shut her eyes. A tear ran down her cheek.

“That’s true,” Colin replied, tightening his grip on her hand.

She squeezed his in return.

“But,” he began cautiously, “that is what makes it so precious.”

She turned and looked at him, her eyes glinting with more tears. Colin had once been somewhat annoyed by her height, that she needed only look straight ahead to meet his gaze.

Now, though, it seemed perfect.

With a gentle hand, he cupped her cheek and brushed away the stray tear.

“I saw her, and I thought… but it was so fleeting.” Her words were cut off by a sob, and another tear spilled forth. “If only… if only I could…” She swallowed miserably, then shook her head. “What are we to do, then?”

“There’s nothing to do but live.”

He half-expected her to scoff, then settle back into her usual aloofness.

But she didn’t. She watched him, her eyes filled with all the hope that Colin felt in himself.

“But what shall we do about your head?”

Colin laughed softly.

“I don’t know.” He placed his other hand gently upon her injured arm and caressed her. “But we shall figure it out together.”

She kept her eyes on his; he could feel her searching for any shred of hesitation or uncertainty. But he knew she would find none.

Colin waited a moment, then gathered Charlotte in his arms and kissed her.

A chorus of youthful shouts rang out.

Colin didn’t let go.