“Yes, now you see how it is, Gracie. Charlie, wheel Dashlend to the drawing room. The rest of you but for Grace, out you go. Take yourselves to the dining room and we’ll send in a tea tray and set up a sideboard. Out, out, out—you too, Lady Margaret, out with you.”
Lady Margaret did look affronted at being ordered out, but Lord Harraby said some soothing words in her ear that seemed to mollify her. Lady Marchfield sniffed as she passed by her brother. Lady Grace’s sisters filed out, all looking at Miles suspiciously. Lady Valor whispered to their three-legged dog and he growled at Miles, while wagging his tail at the same time.
Charlie got behind him and wheeled him into the drawing room. Lady Grace had sunk into a sofa and Miles motioned to be taken closer to her.
Then he craned his neck and said to the footman, “Close the doors on your way out.”
Chapter Twenty-One
GRACE HAD SUNKonto a sofa as everyone in the drawing room but for herself and Lord Dashlend had been ordered out of it by the duke.
What had just happened? Was it true? Lord Montclave had sent the daisies and roses?
If that were true, then perhaps Lord Dashlend was not set on Lady Lavender after all.
The thought made her feel swoony. She gripped the side of the sofa. She might feel swoony, but she would not swoon. Not until she understood the case of things.
Charlie wheeled the lord to her side and then jogged to the doors and closed them behind him.
“Lord Dashlend,” she said, determined to go straight to her apology, “I deeply, deeply apologize for pulling you from the side of a house and causing… your current condition. I was dizzy, you see, which I’m afraid is a regular occurrence.”
“It is nothing, I assure you,” Lord Dashlend said.
“Nothing? You have broken your ribs, sprained your ankle, and are in a wheeled chair!”
“Yes, well, all of that will heal in not too long a time.”
Grace twisted her hands together. It would almost be better if he just said what he really felt about it, instead of being so gentlemanly. “I am sure you are angry over it and it is very good of you to pretend you are not but I do not deserve the courtesy. I set that fire myself, because I am clumsy, particularly when I am startled.”
“How did you manage to lock yourself in, though?” Lord Dashlend asked. “That was quite the trick.”
“Oh, I did not. Someone opened the door and startled me, then they closed it again and I could not get out.”
Lord Dashlend had a pensive look and she wondered if he believed her.
“Never mind that mystery for the moment,” he said. “Lady Grace, there is no other lady I would rather fall off the side of a building with and it was my honor to break your fall. From the first moment I saw you on the beach I have been drawn to you, and every day that has passed only increases my surety that you are the lady for me. I find myself entirely besotted. Assuming you’d have me. To wed.”
Grace was certain she had turned the color of an aubergine, but who cared for that?
“Haveyou?” she cried. “Of course I’ll have you. When I thought you were all in for Lady Lavender, well, I wanted to tear her hair. Or yours. Or my own.”
“Do not tear a single hair from your head,” Lord Dashlend said, hoisting himself from his chair and hopping over to her.
He landed on the sofa with a thud. Grace thought this was the moment. He would kiss her. She stared at him. Then she decided to hurry him up and she kissed him.
That seemed to break apart any constraint that was between them.
Hair pins flying, arms and legs entwined, clothes wrinkled beyond repair, they came together as if they had been always built to be so. There was the occasional wince on account of his broken ribs, but he would not be put off. Grace had not the least inclination to put him off and just reminded herself not to clutch at him too hard.
Before the season, the idea of a gentleman she would wed was a foggy one, all blurry outlines and a faceless head. But now, here he was, exactly how he was meant to be.
“I would have married you even if you were paralyzed,” Grace said softly.
Dashlend said, “Thankfully, it’s not come to that,” as he kissed her neck.
“Oh dear, I wrote Lady Lavender a letter regarding your condition. I thought I would be forced to tell you the terrible truth that she would not come to your side.”
Dashlend laughed into her hair. “She must have been startled to receive such a message, as I have not expressed the least interest in her, nor she me. Now, let us not speak of Lady Lavender more.”
