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“God will forgive me for breaking my vow,” he said, his lips tracing the very edge of her bodice. “He can see into my heart and knows that I love you with every bit of my soul. That’s the most important vow.”

“I love you the same,” she said, and then his lips did slip below her bodice—but only for a moment or two.

Mr. Holland, vicar of St. Mary’s, was a man of considerable self-control, and considerable patience.

The portly Bishop of Rochester viewed the young couple before him with keen interest. “I only have the slimmest acquaintance with your father,” he said to Miss McKenna. “I knew him at Cambridge, oh, many years ago, that was. He was quite the rapscallion, your father!”

That seemed to surprise Miss McKenna.

“Indeed,” Bishop Lynsey assured her, with a belly laugh that made his vestments shake as if a tempest had struck the environs of Rochester Cathedral. “They do say that rascals make the best churchmen, you know! Well, mum’s the word on that. He’s an excellent man, your father, an excellent man. And you couldn’t do better than marry Mr. Holland, my dear. I can see your father’s influence in your choice. I’m only sorry that your family can’t be with you. But I do understand the urgency of young love, even such an oldster as I.”

He gave the bridegroom’s elder brother a sapient look. It would be nice if that ne’er-do-well, Lord Godwin, were moved by the words of the marriage ceremony into conducting his own affairs with more propriety. It was surprising to see the earl and countess standing beside each other; Lynsey had heard gossip that suggested the two hadn’t even spoken for years. But here they were, looking as married as can be. Well, the ways of God are mysterious indeed.

Still, he beckoned the married couple closer. It would do them good to hear the words of the ceremony since, if he remembered correctly, they had trotted off to Gretna Green in a harum-scarum fashion and married over the anvil. Likely two or three words in the whole ritual, if one could even call it that.

“Dearly beloved,” he began with a fine flourish in his voice, “we are gathered together here in the sight of God, and in the face of this congregation”—he smiled encouragingly at Earl Godwin and his wife—“to join together this Man and this Woman in holy matrimony, which is an honorable estate…”

“You’re awfully quiet.”

“That was a very sweet ceremony, didn’t you think?”

“Mmmm.”

“I believe I shall retire to my chamber.”

His hands stopped. “Weren’t we going to work on the étude before bed?”

“Rees!”—rather exasperated—“I’m exhausted. We can think of this in the morning.” And then, “What are you doing?”

“Taking you upstairs,” he said. “I’m going to carry you over the threshold.”

“What?”

“I never carried you across the threshold of the house ten years ago, Helene, so the bedchamber door will have to do. I have a mind to pretend that I’m going to walk into an inn bedroom and find you there.”

She had her arms around his neck, and he was climbing the stairs. “Are you going to laugh at my bosom then?”

He stopped. “What?”

So, in the way of wives, Helene reminded the earl that on seeing his wife’s breasts for the very first time, he had suggested that she might have shrunk in the rain.

Repentance is an emotion that can be expressed in many different ways. Rees was not eloquent. He wasn’t good at tossing off debonair little phrases or comparing his wife to roses or jewels.

So he did the very best he could. He took his wife into his bedchamber, pulled her gown over her head, revealing a pair of breasts whose pale pink perfection instantly fired his loins, and then fell backwards, flat on the floor.

“What’s the matter with you?” the countess asked with some curiosity, walking over to peer down at him.

“I’ve fainted from the beauty of your breasts,” he said, grinning up at her lasciviously.

And then, as she giggled, large hands circled her ankles and crept up her legs. “I’ll make up for my stupidity, Helene,” he said, kissing his way up a slender thigh. “I’ll make it my daily chore to praise your breasts. Even before I touch the piano.”

As one musician to another, Helene could tell when she’d received the greatest compliment of her life, although nary a rose nor a jewel was mentioned.

Thirty-nine

The Plot Unveiled

Lady Felicia Saville gave one, and only one, ball each year. The night before the event she often couldn’t sleep. There was so much to worry about: would Gunter’s deliver half-melted ices, would the champagne punch be sufficient, would her husband appear reasonably sane or utterly cracked? The last question was the most pressing. The year after they married he informed a large and amused audience that he was actually the child of a black-tipped ewe, and then there was the occasion when he insisted that his horse was a blood relative. Over the years, she had realized that his particular form of mania was less disagreeable than it could have been, but it did require forethought to make certain that he did not regale the ballroom with tales to rival those of Aesop.