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The moment she stepped out into the aisle, pride and love swelled in her breast. Lining it were her girls, all forty-seven of them, dressed to match the bride in a paler shade of mint and bearing baskets of pink rose petals. As she approached, they tossed handfuls of these before her.
Her cheeks tingled at the ostentation of it all. Tavistoke hadn’t been jesting when he’d announced that hers would be one of the grandest weddings London had ever seen. So lavish was it that a passerby might think members of the peerage were being joined here today.
The pews were mostly full of people she didn’t know, people her husband had helped in some way; however, there were a few familiar faces among them.
Will’s family, who’d accepted her with warm hearts and open arms. Doctor and Mrs. Whitehall. Everyone from Mrs. Hayton’s. Suzette and Coralline. Janet waved furtively from her spot at the end of Suzette’s pew.
Jacqueline looked with gratitude and affection on those who’d helped her in her direst hour of need: Loxdon, Thomas, Gerald, and, finally, Peg and Richards, who’d announced their engagement last week. Sir Gonson was also present, along with several of Will’s former colleagues to “see him put on the leg irons” as one had laughingly put it.
Her staff were all present. Even Sally, though she was still recovering from her wound. Her sister Marian beamed as Jacqueline passed.
In fact, everyone was smiling, including her husband-to-be.
Tears sprang into Jacqueline’s eyes at the sight of him. The last vestiges of her painful past melted away as she came up and they knelt before the altar to repeat the words of the sacred rite she’d not thought to ever utter. She smiled through her tears as he slipped a warm circle of gold onto her left hand and then pulled back her veil.
His blue eyes shone with love as he gave her a kiss that, though chaste, nonetheless stirred to life the embers of desire.
Unable to contain her joy, she smiled against her husband’s lips.
Some fairy tales do come true.
