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Lady Margaret had been furious. In anger, she’d settled for the next best suitor that came her way, Lord Wisham, and married him, all in a bid to show the world, and most especially Lady Matilda, that she was still capable of getting any gentleman she wanted.
The battle line was drawn but Lady Anna’s parents didn’t care. They weren’t at war with Lord Rockgonie’s mother who was now the Marchioness of Wisham by virtue of her marriage, even though she was at war with them.
Eventually, Lady Wisham would have the last laugh when her son would bring the daughter of her arch nemesis home with the proclamation that he wanted to marry her.
“Over my dead body,” Lady Wisham had screamed. “I would rather go to the grave than let you marry her.”
“And go to the grave she did. Still, she refused to let us get married,” Lady Anna finished the tale.
“Oh, my goodness.” Rose was only able to exclaim after the tale was done.
“So in spite of all that hate, how did your love for Lord Rockgonie originate?”
“Well, we’d always known about the bad blood between our families but for some reason, we’d never seemed to care about it like the rest of our siblings. We’d just simply stayed out of each other’s way. Then we’d gone on this trip to the countryside to attend a ball. Somehow I’d gotten lost in the woods and separated from the rest of the party.”
“The damsel in distress,” Rose interjected causing both of them to chuckle.
“Well, no one except Lord Rockgonie had noticed this damsel was missing. He’d thought I was going to come back, but when I didn’t, he’d gone out to search for me. He found me in a ditch, as I had slipped and fell, and he rushed in to get me.”
At this point, Rose’s hands came up to her chest in admiration. Even though her eyes were tearing up, she contained her tears and continued to listen.
“He carried me all the way back because I’d sprained my ankle. That was the beginning. We carried on the hide-and-seek around our emotions for ten years, before he finally summoned up courage to declare his love for me. Of course, I had long since fallen for him as well but was just waiting for him to come forward.”
They laughed at this point as Rose used a finger to swipe at her eyes.
“Two years later he asked me to marry him and I said yes. Of course I wasn’t going to say no. I had turned down every other suitor in the hopes that he was going to be brave enough to ask me, damning the family feud. And then…” Her voice trailed off.
“And then he brought you home to his mother who said no,” Rose said.
“Exactly. She died not long after,” Lady Anna responded.
“And still you stayed, hoping that you were going to finally get what you wanted,” Rose commented.
“Well, I didn’t necessarily stay. I actually left him and came back,” Lady Anna responded.
“Left him? Why? Wouldn’t that have been a perfect time for you both to quickly seal the deal now that the main opposition was gone?” Rose queried.
“Well, I couldn’t bring myself initially to go against the dying wish of a lady for her son. And that was for him not to marry me,” Lady Anna said in response. “She really took that grudge to the grave with her, manipulating me in the process.”
“So what made you come back after leaving? Did you begin hoping you were going to finally get what you wanted?”
“No. I came back because I loved him. And no matter how hard I tried to run away from that, it kept staring me in the face,” Lady Anna corrected her.
After a brief pause, Rose continued the line of questioning.
“And your parents? What did they say when you told them? Didn’t your mother try to discourage you?” Rose asked.
“Discourage me? It was my mother who taught me how to love, how to fight for love. She couldn’t very well turn around and discourage me. On the contrary, she encouraged me to follow my heart.”
“And do you ever think you made the wrong choice?”
“Well, there are times when I’ve doubted my decision to stay with him. We all have those moments from time to time. But what I’ve never doubted is my love for him,” Lady Anna declared.
A tear escaped Rose’s eyes. This time she let it trace a path down her cheek.
“So what are you going to do now?” Rose asked.
“For the longest time, I didn’t see a way Lord Rockgonie and I could end up together peaceably. Still, we didn’t let that stop us. Now, you and the Marquess have been thrown into the mix and aren’t we fortunate that you are also willing to fight for your love. Somehow I think we are going to be fine this time around.”
