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“What?” She almost choked on her tea.
“You are next.” Lottie grinned.
Rayne shook her head. “Not me. Well, actually, I guess it will be me.” Why did her spirits drop when she thought of Mr. Faulkner-Jones?
Addie lowered her teacup and began to place food from the platters in the center of the table on her plate. With a certain attempted nonchalance that she didn’t quite pull off, she said, “Why do you guess it will be you? Have you been keeping something from us?”
“I heard that Lord Sterling has been dancing attendance on you,” Pamela added.
“Is that true?” Addie asked.
“Lord Sterling is not ‘dancing attendance’ on me. You all know the story of how he came to be my patient. Once he was able to rise from his bed, he became quite a helper. In fact, one area he has been most useful in is my lack of ability to collect monies due to me from patients. Edwin has taken on that task and has recovered quite a bit of the outstanding debts.”
The words were no sooner out of her mouth than she closed her eyes and gritted her teeth, wanting to pull them back. Therefore, it was no surprise when all the women said at the same time: “Edwin!?”
Rayne sighed. Now it would take forever to get the idea of her and Lord Sterling as a couple out of their minds. “Yes. We are on a first name basis since we’ve been working together. But I will tell you all this. To my knowledge he has not had a drop of spirits since I took his friends’ flasks of brandy away from them.”
“But his reputation.” Addie shook her head.
“Is no matter to me since when I said I might be the next one married, I wasn’t referring to Lord Sterling.”
Forks paused half-way to ladies’ mouths and eyebrows rose in unison. “My, aren’t you full of surprises today,” Pamela said.
She would like more than anything to avoid the story, but they were her friends and they deserved to know. She’d had so few female friends in her life that she didn’t want to lose their bond. “Years ago, my father worked out an arrangement for me to marry. Why, I have no idea.” The story did seem to become stranger each time she told it.
“How very odd. Do you have a fancy for each other?”
Rayne couldn’t help the laugh that escaped at Lottie’s question since she couldn’t imagine anyone having a ‘fancy’ for Mr. Faulkner-Jones.
“No.” She shook her head. “Not at all. In fact, Father didn’t tell me about it until the day I left for my medical training. Although it was quite a surprise, with the excite
ment of beginning my studies, I relegated it to the back of my mind.”
Rayne pushed her empty plate away from her. “I met Mr. Faulkner-Jones probably three times, the most recent time a few days ago.”
Lottie leaned on her elbow, her countenance all excitement. “And?”
Rayne remembered the stiff, cold man who annoyed her, antagonized Edwin, and was now pushing for a fast wedding so he could return to his work somewhere far away from England.
Most likely he was planning a wed her, bed her, then leave her to her work sort of marriage. At one time when she never thought much about marriage, she might have accepted that. Providing she had her work she would be happy.
But then things changed. Edwin entered her life and for the first time ever, she enjoyed the company of a man. Not the derision and condescending attitude she’d received from her male counterparts at school, or the professors who were even worse. Rayne enjoyed verbal sparring with Edwin, and most of all she enjoyed his arms wrapped around her as they kissed.
“I don’t think we will suit, actually.” She surprised herself by that statement. The thought had apparently been there, but now that she’d given herself time to really contemplate it, she did not want that sort of marriage.
She looked around the table at her friends. They were all happily married. Ecstatic, truth be known. They had husbands who adored them, and now they were starting their families. A loving husband, a warm secure home, and children to raise.
Did she not deserve the same?
* * *
Edwin paced—as best he could with a broken leg—in Rayne’s office, awaiting her return. She’d sent word earlier that Mrs. Mallory had safely delivered twin girls and once she and the other ladies who had attended the birth finished breakfast she would be back at the infirmary.
It was time.
He could not allow her to marry that stiff-necked fiancé. Perhaps he was speaking too soon, but he felt as though the timing had been taken away from him once Faulkner-Jones had showed up, staring down his pointed nose at everyone. He knew in his bruised heart that given enough time he would have been on his knees begging for Rayne’s hand.
She was everything a man could want. This man, at least. At first her staunch moral code had annoyed, and then amused him. After his brandy-fogged brain cleared, however, he’d begun to see the woman beneath the doctor.
