Page 1 of Better Love Next Time
PROLOGUE
May 1763
Notfelle Estate Family Chapel
Huntingdonshire, England
Dragme to the altar and I’ll shout my refusal to marry to the heavens.
How many women throughout time had thought those words?
How many had dared to say those words aloud?
Exactly how many had done as Kitty did? Thought and said those very words and then walked meekly down the aisle, head bent to the worn tiles, halted at the left of her betrothed, Lord Staverton—a man old enough to be her great-grandfather, more malicious than a Nile crocodile—and waited.
“Dearly beloved, we are gathered together here in the sight of God…” Vicar Johnston began.
Kitty prayed.
“Therefore, is not by any to be enterprised, nor taken in hand, unadvisedly, lightly, or wantonly, to satisfy men's carnal lusts and appetites…”
She prayed harder.
“Therefore, if any man can shew any just cause, why they may not lawfully be joined together, let him now speak…”
She prayed for a second chance. For Julian St. Clair to burst through the chapel doors and save her.
The vicar said, “Wilt thou have this woman to thy wedded wife…”
“I will,” Lord Staverton replied.
She ceased praying when the vicar turned to her and said, “Wilt thou have this man to thy wedded husband, to live together after God's ordinance in the holy estate of matrimony? Wilt thou obey him…”
Kitty raised her head and said, “No.”
Her father, Lord Staverton, and Vicar Johnston jerked forward in stunned unison.
The vicar cleared his throat.
“She said yes,” her father said, gripping the tender flesh beneath her arm.
Kitty raised her voice. “No.”
“Yes,” her father hissed.
“Sir Jeffrey?—”
Her father cut off the vicar with a slash of his large, bony hand. “She said yes. Now get on with it.”
“She must consent.”
“She has.”
“Sir, I distinctly heard your daughter say no.”
Lord Staverton’s bulbous nose turned a livid shade of purple. “I heard yes.”
Kitty’s voice drew low, anger swirling from the deep to fortify her courage. “I said no.”
