Page 25 of A Sense of Fate
‘Do you think she will keep the engagement?’ Archie asked with feigned casualness. ‘The roads could be tricky.’
Pawson shrugged. ‘Can’t see why she wouldn’t. She hasn’t let the weather stop her from galivanting all over the village, helping her old ladies. Besides, for reasons that escape me, she appears to enjoy your company.’
Archie grunted, accustomed to Pawson’s irreverence. ‘Keep her safe, and if you think the conditions are too treacherous on the way to fetch her, then tell her not to come. We can do this another day.’
‘I have a feeling she’ll do whatever she wants, no matter what I recommend.’
Archie rolled his eyes. ‘I have a feeling you’re right.’
‘Just think about what I told you about Conrad while I’m gone. That should keep your mind occupied.’
It should, Archie knew, watching his conveyance leaving tracks in the slush as it made its way down the long driveway, but his concentration was shot and he failed to make any sense of what he now knew. Loneliness was a foreign concept to Archie—or it had been before he’d made Flora’s acquaintance. All those years of recovery in France had taught him the value of his own company. Eloise couldn’t be with him all the time, nor did he want her to be, so he had found ways to occupy the long and painful hours, distracting his thoughts from past indiscretions that couldn’t be changed and for which he’d paid a heavy price. Sometimes simply being grateful to be alive, glad to have survived a crushing fall that somehow hadn’t kill him, wasn’t enough.
Now he was home and had assumed his father’s title. No one questioned his rise from the dead or his right to become a marquess, someone who was looked up to and respected. The myriad duties attaching to his status and the management of the estate was more than enough to keep his mind busy and gave him a purpose. Yet his life felt empty.
Incomplete.
An opinionated siren with flashing violet eyes and a propensity for plain speaking would make his existence whole again, even if his body would always be broken. He had known it almost since first making Flora’s acquaintance, but he also knew better than to rush her. She had a point to prove—to herself and the world in general. He would not clip her wings and try to turn her into somebody she was not. It would be the surest way to frighten her off. Her father had attempted it, unaware of the treasure that lay in the midst of his family.
Archie would not make the same mistake, and was content after a fashion to bide his time—just as long as no other man sniffed around her petticoats whose attentions she welcomed. If that situation arose then all bets were off. Flora was his. She just didn’t know it yet.
He sat behind his desk since it offered him a clear view of the front drive and tried to concentrate upon his correspondence. How long would it take before his conveyance returned? The distance wasn’t far. Even in these conditions, an hour should be sufficient.
He felt concerned when it returned in less time than that, worried that his visitor would not be inside it. He stood, adjusted his lapels and then grabbed the stick he so despised and walked out onto the top step, conscious of the cold wind biting into his face, adjuring himself to remain calm. Only after Pawson had jumped down from the box-seat, opened the carriage door, let the steps down and handed a familiar lady out did he relax. Of course she had come! It would take more than a little inclement weather to deter Miss Flora Latimer.
The sight of her in a fetching violet ensemble topped by a thick fur-trimmed tippet took his breath away. Her sense of style captivated him almost as much her spirited determination to forge her own path.
Archie raised a hand, unsurprised when Flora’s maid followed her from the carriage. Pawson, he noticed, held the girl’s hand to help her down and was slow to let it go again.
‘Archie, don’t come to us,’ Flora called out, returning his wave. ‘It’s freezing and you will slip.’
‘I will not slip,’ he replied, aware that he very well might and remaining where he was.
‘I am glad you came,’ he said, taking her arm the moment she joined him at the top of the steps, somehow resisting the urge to kiss her witless. ‘And looking so vibrant and full of life.’
‘Is vibrancy a good thing? It sounds as though being vibrant ought to be fun, in which case I don’t suppose Papa would agree with you. No good can come of pleasure, in case you were not aware.’
‘Thank you for putting me straight on that point,’ he replied, deadpan.
‘You are entirely welcome. Anyway, of course we came.’ She slipped her hand into the crook of the arm that wasn’t holding the stick. ‘I brought Polly along for the sake of respectability. Well actually,’ she added, lowering her voice, her expression mischievous, ‘I think it was Pawson’s idea, and he somehow got Polly to communicate it to me through a mildly worded suggestion.’
‘Very likely. Pawson usually gets what he wants, but he makes himself useful to me so I allow him to get away with it. Come inside and get warm.’ He led her into the library, aware that it was a favourite room of hers and one of the few in the vast house that felt lived in rather than neglected.
‘We are to have snow, I am told,’ she said, stripping off her tippet, gloves and hat and warming her hands in front of the fire. He liked that she felt comfortable enough in his company to remove her hat. Most ladies would not forgo their headgear when attending a luncheon. It didn’t surprise him that Flora flouted that particular custom.
‘How have you been?’ he asked, seating himself across from her after she herself had taken a chair.
‘Fully occupied with the school and my old ladies. My time doesn’t seem to be my own, but I am not complaining. I like to help where I can.’
‘You do too much.’
‘On the contrary, I don’t do nearly enough. I am told that I have been accepted by the locals, by the way, which is apparently a very great accolade.’
‘I would have something to say on the matter if you were not.’
Her expression closed down. ‘And you would force the locals to like me, would you?’ she said on a note of censure. ‘You promised not to interfere in my affairs, Archie. I don’t want people to get the wrong idea. Besides, I am perfectly capable of looking out for myself.’
Oh, Flora, you really are not!
