Meant To Be (Pendleton Manor 1)

He’d recognised the fair-haired man she was with as Digby’s elder brother James. After Evelyn had told him that James had offered for her hand, and been refused, he seemed to notice him everywhere. Seeing Sophy and James together made him suspicious. Had the two of them formed some kind of allegiance? Were they intent on destroying his peace of mind? Or was he losing said mind because of his own idiotic imaginings?

“Is something the matter, Harry?” Evelyn’s mother wore a frown between her winged brows. “You’re very reserved this evening.”

“Nothing at all,” he assured her. “Although perhaps the guests are packed in a little close tonight.”

Lady Helen smiled. “Nonsense. London is exciting, Harry. You are such a country boy at heart.” But she said it fondly, as if she forgave him his provincial roots.

Evelyn’s family wanted the two of them to be seen together, and they were excited about the wedding. Evelyn was an only daughter and the desire to see her happily settled was understandable. Although Harry was aware that that happiness came with the addendum of her making a good marriage and being properly maintained in the years to come.

Lady Helen was the Earl of Albury’s second wife, and now a widow herself. The son from the first marriage, Oscar, was now the Earl of Albury, and as far as Harry could see, he ruled the roost. Evelyn seemed rather intimidated by her half-brother, while her mother was clearly under his thumb.

So Harry wasn’t surprised to see Oscar step in, taking over the conversation. “As you are aware, Baillieu, Evelyn had many contenders for her hand. Yet you were the one she chose to marry. I do hope you are aware of that honour and treat my sister in the manner she deserves.”

Harry didn’t much like Oscar. The man was a bully, rather like Harry’s father, and perhaps it was that similarity that gave him the tools to handle his future brother-in-law.

He nodded and said the right things—how fortunate he was to have won Evelyn’s hand and how much he was looking forward to spending his life with her. The words came easily but they tasted wrong in his mouth. Everything seemed to taste wrong since Sophy had reappeared.

Oscar listened without emotion, then leaned in close and spoke for Harry’s ears alone. “My sister is a dear sweet girl but she is still young. Young girls get carried away sometimes, and have their hearts broken. It is a rite of passage, so my step-mother tells me. Evelyn has had her heart broken once, Harry. I do not want it broken again. Take heed.”

Harry stared after him. Evelyn had had her heart broken? This was news to him. Was it something to do with the proposal from James Abbott? But how could it, if she was the one who called off the engagement? What did it matter anyway? He and Evelyn were engaged and he needed to stop all this nonsense with Sophy Harcourt.

Evelyn also seemed a little on edge, which made him wonder if her step-brother had been whispering in her ear as well. At least once they were married he could put a stop to all that.

They took their places in the set dance and he smiled as he reached for Evelyn’s hand. He was sorry that Adam wasn’t here tonight. Apart from being the better dancer, his brother’s easy going nature meant he was good at easing any tension in the room. Harry never felt so comfortable as when Adam was around. All the same as the evening went on he began to enjoy himself. Just as well, he thought wryly, because there were many more to come. He was only prepared to suffer them for the sake of his future wife. Evelyn was far more of a social animal than Harry, and it would be cruel not to indulge her.

They had finished their dance and had made their way back to Evelyn’s mother, when Harry saw Sophy again.

His body stiffened, every muscle instantly rigid, and his smile fell from his face like snow down a mountain.

She was dancing with Digby.

The past momentarily swamped him and he struggled to breathe. She was dancing with Digby. He ran a hand down his face, trying to sluice off his anger. Wild thoughts filled his head. Had she given herself to his enemy? When he had learned of her marriage it had occurred to him how blind he had been in regard to her morals as well as her honesty. How else could Sophy bear to be in that man’s arms?

He stood frozen as images flashed through his mind, of the two of them under a Pendleton sky. He swore that for a fraction of time he even felt her warm and soft against him. The taste of her on his lips and her gasps of passion as he pushed deep inside her. Sophy had been his lodestone, she’d kept him from spiralling into the sort of man his father was and the man his brother was becoming. He had thought she would be forever his.

Now that was over, and it made no sense that Harry wasn’t sleeping at night. And when he did sleep, why his dreams were filled with Sophy. And when he woke up in the mornings his body was on fire and his head full of thoughts of her lying beneath him. Thoughts that left him feeling bewildered and confused.

He shouldn’t be lusting after a girl he no longer wanted and who no longer wanted him. He had hoped it would all just melt away like a spring thaw and he could get back to what he was supposed to be doing. Making Evelyn happy.

He hadn’t realised it would be so difficult to push Sophy into the past where she belonged, even though she had married another man. She had betrayed him. Remember that, he told himself, and hate her as she deserves. He wasn’t like Adam, who seemed to easily justify sleeping with a different woman every night. Harry was an engaged man. He needed to remain faithful to the woman he was going to marry.

He was a heartbeat from turning away when something in Sophy’s expression brought his eyes back to her.

It was a look that he remembered. The little frown between her brows, the slight pursing of her lips, and the way she kept her eyes downcast. She was uncomfortable, out of her depth, and afraid.

Again he hesitated. The memory of Sophy standing with her husband, the baby in his arms, and the smiles of their faces, flashed into his brain. If she had looked miserable and downtrodden, if she had appeared as if she had been coerced … He had seen for himself that none of those things had been true. Just as he could see how she was feeling right now.

Harry’s gaze jumped back to Digby. His former friend was watching her too, just as he had watched her the night of the Christmas celebrations. The night he had almost taken what Harry believed rightly belonged to himself. A smile lifted the corners of Digby’s mouth, and there was something so predatory about it that made Harry’s hands clench at his sides.

He might despise Sophy Harcourt with a black bitter hatred for what she had done to him. But he could not stand by and allow her to be preyed upon by someone like Digby.

Propelled by anger and concern, as well as sheer bloody annoyance at himself and Sophy and the world in general, Harry began to wend his way through the dancers.

Chapter 18

SOPHY

Digby’s hand tightened on hers. Sophy had been doing her best to pretend he wasn’t there, that she wasn’t touching him or breathing the same air as him. She had never intended to dance with the man, let alone be in his space, but with James standing there smiling when he asked her … It seemed cowardly to say no, and she refused to be a coward any longer. Dancing with him would show him how little she cared.