“And there’s nothing you can say that will make any difference, Lord Nash.” Indignantly, Kitty stared at the door, rising onto her knees as she wrapped her arms about Lord Silverton and kissed his right ear. He looked at her with a mixture of love, admiration and longing.
“Please, I—”
“It’s too late. Lord Silverton has shown me how a true gentleman behaves—”
“Lord Silverton? What has he got to do with any of this? Besides, Lord Silverton isn’t prepared to marry you. And I am! My father thought the marriage was not legal, but I went through every avenue with my solicitor, and he declared that the vows we were to say were indeed legally binding. I’ve now persuaded my father of the fact, and I’m here to persuade you. As my father will. Dorcas told me you’d been picked up by your old landlady and taken here, though Lord knows why.”
Mrs. Montgomery’s voice sounded in the passage, and then there was the sound of the key being turned in the lock, and the door was pushed open.
And there was barely any time for Kitty and Lord Silverton to hastily cover themselves, before Lord Nash’s earnest, eager face was staring at them.
First with disbelief.
Then, shock and horror.
And finally anger and dismay.
Certainly, dismay was written all over Lord Silverton’s face as Kitty looked between the two men...the one who would have married her after all, and the one...
She loved.
She swallowed, and tears welled up in her eyes. For both men.
“I’m sorry, Nash,” she whispered.
He looked as if she’d whipped him across the face with a cat o’ nine tails.
“I’m sorry, Kitty.”
It was Lord Silverton who was speaking, tenderly stroking the strands of flyaway hair from her forehead.
“Kitty? How could you?” Lord Nash asked brokenly. “We would have been married by now if...if you’d had faith in me.”
Kitty dropped her eyes. Guilt scored her very soul. Then she raised her head and whispered, “You deceived me once. I thought you’d done it again. It’s true; I should have had faith. I should have waited.” She swallowed and gently stroked Lord Silverton’s cheek. “But in truth, I have found that, after all, I have won my heart’s desire. I thought I wanted marriage above all else.” She tilted her head so that Lord Silverton could see the sincerity of her expression. Love, greater than she’d ever felt or even believed possible, flowered in her breast. Her breath hitched in her throat as she opened her mouth to say the truest words she’d ever spoken. “But now I know that, above all, I wanted love.” Almost tentatively she touched her finger to his lips and she thought she would cry with joy to see all her hopes for the future reflected in the eyes of the darling man before her. “And that’s what I’ve found.”
THE END