Truly a Wife (Free Fellows League 4)

Miranda untied the bow on the box, removed the wrapping, and gasped at the cream-colored dress inside it.

She lifted it out of the box and held it up.

It was a dress fit for a queen, made from yards of silk and lace and embroidered with hundreds of pearls and diamonds.

“I almost ordered a green one identical to the one you wore to our first wedding,” he admitted. “But I decided that only something extraordinary would do.”

“Oh, Daniel …”

When she said his name like that, something inside him melted, then thrilled with pride. “Marry me again, Miranda,” he said softly. “So I might have the opportunity to repeat my vows before all of London and let everyone know how happy and honored I am to be the man with whom you walk down the aisle. Because I love you and I want everyone to know that I’m the luckiest husband in all the world to have you for a wife.” He kissed her then, a kiss that was long and hot and sweet and full of the promise of tomorrow.

“I love you, Daniel,” she whispered. “And I’ll be happy and honored to marry you as often as you like. Because I’m yours. Truly and forever.”

Epilogue

“It is good news, worthy of all acceptation!

And yet not too good to be true.”

—Matthew Henry, 1662–1714

From the “Ton Tidbits” column of Wednesday, 30th June 1813:

The editors and publishers of the Morning Chronicle are pleased to offer to Their Graces, the Duke and Duchess of Sussex, our most humble apologies for an earlier column suggesting Their Graces committed acts of impropriety in a house on Curzon Street earlier in the season.

According to the parish register of St. Michael’s Church, the Duke and Duchess of Sussex were married by special license in a ceremony performed by Bishop Manwaring immediately prior to their sojourn on Curzon Street, where they spent the first two nights of their honeymoon.

The editors and publishers of the Morning Chronicle deeply regret the unfortunate error and extend our sincere felicitations to the happy couple.

Official Charter of the

Free Fellows League

On this, the seventh day of January in the year of Our Lord 1814, we, the sons and heirs to the oldest and most esteemed titles and finest families of England and Scotland, do amend the original charter of our own Free Fellows League.

The Free Fellows League is dedicated to the proposition that sons and heirs to great titles and fortunes, who are duty-bound to marry in order to beget future sons and heirs, should be allowed to avoid the inevitable leg-shackling to a female until we find the love of our lives, for England’s and Scotland’s greatest heroes deserve no less than the love of extraordinary females.

As active and equal members of the Free Fellows League, we agree that:

1) “We shall only agree to marry when we’ve no other choice, or when we’re old enough, or when we know in our hearts that it’s the right thing to do.

2) We shall no longer require our fellow Free Fellows to pay the sum of five hundred pounds sterling to each of us upon the occasion of a marriage before reaching our thirtieth year. We shall not refuse the sum should our fellow Free Fellows choose to follow established tradition and offer it, but we shall not expect or require it.

3) We shall reserve the right to never darken the doors of any establishments that cater to ‘Marriage Mart’ mamas or their desperate daughters unless forced to do so. Nor shall we frequent the homes of any relatives, friends, or acquaintances that seek to match us up with prospective brides, unless we want to do so.

4) When compelled to marry, we agree that we shall only marry women we love or women we hope to love or women we pray will one day love us.

5) We shall never feel encumbered by the sentiment known as love or succumb to female wiles unless we

choose to do so because love is a gift, not an encumbrance, and the females who hold us enthralled are wives who love us to distraction and are dearly loved in return.

6) We shall sacrifice ourselves on the altar of duty at every opportunity in every way we can, in order to give and receive pleasure and to beget our heirs and pray that we always find great satisfaction in doing so.

7) We shall install our wives in our hearts and keep them there and by our sides in our country houses, in London, or wherever our journeys take us.

8) We shall drink and ride and hunt, and consort with our boon companions whenever we are pleased to do so, and then eagerly return home to our wives and families with smiles on our faces.

9) We shall not dictate to the wives who have given us their hearts, but shall love, cherish, and respect them and do everything in our power to share our work and our lives with them. Furthermore, we shall take care not to put our feet upon tables and sofas and the seats of chairs, or allow our hounds to sit upon the furnishings and roam our houses at will, if such behavior causes our spouses distress.