Page 100 of Bad Luck Bride

Devlin paused in the main hall of Victoria Station and pulled out his pocket watch. An hour and a half before his train departed, and only seven minutes since the last time he’d checked the time. He’d come far too early, he supposed, but then, he hadn’t been able to bear the idea of hanging about the Mayfair any longer. Once Kay had refused to come with him, there was no reason to stay. Long, drawn-out farewells at that point would only have made things harder on both of them.

Even so, at this moment he’d give his right arm to see her one more time before he left. Just once more. There was time, he supposed, to dash back to the Mayfair—

Muttering an oath, he put his pocket watch away and resumed walking, taking his fourth turn around the main hall. He couldn’t go back to the hotel now, he knew, or he’d never leave again. And it wasn’t as if he and Kay would be parted forever. Six months. Maybe a year.

Even a day seemed too long.

Kay, he thought, anguished.I have to go, but how can I, when I promised you I’d stay?

He stopped and turned, leaning his back against a wall, closing his eyes, imagining her as he’d seen her last, but the sadness in her face was too much to take, and he opened his eyes again, straightened away from the wall, and kept walking.

He went round the main hall yet again, this time pausing at WH Smith and Son. There, he bought three novels, half a dozen newspapers, and a copy of theStrand Magazine. He’d need them all, he feared, if he was to get through this journey without going out of his mind.

He checked his watch again. Still an hour and a quarter to go.

Again he put his watch away and resumed walking, but he didn’t take a fifth turn around the main hall. Instead, he made for the Chatham terminus, where the trains departed for Dover. His luggage was there already, having been taken by a porter upon his arrival to be safeguarded until his train pulled in and it could be loaded.

A train must have just arrived, for everyone seemed to be coming in the opposite direction from his destination, making him feel a bit like a salmon swimming upstream. But he reached his platform eventually, and he found a seat on one of the long, backless benches. Resigning himself to the wait, he set the books and newspapers beside him and opened theStrand Magazine.

“Mr. Sharpe?”

He looked up to find his porter standing nearby, and he rose to his feet, tucking his newspaper under one arm. “Your train won’t be in for about an hour, so I’ve stored your luggage. When the train comes, you can board when you like, and the conductor will punch your ticket. You don’t need to find me.”

“And my luggage?”

“I’ll load it when the time comes, never fear. And it’ll go straight through to Calais. There, of course, you’ll need a porter to transfer your trunks to the Calais-Méditerranée.”

He nodded and reached into his pocket for a shilling to tip the fellow, since he wouldn’t be seeing him again. “Thank you,” he said, holding out the coin.

“Thank you, sir.” He took the tip and held out a small pink ticket. “And here’s your claim check. You’ll need it for the porter to transfer the luggage. Even the Archbishop of Canterbury,” he added with a laugh as Devlin took the claim check, “couldn’t get his luggage without that!”

Devlin froze, staring down at the slip of pink paper in his hand.The Archbishop of Canterbury?he thought.Of course.

The porter was already walking away as Devlin looked up. “Porter?” he called, but the man didn’t hear, and Devlin started after him, breaking into a run.

“Oh, dear, oh, dear,” Magdelene clucked, looking over the trunks and suitcases as the bellmen carried them past where she stood and loaded them onto the boot of the cab that was waiting to take Kay and her mother to Victoria Station. “I do hope we haven’t forgotten anything.”

“If we have, I’m sure we can purchase it along the way,” Kay told her. “Do stop fussing, Mama.”

“Going somewhere, Lady Kay?”

She turned to find that loathsome woman, Delilah Dawlish,standing nearby, a notebook in one hand and a pencil in the other, and she suddenly appreciated that Devlin was right. Mrs. Dawlish really did look a bit like a rocking horse.

Giving an irritated sigh, she turned away, facing Delia and Josephine. “I’ll cable you when we’ve arrived,” she told her friend. “Take care of my girl.”

“Of course I will,” Delia replied. “So don’t worry. And I shall hire a photographer to take pictures of her in her court gown so you’ll know how gorgeous she looked when she was presented.”

Kay nodded. “Thank you, Dee. You think of everything,” she said, and turned to her sister, opening her arms.

Jo’s beautiful face suddenly broke up, and she hurled herself at Kay. “I’m going to miss you so much!” she cried.

“Stuff,” Kay said, her voice stern to hide the fact that she was starting to cry, too. “You’ll be far too busy flirting with all your suitors for that. Listen to me,” she added, interrupting her sister’s indignant denial and pushing her back a bit so she could look into her face. “You are to do whatever Lady Stratham tells you to do, you understand?”

Jo nodded. “Of course I will.”

“And don’t cry,” she added with a sniff, cupping her sister’s chin and trying to smile. “I’ll write you every week,” she promised. “And I’ll come for a visit next summer. Everything in Egypt should be settled by then.”

“Is that where you’re going, Lady Kay?” Mrs. Dawlish asked, sidling closer. “Egypt? But what about your job?” she added when Kay didn’t reply. “Aren’t you working as Lady Stratham’s secretary now? And working with Mr. Sharpe, too, I hear. How doesit feel to be working with the man who ruined you all those years ago?”

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