Page 62 of Miss Dignified
“You don’t trust Tremont’s cousin?”
Lydia had to think about the question because keeping straight what she’d admitted and what she’d withheld was becoming difficult. Her eyes were growing heavy, and she was increasingly aware that she faced a choice—a hard choice—where Dylan and Marcus were concerned.
“Tremont’s cousin is in a delicate position. On the one hand, he is his father’s only offspring and mindful of his filial duty. On the other hand, he’s Tremont’s friend, and—I think—a good friend, more like a brother. Choosing between loyalties like that is nearly impossible.”
“My commanding officer delighted in forcing me to choose between following orders and putting my men at needless risk of harm. I tried to be both dutiful toward Dunacre and decent to the men, but the object of the game—it was a game to Dunacre—was to break me. To break my honor as an officer and a gentleman.”
What had the cost to Dylan been of enduring such games? “I am worn out,” Lydia said, “not quite broken. My mother and others are depending upon me, but if I turn my back on them and do as I please, they have no one else.”
If she married Dylan, assuming he would have Lady Lydia Glover in the place of his Mrs. Lovelace, Reggie would prevail, and the Tremont estate would be ruined.
“I eventually gave up,” Dylan said. “I reasoned that I would let Dunacre win, and then he would leave me alone. I was wrong. He saw me stripped of rank when I disobeyed an order to scout terrain we knew was securely held by the French. Even that wasn’t enough for Dunacre. The games, the tests of honor and loyalty, went on and on. I hated him and those who toadied to him more ferociously than I ever hated a lot of French farm boys conscripted into the Corsican’s army.”
Those who had toadied to Dunacre included Marcus, of course. Especially Marcus.
Lydia wanted to weep, but tears never solved a problem. She instead sat up. “I have a few things to tell you, things you won’t like.”
“This again. You don’t want to marry me?”
“I do want to marry you.” That much she could say honestly. Breathtaking passion aside, Dylan was kind, tenacious, devoted to family, self-sacrificing, and so endlessly, relentlessly decent. If Lydia’s life had been a desert of truly honorable men and filled instead with an endless expanse of knaves, charlatans, and self-serving twits, Dylan was a lush oasis of integrity.
She longed to dwell with him for all her daysand all of her nights.
“You want to marry me?” He spoke softly, his tone clearly anticipating all thebutsandnotwithstandingsandneverthelessesthat turned hope to despair.
“I want to marry you, and dwell with you in Wales, and make a home and a family with you. I have not known you long, but I know you well, and I adore the man you are.”
He hugged her. “Hush. Cease prattling before I have to kiss you.”
Dylan did kiss her, or Lydia kissed him, though it was a kiss of contradictions. She could feel the joy in him, the relief and wonder, because she had expressed a desire to accept his proposal. True, he could be taciturn, and he had his rules and routines, but what did that matter next to his lovely and caring soul?
No woman who had shared intimacies with Dylan Powell would reject his proposal.
Lydia had not, however, accepted his offer of marriage. She could not, and thus for her, the kiss was one of yearning and heartache. She indulged as long as her conscience could bear the strain, then eased back.
“Tell me,” Dylan said, still hugging her. “Tell me the awful weight on your heart, and I will kick it into the Channel, and then we will be married.”
Lydia’s heart made a slow, painful drumbeat as she extricated herself from his embrace and rose. She paced over to the chess table, where her king and queen still stood alone on their respective squares.
“That missing earl,” she said, putting the royal couple back into their box, “Lord Tremont, the distant maternal relation who sent me flowers—”
A commotion sounded outside the door, followed by loud knocking.
“We know you’re in there, Dylan. We’re coming in on the count of five. Put away your naughty prints and prepare to defend yourself.”
The door opened immediately—no count of five—and three young ladies swept into the library, all three wreathed with smiles and making straight for Dylan, who’d bolted to attention beside the couch.
To hear Marged threatening on the other side of the door had inspired an exquisite confusion of joy and frustration for Dylan. His sisters barreled into the library on a cloud of floral scents and softly rustling muslin, moving toward him like a summer downpour of fragrance and smiles.
He’d been on his feet more swiftly than if Wellington himself had appeared for parade inspection. Marged led the charge, squeezing him soundly about the middle. Tegan followed up with a stout hug, and Bronwen—dear, no-longer-little Bronnie—looped her arms about him and sighed as if she’d walked every step from Cardiff in her bare feet.
“You have been exceedingly naughty, Dylan,” Tegan said. “Expect to make amends at length. We have new cousins-by-marriage to meet, and we are years behind in our fashions.”
Tegan, oldest and tallest, was the sororal general. Marged, the most outspoken sibling, was her aide-de-camp, while Bronnie was simply herself. Quiet, diminutive, astonishingly well-read, and sweet, but like Dylan, also possessed of a rare and formidable temper.
The sisters were stair-stepped in height. In terms of coloring, Tegan was possessed of Titian locks, while Marged was a lovely chestnut, and Bronnie had inherited Papa’s fiery copper hair.
“Ladies, you look well.” Dylan wanted to hug them all at once, forever, and to shoo them out the door so he could finish his conversation with Lydia. “My prayers are answered by your safe arrival, though, Marged, we must work on your counting skills. May I introduce you to my housekeeper, Mrs. Lydia Lovelace…” He marched through the introductions, and the ladies dutifully bobbed serial curtseys, but Lydia had retreated beneath her figurative cap.
