Page 14 of Once Charmed, Twice Cursed
But I only ended up thinking of Weston the whole time, and I don’t expect a second try to prove any different than the first. At least…not with Theodore.
So I stay home, and the days drag by. At times, I wonder if I imagined Weston’s duty-bound proposal.
Maybe, because Brendan never mentions it. Nor does he waver in his decision to marry me to the duke. He insists that Fortuna wouldn’t permit a match that wouldn’t result in my happiness, and therefore I’ll be utterly fulfilled as the new duchess of Alverton.
Every time he says it, I will myself not to gag.
I don’t argue, though. I hunker down. I bide my time and wait for my luck to save me. It always has before.
Yet Fortuna fails to intervene, and a week after my forced engagement, I find myself being laced into my wedding dress by Minnie’s capable hands. The gown has so many ruffles that a family of small animals could probably make a home in its skirts.
“Just your luck that this fits so perfectly,” she says, tugging at the laces. “Considering the duke sent it without having your measurements taken.”
I meet my own eyes in the floor-length mirror. There’s no expression on my face. Not a single flicker of emotion. I can’t seem to locate any within myself, either. “Yes. Lucky.”
“Almost like this was meant to be,” she continues. “Which, since it’s you, I suppose it was.”
She runs a brush through my hair and smiles at me in the glass. I try to smile back, but it ends up looking as though someone has knocked my mouth out of alignment.
“You had a hundred proposals, too,” she says brightly. “Imagine that.”
“A hundred and one, actually,” I murmur.
Minnie pauses her brushing. “What?”
An eon passes.
I swallow hard. “Nothing.”
Before I know it, she’s leading me down the stairs. Brendan waits below, all smiles. He escorts me out front, to where the duke’s garish carriage awaits. Twelve miles separate me from my fiance’s country estate, but I wish it were twelve thousand.
Even that wouldn’t be enough.
My brother wraps me in a hug. I stand there, feeling strangely boneless, and pray for Fortuna to show her hand. Any moment now, a crack of lightning will detonate inside my brother’s mind. He’ll tell me this is all an elaborate jest, that I don’t have to marry at all. That we don’t need any more money or riches, not at the cost of my happiness.
But when Brendan pulls back, he only says, “Are you sure you don’t want me to come?”
I force a mute nod. A private ceremony is the one thing I managed to ask for. I can’t tolerate the thought of anyone watching while I swear my life away. Or of Brendan being there to interfere when Fortuna finally executes whatever plan she has in mind.
Goddess, please let her have a plan in mind. Please.
Brendan urges me into the carriage. Minnie bursts intotears and waves with both hands. I stare leadenly through the window as the door of my cage clicks shut.
The carriage lurches. At the first jostle of the wheels, sweat breaks out on my palms. This is…happening. Actually happening. I’m being delivered into my own worst nightmare, because once I reach my destination, I’ll be married. Immediately. Tonight.
Come tomorrow, I’ll be smothered in jewels. Entombed in silks. I’ll spend my days as an ornament. As a conduit for the duke to leverage his fortune to even greater heights.
I stare at the fields zipping past, unable to fathom that future. Maybe an axle will snap. A stampede of wild animals will spook the horses and send us back the way we’ve come.
Something.Anything.
Then a few miles later, I see him—a blond rider, outlined against the ridge ahead. He tracks the carriage’s progress with unsettling focus.
There’s something about the way he sits atop his black horse. A...stillness, almost. An anticipation.
I squint. We draw close enough that I can make him out.
I don’t recognize him. Broad features make up a face that’s pleasant enough, but would prove easily forgettable if not for the way he measures our approach.
