Page 29 of Lady Willa's Divinely Wicked Vicar
“God rest him, yes, yes.” He searched his waistcoat pocket for his pipe. “But really, Madam. Willa as Lady Wittford Williams? A tongue-twister. Mouth full of mush. No, simply no.”
Wills did not object. In fact, those names were more commendable than many other monikers thetonascribed. LikeJumboto the Prince Regent. OrYelperto the Prime Minister.
“Ignore him, my sweet,” her mama advised in her stern-let-me-wrestle-him tone. “Continue to pack. Go to your party with your friends.”
There is no stopping me.
Mama repeated her wish each year for Wills to enjoy some gaiety. Ever since Wills’s first betrothed Wit had died in the battle of Albuera, Mama had become a parrot repeating injunctions to joy. Come to think of it, she’d also encouraged her to do so after her second fiancé, the Marquess of Dennybrook, Frederick Tipton, had passed away of an ague.
Her mother leaned toward her. “Do laugh and dance, my dear girl. You need it.”
Wills shivered in anticipation. Yes, she needed more than that. She needed to settle her future. In a way none of them could dispute.
“Enjoy yourself, dearest,” Mama went on, raising a defiant brow at her husband. “Find some pleasure.”
“I will,” she assured her doting mother.Not the way you want, but still.“Never doubt.”
“You see, Bark? Our girl recovers!”
Would that her father could find it in his heart to do more than recover. But repenting was not in his ability and so Wills would do what she must. She’d take the family coach to the Courtlands’ May Day Frolic and then, before they could blink, she would simply…disappear.
“As long as she does not encourage that clergyman.”
Wills glared at her father. How dare he speak of Charlie in that manner.
“She won’t. Will you, darling?”
Wills stood. “I’ll not discuss this.”
“Now the two of you,” he said, “know my view. Vicars should be perfectly godlike.”
“You mean prigs,” Wills bit off.
“Precisely. Compton is not. He’s soft.”
How dare you?Wills would not hear this lie. “Charlie is stronger, more valiant, more virtuous than ten bishops rolled together.”
Mama gave her husband her prune face. “Viscount Courtland likes him.”
Her father snorted. “I respect Courtland. Smart if often misguided. But about his vicar? I am right and I know it, because I hired a Bow Street man on him!”
“Bark! You investigated Compton?!”
“Oh, Father!” Wills clenched her fists. “Reverend Compton is a man of God. A soldier. A hero of Salamanca!”
“Vicars should be reserved!” he raved on. “Not—not soldiering.”
Wills took umbrage for the muscular, darkly enthralling creature who kissed her each night in her dreams. “He comforted the dying and wounded. Walked miles with wounded men in his arms! Saved them, I am certain of it.”
“Of course, justly so,” he conceded with a hint of humility.
She would not let him win with so little acknowledged. “He fought for his country.”
“Commendable! But Christ, he dances!”
Wills was furious!
“A moment, please, sir!” Her mama raised her voice another octave, a sign her papa was in terrible trouble. “Charles Compton is Church of England. Not a Jumper!”
