Page 37 of Lady Willa's Divinely Wicked Vicar
Right.
Except that was not so. He’d done all of those things in the heat of battle. Automatically. With conviction. Saving comrades in arms, friends, strangers. Now he wanted her the same way. Without reserve. Instinctively. And he could not save himself from the tragedy that he could not possess her. Nor she him.
He swung away, clenched his fists and strode the path to his cottage.
What had she done in the few days he’d gotten to know her last year that had so enchanted him?
He’d asked himself that for months.
She’d not been prim or self-impressed.
That would have driven him away faster than a free Season subscription to Almack’s. He’d met his share of ladies who searched for a marital means to leave home and the sufferance of their papas.
She’d not feigned interest in the Church.
That would have made his skin crawl. He’d met the overly pious in spirit and he much preferred those who displayed affection for the Almighty in deed.
Nor had she done that most objectionable of acts: She’d not pretended interest in him because he was a son, albeit the youngest son, of the Duke of Southbourne.
If she’d preened and done the pretty for him, he would have given her his most officious Reverend-of-the-Ugly-Eye-who-Brooks-No-Flirting stance. That beast had scared off many a maid.
None of that had occurred.
No. The first time he laid eyes on her, he had discovered he could be enchanted by another being in a house of God. Her dark head bowed, she had sat in an old pew in the rays of sun bathed in pinks and reds that washed over her in heavenly hues. He’d remember until he died her lovely face and his loss of sanity and breath. Love at first sight, without reason, fully formed and rapturous.
But he could not have her as his own. The mere memory of her rejection and her father’s summoned uncommon anger.
He was not accustomed to rejection. What he had in life—a university education, violin lessons, his Army rank and even his position in his parish—he himself had demanded or earned. Roiled at her father’s abrupt rejection, Charlie had left her family’s home and returned to his vicarage. While he pined, he also criticized himself for vanity. If she had suffered as long or as much as he, he had not written to ask or to prolong the agony. He had left her with an injunction three weeks ago. Was she here to enact it? Propose to him?
Her father was within his right to refuse his suit. But he’d done so in anger. Without moral cause. Marriage to a lowly vicar in a small parish was not a socially acceptable choice for the daughter of an earl, an heiress, a blue-blood of Norman descent and cousin to Valois French royalty. No matter that he was son of a duke. No matter that the use of a house from his father and a generous salary this past year plus the living the Courtlands gave him brought him more than enough money. No matter his beneficent work at the Marlborough Foundling Hospital saving children, feeding them, clothing them, loving them. He could save the world. But if she would not fight to have him, he must not pursue her.
Despite what he’d done to improve his lot, he would not propose again to her. She had to come to him. And so…
He’d not go near her. He’d not attend the ball tonight. Ignore her tomorrow at the wedding and the breakfast reception. Then soon after she would leave.
And he would spend months once again imagining her smile.
He shook his head and slogged on.
Bugger it! He needed his luncheon. One of Mrs. Powell’s sturdy stews that would put lead in his stomach, blubber in his brain and send him to his favorite chair for a nap. To hell with finishing his sermon for Sunday!
