Page 91 of Marry in Secret
She laughed. “You remember that, do you?”
“When a lady orders you tossed into a gutter, it creates a certain bond,” he said dryly. “And twice? Well, that just seals the deal.”
She laughed again. “I’m so glad you don’t hold a grudge, Thomas—may I call you Thomas, since we are family now? And you must call me Emm.”
“Of course.” It wasn’t true that he didn’t hold a grudge. All this time he’d nourished hatred for Uncle Walter and Gerald, swearing revenge against them. And they were innocent.
Who had sent those letters?
However the story got out, it was soon clear that the news had spread like wildfire: Lady Rose’s impossible nobody of a husband was in fact the Earl of Brierdon.
Thomas was congratulated right, left and center. People who’d barely talked to him before, people who’d simply looked down their noses at the nobody whom Lady Rose Rutherford had married, now wanted his opinion on everything. If he’d thought the squeeze was bad before, now that the attention was centered on him it was even worse.
“Oh, you are such a naughty man, Lord Brierdon.” An arch voice behind him accompanied by a sharp tap on the shoulder caused him to turn. It was the Roman-nosed matron. She gave a trill of laughter and said to the people standing closest, “We are old friends, you know, Lord Brierdon and I.”
Thomas looked at her in stupefaction.
She trilled with laughter again and smacked him on the arm with her fan. “Do you know he calls me ‘Lady Er-Um,’ a little joke between us because when we first met he forgot my name. Isn’t that naughty of him?” With a playful titter she smacked him again.
Thomas gritted his teeth. If she hit him again with that thing... No. If his first act as an earl were to destroy a lady’s fan it would be an inauspicious beginning. Probably. Although quite satisfying. He tore himself away from the temptation.
“Excuse me, Lady Toff-er-um-dammit, I’m needed over there.” He pushed his way through the crowd, leaving Lady Roman-Nose entertaining people with tales of his delightfully naughty pretense that he couldn’t remember her name.
“Toff-er-um-dammit! Too funny!”
He fled.
***
The first Rose knew the secret was out was when people started addressing her as Lady Brierdon, instead of Lady Rose. They were full of congratulations, and there was much talk of how sly she’d been, pretending in the note she’d sent with the invitation that she’d married a simple navy officer.
She wanted to say that shehadmarried a simple navy officer, that she hadn’t married Thomas for any other reason except love, and that neither of them had known he was the Earl of Brierdon until fifteen minutes ago.
But she didn’t want people gossiping any more than they already were. If they knew there was an added mystery, how much worse would the interest be?
She could see that Thomas was hating the attention. He had that grim, granite look she was coming to know so well. “Excuse me, please,” she said to the latest batch of well-wishers. “I must speak with my husband.”
She hurried across to him.
“Would you like to leave now?”
He brightened. “Can we? It seems awfully early. People are still dancing.”
“It’s three in the morning. A lot of people have left, but others will stay until the band stops playing, and they will play until four. Or maybe five, I can’t remember what thearrangement was. And some of the card players will be here all night. In any case, Cal has already sent Emm upstairs. She’s worn to the bone, poor thing. My aunt has agreed to play the role of hostess in her absence.”
“Which aunt?”
“The aunt who is soooo delighted with you for becoming the Earl of Brierdon—of course, Aunt Agatha.”
“Is Aunt Dottie not delighted with me, then?”
She smiled and patted his chin. “Darling Aunt Dottie has been delighted with you from the very start, earl or not. She’s having a fine old time rubbing Aunt Agatha’s nose in the fact that she’s always had one of her ‘feelings’ about you—that’s a good thing, by the way. Aunt Dottie’s ‘feelings’ are legendary in the family.”
“So we can leave?”
“Yes. And if anyone wonders, well”—she dimpled—“we’re married and only recently reunited. I think people will understand.”
He looked horrified. “I won’t have them thinking that we’re doing that.”
