The Determined Lord Hadleigh. Virginia Heath

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       Chapter Five

      The pews in St George’s in Hanover Square weren’t meant for big men, yet for some inexplicable reason the ushers at Lord Fennimore’s wedding had decided to seat the two biggest together in the middle of a row. Seb Leatham’s ridiculously burly shoulders were encroaching into his space on one side and a strange woman’s ludicrously large bonnet inhabited the other. In silent, tacit agreement, both men were twisted at the same obtuse angle to try to make the best of it.

      ‘Dear God, I hope the bride arrives soon!’ Leatham hated social occasions and was already getting twitchy.

      ‘It’s the bride’s prerogative to be late, so please try to sit still.’

      ‘My leg is going to sleep. My backside is already numb!’

      ‘Then it shouldn’t be long till your leg joins it and you won’t feel the pain any more.’ If only all pain could be so easily desensitised. The dull, constant one in his conscience had taken permanent root since she had held a mirror up to his face. What had he been thinking? Acting like the Admiral of the fleet, snapping out orders and expecting them to be followed, when any fool with half a brain would know a woman who had suffered at the hands of a dictatorial, brutish husband was never going to respond well to such behaviour. Common sense would tell them that the reaction would either be cowering fear or bristling outrage. He was heartened that her response to his I-know-better-than-you tactics had been to fight back. He doubted he could live with himself if he had caused a woman’s fear. No matter how much he worried that the man in the mirror that day might be a little too much like his father for comfort, to be that much like his father made him feel physically sick.

      ‘The bride is certainly milking her prerogative to be late! There is late and then there is just plain self-indulgence.’

      A scowling society matron offered them a pointed look, one which clearly said shut up. Hadleigh lowered his voice further, because he couldn’t pretend even to himself any longer that he didn’t need to know. ‘How is she?’ A very touchy subject, seeing as Leatham had threatened to break his idiotic, ham-fisted and worthless neck over the guineas incident three weeks ago.

      ‘How the blazes do you think she is?’ Seb offered him his most withering of glances. ‘Applying for every blasted housekeeper or governess job from here to John O’Groats to no avail to pay you back what she owes you. Hell-bent on leaving London as soon as possible regardless. Scrimping on food for herself to make the last pennies she has stretch further. Clarissa is beside herself with worry! I hope you are pleased with yourself. If she ends up working for some robbing scoundrel for farthings in the back of beyond, I give you fair warning, I’ve promised my wife I’ll give her your jewels as earrings.’ His friend threw up his hands despite the confined space. ‘I just don’t understand it. You are normally such an affable fellow. Charming, even. Upright, upstanding—normally annoyingly very sensible. Yet in all your dealings with poor Penny you have been a total oafish idiot!’

      Hadleigh couldn’t argue with that description. ‘Surely I can do something to help? I could try talking to her again...’ Something he had desperately wanted to do since she had given back his now-tainted six guineas and left him with a heavy heart and his tail between his legs. He only wanted to make things right and it was driving him mad that he had been thwarted in that noble quest.

      ‘Stay away from her!’ Seb’s elbow jabbed him hard in the ribs. ‘Unless you know some generous toff with an estate that needs a very well-paid housekeeper, you’ve caused more than enough trouble already!’ Hadleigh had an estate... She wanted to trade her labour for honest wages...that might just work...

      No! Bad idea... A very bad idea. For so many reasons.

      ‘Hallelujah!’ Seb’s cry had the stern matron frowning again. ‘I do believe it’s finally time for the off.’

      Hadleigh settled back in the pew as the organ began to play and fixed his gaze firmly on Lord Fennimore waiting nervously at the altar in an attempt to stop his mind whirring. There was no point in attempting to meddle again. She wouldn’t take well to it and Seb would kill him. Clarissa, too. Lady Penhurst probably hated him. Another depressing thought. Not that he wanted her to like him, but still...she thought him a bully. No better than her awful husband. He felt an ache form between his eyebrows and realised he was scowling, something which was hardly fair on the bride, so he stalwartly banished all thoughts of saving the proud and exasperating woman who didn’t want rescuing to focus on the unlikely wedding about to take place in front of him.

      The Commander of the King’s Elite was close to sixty and, up until recently, had been a confirmed bachelor wedded solely to his profession. Yet, like Warriner, Leatham, Flint and Gray, he had also fallen victim to the parson’s trap. All five men—Hadleigh’s friends and comrades—had succumbed in quick succession this past year. Like dominoes, lined up just to fall, there had also been an inevitability about it. The ladies they had fallen for were all perfect for them. But out of the five of them, only Lord Fennimore’s impending nuptials had surprised him. Not because his choice of bride was wrong—Hadleigh had developed a soft spot for the indomitable Harriet and wished them all the happiness in the world—but because he saw a great deal of himself in old Fennimore. More, he hoped, than he saw of his father.