“Woman or not, I can do whatever is necessary to keep your family safe, Lord Templeton,” Jacob answered stoutly. “When a dog becomes a killer, putting it down is the kindest option for everyone.”
“Make sure you don’t repeat that in front of Kitty,” Diana muttered, entering the room, and closing the door behind her. “She’s distraught already. I’ve given her a sleeping draught.”
“I’ll be interviewing and appointing armed guards for Colborne House tonight. Would you like me to also select some men to join Jenson, Percy, and Jacob here?”
“Thank you, Edmund.” Lady Templeton said as her husband nodded approvingly.
“I just wish I could be here myself, as well as at Colborne House,” Edmund admitted a few minutes later as Diana walked with him to the front door. Diana nodded her understanding and kissed him swiftly on the cheek behind Jenson’s back as he opened the door.
“I will be quite safe here with Percy and Jacob,” she reassured him. “Go and deal with the armed guards, the Bow Street Runners and the church for our wedding.”
* * *
The six days that followed were tense but uneventful. A single possible sighting of Lady Birks was reported to Bow Street from one of the minor staging posts on the outskirts of London, but then, the trail went dead and nothing more was heard.
Bow Street officers temporarily increased their night patrols in the vicinity of both Colborne House and the Arnolds’ London home. A warning and paid request for information had also been issued to all London apothecaries to make sure that they would be better paid for turning in Henrietta than selling her poison. Meanwhile, Edmund went about town each day fully armed and on high alert.
The sudden disappearance of Diana from the social scene was noticed, but the explanation of busy wedding preparations was grudgingly accepted as the reason for her withdrawal. The excitement following the sudden announcement in theTimesalong with invitations to the church service and feast of the Season’s first wedding were acceptable consolation prizes to soothe the ruffled feathers of various society hostesses.
Thankfully, the news of Lady Birks’s escape and flight to London had not yet made it into the society press, although sketches of her face were pinned up at crossroad inns and staging points around the city, offering a financial reward for the capture of this dangerous criminal. Edmund guessed that it was only a matter of time before the story blew up one way or another.
He longed ever more for his wedding day, now duly arranged at All Saints church near his home. Before Lady Birks’s unexpected return from the dead, Edmund’s anticipation of the wedding had been more about simply being together with Diana again and free to make love to her whenever they both wished.
Now, his longing was equally about keeping Diana safe. Edmund was determined that nothing would be allowed to threaten his wife and child. After the wedding feast, he and Diana would depart for Colborne estates in the Scottish Highlands. They planned to remain there until after the birth of their child.
No more guns, no more poison and no more murderously insane relatives. Was that too much to ask?
ChapterTwenty-Five
Barely a week after sharing her news with Edmund, Diana stood outside the church doors with her father. The morning of the wedding had finally arrived.
Her bridesmaids, Sophia and Beatrice, chattered excitedly behind her, delighted to have such a role in the first wedding of the Season. By virtue of their lack of acquaintance with Lady Birks, they were less disturbed than the rest of the family by her still being at large.
Kitty, as maid of honour, smiled as much as she could in handing Diana her bouquet and then gave the signal for the younger women to lift the small train, ready to enter the church.
“I wish you both every happiness,” Kitty whispered, kissing Diana’s cheek, and falling back to take her place at the rear of the small procession. Diana looked back with tears in her eyes and mouthed a thank you.
There had still been no real questioning of the acceleration of their marriage. Lady Birks’s escape had seized the families’ imaginations, displacing any speculation that might otherwise have taken place. And an unexpected message of congratulations from the Queen herself set the ultimate approval on proceedings.
Even the seamstress letting out the bosom of Diana’s presentation dress, now modified and simplified for her wedding, passed entirely without comment. Diana’s queasiness first thing in the morning was attributed only to wedding nerves on top of the situation with Lady Birks.
With a nod from Diana to the two ushers, the doors were opened, and she stepped inside the church by her father’s side. While the pews were full of acquaintances and fashionable London folk who wished to be seen at this royally supported wedding, Diana only saw Edmund, tall, dark, and handsome at the altar with Jacob beside him.
Edmund’s green eyes flashed as he watched her approaching, mirroring the physical longing that she also felt. Looking at Diana’s bouquet of ferns and forest flowers, he smiled, and her love and desire for him blazed through her body.
Finally, they were standing together at the altar and the service began.
“Dearly beloved, we are gathered together here in the sight of God…”
Edmund’s hand was as warm and reassuring on hers as the first time he had taken it in the library and then danced with her around the room. She also knew how good his hands would feel again on her body later that night after all ceremony and social obligations were done with.
“… if anyone here knows of any impediment, why this man and this woman may not be lawfully joined together in matrimony, confess it now…”
A loud cry of “Yes!” crashed into Diana’s daydream and shattered it, the whole congregation gasping and twisting in their seats to see who had spoken.
Edmund and Diana turned around and looked down the aisle. A figure in heavy, old-fashioned puce brocade with a matching hat and veil could be seen about halfway down the church standing and pointing at them accusingly.
People began muttering and shrugging.