Tilting her head back to see him better, Tess smiled up at him. “I’ll wager Fanny will become much less notorious in the near future. She has abandoned her wicked ways in order to settle down in staid matrimony, just as you have.”
Ian’s humor deepened. “I fervently hope there will be nothing staid about our marriage, Tess.”
“You have a point,” she conceded. She paused. “I don’t believe I thanked you yet, Ian. I am so grateful that you made it possible for Fanny to marry for love.”
“I confess my motives were completely selfish. I only wanted to make you happy.”
Reaching up, she twined her arms around his neck. “You have made me happy, darling. Deliriously so. You filled the emptiness in my heart.”
Her simple declaration humbled him.
“I could say the same about you, my lovely Tess. I never realized how empty my life was until I met you.”
She smiled radiantly, the same precious smile that had captured him the first time they’d met—only this time her joy was solely for him.
In response, Ian pressed a reverent kiss on her mouth. His heart was full of emotion for her: lust and love, caring, protectiveness. His fierce desire for her was only eclipsed by his even greater desire to protect and cherish her.
Suspecting that Tess still needed proof of his love, however, Ian wrapped his arms around her and deepened their kiss, determined to show his adoration with deeds and not mere words.
He succeeded admirably, if her blissful cries a short while later were any indication.
My friends have all been remarkably lucky in love, but I am the most fortunate of all, having my not-so-wicked duke for my husband.
—Diary Entry of Tess Sutherland,
Duchess of Rotham
Pride and delight surged through Tess as she watched Fanny and Basil being united in holy matrimony. The bride looked amazingly beautiful, her long-sleeved gown of forest green lustring boasting a high-necked bodice embroidered with gold threads. The groom, though almost handsome in a long, lanky sort of way, seemed a trifle awestruck at his good fortune. Yet the love in his eyes was unmistakable, as was Fanny’s love for him.
The couple’s friends had gathered in Bellacourt’s small, elegant chapel behind the manor for a private ceremony, since society was not yet ready to publicly embrace the nuptials of a former lady of pleasure.
This was the last in a rash of unexpected weddings from among Tess’s close circle. Indeed, Fanny’s unlikely romance was the culmination of a remarkable year of love matches, which had begun in May when Marcus, Baron Pierce, inherited the Danvers earldom along with his unwilling guardianship of the Loring sisters. Now Marcus and Arabella were expecting the birth of their first child in the spring.
The thought warmed Tess’s heart. So did the nearness of her own handsome husband sitting in the pew beside her.
She had actually seen little of Ian since breakfast, having spent the morning at Danvers Hall helping the bride dress and primp with the rest of Fanny’s dearest female friends. Tess had then accompanied the ladies to Bellacourt, where, following the quiet chapel service, she and Ian planned to host a large wedding breakfast and ball to celebrate their own recent marriage.
The guests present in the chapel were an interesting mix of commoners and gentility, Tess noted. Several of Basil’s bachelor friends from his law clerk days had come to support him. And not surprisingly, Fanny’s beloved Cyprian friends, Fleur Delee and Chantel Amour, had been invited and appeared to be thoroughly enjoying themselves.
It was highly unusual, however, to see so many high-ranking members of the ton at a courtesan’s wedding. In addition to Arabella, Roslyn, Lily, and their three noble husbands, Tess’s cousin Damon, Viscount Wrexham, was there with his vivacious wife Eleanor, who happened to be Marcus’s younger sister. Also in attendance were Arabella’s nearest neighbor, Rayne Kenyon, the Earl of Haviland and his charming new wife, Madeline, whom the sisters had taken under their wing this past autumn.
Yet it was only fitting, Tess reflected, for them to honor Fanny this way, since she had aided them all in their courtship wars at one point or another.
Winifred, Lady Freemantle, was in attendance also, seated at Tess’s other side. The plump, plain, middle-aged widow had been born into the lower classes, but her industrialist father’s fortune had purchased her marriage to a baronet. Winifred was the original patron of the Freemantle Academy for Young Ladies, funding the school entirely before Marcus bought it outright for Arabella as his wedding gift to her this past summer.
Tess’s godmother was not at the chapel, although she meant to attend the festivities afterward, once the notorious lightskirt and her groom had left the premises and set out on their wedding journey to Hampshire. Lady Wingate had her
reputation to uphold, after all.
Lady Freemantle was not so fastidious. After warning that she always cried at weddings, Winifred sat sniffing happily throughout the ceremony. When the vows had finally all been spoken, she heaved a dreamy sigh while clutching her hand to her generous bosom. “That was simply beautiful. Weddings are such a joyous occasion, especially this one.”
Tess nodded in agreement, wiping away her own tears of happiness with the handkerchief Ian had loaned her. She couldn’t help comparing Fanny’s wedding to her own hasty, forced marriage, however.
Ian must have been having similar thoughts, for he bent to murmur in her ear. “Do you regret not having a church wedding?”
Tess smiled up at him. “Not at all. How our vows came about hardly matters as long as I have you for my husband.”
It was clearly the answer he hoped for, judging from the tender sheen in his gray eyes—a tenderness that warmed her from the inside out. By the time the wedding guests spilled out of the chapel into the chill gray day, the first snowflakes of the season had begun falling, yet Tess felt as if she was coming out of a dark winter.