Wild Lily by Cerise DeLand

Author:Cerise DeLand
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Publisher: 0
Published: 2017-10-10T04:00:00+00:00

Chapter Ten

Three weeks later, Lily walked to the head of the grand staircase in their home and steeled herself for the day ahead. Behind her, she trailed a three-foot ecru veil to match the satin and tulle of her wedding dress. Ahead of her walked her younger sister Ada in a Corinthian green who’d arrived only yesterday with their older brother Pierce. Beside Lily was Marianne, resplendent in a raspberry confection, who had assured her innumerable times that marrying Julian was the most wonderful thing that had happened to her.

But it terrified her. She’d lain awake most of the night, anticipating with delight what might happen in his arms…or dreading what might not happen if he did not come to her.

Early this morning, Marianne had swept into her bedroom, taken one look at her and thrown back her bed linens. “Up! Up! To your bath, woman. He cares for you. Weren’t you sure of that when you went riding with him?”

With a heavy heart, Lily doubted it. “That was before that hideous scene with his father.”

“And after, Julian didn’t walk away from you, did he? No. So, there you are.” From behind her back, Marianne had revealed a bottle of brandy. “I keep it in my room for a nip now and then. A bit of Dutch courage is the answer. You’ll have one shot. Maybe two!”

Lily had drunk three.

“How’s my breath?” she whispered to Marianne as they rounded the first landing.

“Chewing the mint leaves worked.”

“They’d better.” Lily could imagine what the ton would say if the bride were discovered to be tipsy for the nuptials. Two scandal sheets had already speculated “If the American Girl L—H— had urgent reasons to accept the proposal of a certain marquess of C—. She skips her presentation at court to marry. What can compel her?”

My father. That’s who.

He stood at the bottom of the stairs, resplendent in his formal cutaway, his jet-black hair glistening in the morning sunshine streaming through the front glass. “You’re stunning, my darling Lily.”

She took the last few steps down in the comfort of his smile. “I hope this service is short.”

He patted her hand and looped her arm through his. “Chelton assures me it is.”

She gazed down the hall toward the ballroom. Two footmen stood aside the closed doors. The guests there totaled two hundred and ten. The prospect of greeting each of them made her stomach quake. She’d requested an intimate affair, but her father had insisted that only a large one, a lavish one, would hush any of the tattlers. Lily had succumbed to his intentions, wishing no arguments.

“Lily’s the most glorious bride, isn’t she, Papa?” Ada, at eighteen and fresh to London, was atwitter with excitement for the day and every aspect of her own future. With her curly cinnamon hair and grass-green eyes, she was a bubbly creature whom everyone adored.

“I’m proud of her,” he answered Ada, but his attention went to Lily. “Never forget that.”

I won’t. She lifted her chin.

Pierce at twenty-seven was the younger version of their father, strapping and virile.

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