(Malloren #9) The Secret Wedding by Jo Beverley

Author:Jo Beverley [Beverley, Jo]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

Christian was glad when Kat put the matter aside. He kept forgetting that he was a married man.

It was one thing for a bachelor to persuade a woman to leave her husband and be his wife in all but name. It was another for a man with a wife to set up a mistress in competition. The situation would be fair to neither woman, but it would be particularly painful for Dorcas, knowing that he loved another.

Loved?

His heart missed a beat, but it was past denying. Hadn’t he just as good as confessed it to her?

He smiled wryly at the flaring irony. The universal snare had caught him at last, just as he’d discovered he was committed to another.

He’d thought his situation was difficult. It was about to become hell. He’d vowed to treat Dorcas as well as possible and his honor would permit nothing less, but thoughts of Kat would come between them anyway.

He wanted to present Kat Hunter, not Dorcas, to the world as his wife. He wanted her to meet his friends, especially Petra, Robin’s wife. They were very different, for Petra was Italian and aristocratic by birth and had a grand manner, while Kat was a down-to-earth Yorkshire woman. Even so, he thought they would like each other.

He wanted to take Kat, not Dorcas, to meet his family at Royle Chart. Kat might even survive that with grace. She had a lively spirit and could speak her mind. There might even be something of his mother in her.

He wanted Kat in his bed every night, not Dorcas Froggatt.

Good thing Adwick lay just ahead, promising the end of this too-intimate journey.

He had to get Kat safely to York and then find his wife. He’d like to believe that the decade-old ceremony was invalid, or there was a legal loophole that would free him, but he didn’t hold much hope. If he truly was married, he saw no choice but to care for Dorcas as best he could.

If she had a child, a son . . . he put that aside for now. There was nothing he could do as yet, and there’d been no sign of that in Froggatt Lane.

His best hope was that she’d want to live apart, but it wouldn’t leave the way open to an honorable future with Kat. And how was that possible with a married woman? He wanted to beat his head against the wall.

If Dorcas wanted to make the marriage real—that felt like a nightmare and he could only pray she wouldn’t demand too much of his heart.

He rode into the yard of the White Hart and arranged stabling for the horses. Kat went with the fierce warrior of Hesse to a bench in a sunny spot against a wall.

There was no ticket booth here, and they’d have to wait for a coach to have seats, but coaches passed through fairly often. He hoped one came by soon. Kat seemed as willing as he to wait in silence, and he knew why.

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