Chapter 37

CHAPTER 37

L ady Lavinia was gorgeous, just as she always had been, and Seth lost his breath at the sight of her.

She was dressed in a gown that was entirely wrong for her—rose-colored, rather than any of the colors he had advised her to wear. The fit wasn’t right either. It looked as if they had tried, but if Seth had guessed, he would have imagined that this was something her father had seen in a shop and purchased.

It looked like the sort of gown that might be lovely on a dressmaker’s dummy. It just wasn’t that well suited to Lady Lavinia. Not as well as the gowns he had chosen for her when they had been to town together.

Even so, she was lovely. It was remarkable how she managed to look so beautiful in almost anything. It was remarkable, too, how fortunate he was that no one else seemed to have noticed that fact. There were plenty of ladies who garnered attention from every gentleman who crossed their path, but Lady Lavinia wasn’t one of them, and that was Seth’s good luck.

He wanted to run to her and fold her into an embrace, but he couldn’t, of course. Even if her father hadn’t been standing right there beside her, he couldn’t have done that. It would have been a mistake, after the way things had ended between them the last time they had seen one another. Seth didn’t even know whether or not she would be glad he was here. All he could do was hope.

“Lady Lavinia,” he said. “It’s so good to see you.”

“What are you doing here?” she asked him.

“I came because…” He hesitated. Lord Hennington had intended to propose to her. What if that had already happened? What if she was already engaged to be married?

I told myself I would do this. No matter what. I’m going to tell her how I feel.

He drew a breath. “I haven’t been able to stop thinking about you, Lady Lavinia,” he said. “Ever since—ever since the last time we spoke, in the garden.” He glanced at her brother. He wouldn’t reveal the kiss—he didn’t want to get her into any trouble with her father—but he had to wonder whether her brother would mention it.

But her brother said nothing, and his face gave nothing away. Seth had no idea if he was still angry, or if he had foreseen what Seth was about to do and approved of it. Either way, Seth knew he had no choice but to go ahead.

“I’ve thought about you too,” Lady Lavinia admitted in a low voice. “But you said it was important that we not try to see one another again. You said—and I promised—that it would be the last time we’d spend time together.”

“I know what I said,” Seth told her.

“So why are you here now?”

“Because I was wrong. I was wrong about all of it. I don’t know if I can live without you, and I do know that I don’t want to, Lady Lavinia. I want you to forget everything I’ve ever told you. I want you to marry me, if I’m not too late.”

Lady Lavinia stared at him as if she had never seen him before.

“You don’t want to marry me,” she whispered. “It’s the worst thing you can imagine. That’s what you said.”

“That was crazy. I should never have said that. It wasn’t the truth,” he told her. “The truth is that you’re exactly right for me, and I saw it from the start. It scared me. I knew that if I let you into my heart and anything went wrong, I would be destroyed, and I was too cowardly to face that. But even though I’m afraid of losing you, I’m even more afraid of the idea of never having you at all because I couldn’t tell you what you mean to me.

I had to come here. I know you’re expecting another proposal. Maybe you’ve even already received it, and I’m too late. If that’s the case, I’ll have to live with it. But I had to come here, because if there was even a chance that you’d be willing to have me, I had to try.”

He looked around the room to see what kind of reaction his words were provoking.

No one seemed to know what to say.

Lord Feverton was staring at Seth as if he was speaking a language he couldn’t understand. Lavinia’s elder brother had a faint smile on his face, but Seth didn’t know whether that was because he was happy to see what was happening or if he was simply laughing at Seth. Lavinia herself was wide-eyed and silent.

The only person giving anything away was Lady Edwina. She was smiling from ear to ear, and it was impossible to mistake the joy on her face for anything else. Seth couldn’t say for sure what anybody else was thinking or feeling, but she, at least, was glad to see him here.

He wondered why. How much did she know?

He cleared his throat. “If Lord Hennington has already proposed…”

“He has,” Lady Lavinia said, and for a moment Seth felt as if he was drowning. “But…that isn’t going to happen.”

“You turned him down?”

“I told him I didn’t love him,” Lady Lavinia explained. “He’s like me. He wanted to marry for love.”

“Like me as well, then.”

“You didn’t want to marry at all.”

“But don’t you see? You changed all that for me,” Seth said earnestly. “You’re right. I didn’t want to marry—until I met you, Lady Lavinia. And now my world is different. Now I know that if I have to live without you, everything will be a pale imitation of what it could be. If you aren’t going to marry Lord Hennington, I beg you to consider me as an alternative.”

He held his breath, knowing that he had said all he could. Now all that he could do was wait to see if Lady Lavinia would accept him.

She frowned, looking him up and down, and her words from the garden rang in his ears. I don’t want to marry him .

Had she meant that? Would she send him away now?

“I don’t know what to say,” she said.

“Tell me what you’re thinking.”

“I don’t know how I can say yes to you now, after everything you put me through,” she said. “I think you’ve known for a while how I feel about you. You’ve known that I admire you. Perhaps I even love you.

“And you’ve known that love was exactly what I was looking for. Still, you were more than clear with me about the fact that there could be nothing between the two of us. No love. No future. How many times did you make that clear?”

His heart sank. He knew she was right.

“Perhaps you are too late,” she whispered. “But if you are, it has nothing to do with Lord Hennington. Perhaps you and I have simply been through too much for me to believe that you could want anything to do with me now.”

“I’ve always wanted you,” Seth told her. “Always. Right from the start, what I saw in you was different from anything I’ve ever seen in anybody else. I held you at arm’s length because I knew you were having an effect on me, and I didn’t know what to make of it. I wanted to resist you.

“Now I know I never had a chance, and I’m glad I didn’t. Even if you reject me now, Lady Lavinia, even if you laugh in my face and send me away and never speak to me again—even then, I’ll be glad I came here today. I’ll be glad I told you the truth about the way I feel for you.”

He started to turn toward the door.

“Wait,” Lady Lavinia said.

Seth turned back, hope rising within him.

“Of course I don’t want you to go,” she said quietly. “Of course I don’t want that, Your Grace. Did you really think there was any chance I would reject you today?”

“You would be within your rights if you had, Seth said. “I’ve made you believe that I didn’t care for you. It’s like you said—if you couldn’t trust me now, if it was too late for me to earn your love, I would understand.”

“You’re a fool to have taken this long,” Lady Lavinia told him, her eyes filling with tears.

“I am a fool,” he agreed. “I am the world’s biggest fool.”

“But I’m not going to deny myself love because the gentleman I’ve fallen in love with is foolish,” she murmured. “We all have our flaws, don’t we?”

“I suppose we do.”

“If you can fall in love with an awkward wallflower, I can love a fool.”

“No,” he told her. “That may have described who you once were, but no longer. You are not an awkward wallflower anymore. You are beautiful and charming, and you know exactly how to speak up about what you want and what you believe. I don’t think I’d find another lady like you if I spent the rest of my life searching.”

He crossed the room and took her in his arms at last, ignoring the fact that her father was standing there watching. Nothing would keep them apart. Not anymore.

“Tell me you’ll marry me,” he murmured.

“Of course I’ll marry you.” Her face shone. “Did you really doubt it?”

“I really did.”

“Never doubt my feelings for you,” she told him. “Never doubt that they are real. I love you, Your Grace.”

He laughed. “If we’re going to be married, you ought to call me by my name. Call me Seth.”

She nodded and spoke his name for the first time. “Seth.”

It sounded so beautiful on her lips. The sound of it made him shiver with anticipation at the thought of everything that lay ahead for the two of them.

But that thought made him fully conscious, once more, of who else was in the room with them. “I suppose I’d better speak to your father about all this,” he murmured. “We’re going to need his permission.”

“I don’t think that’s something you have to worry about,” Lavinia said. “He’s over the moon about it. I can tell already. He thought I was going to remain unmarried for the rest of my days and bring shame to his household.”

Seth laughed. “I don’t think that was something we ever had to worry seriously about,” he said. “If you wanted to marry, you were never going to have any trouble finding a gentleman who would have you. All the work you and I put in…it was never really necessary.”

She beamed.

Seth turned toward Lord Feverton. “We may as well make it official,” he said. “Will you grant me permission to marry your daughter, Lord Feverton?”

“Of course, Your Grace,” Lord Feverton said. He looked more stunned than anybody else in the room. “I can’t believe this is happening—but of course, if that’s what you and she both want. Lavinia, why didn’t you tell me?”

Lavinia didn’t answer her father. She kept her eyes squarely on Seth.

“This is really what you want?” she murmured. “Really and truly?”

“More than anything,” he assured her, allowing his fingertips to graze her cheek.

And this time, Lavinia was the one to initiate the kiss.