Page 86 of My Fair Lord

“Maybe I’ll come visit you. I’m sure Lord Stretford would be overjoyed to associate with an earl. That is, if he hasn’t decided to end our engagement before it is even formally announced.”

“Engagement?” Ned stared at her, aghast. The vein in his temple began to pulsate.

“That’s why he is in New York. My father told me it had been settled as soon as I arrived at the hotel. They are intending to announce it as soon as possible.” She bit her lip and dropped her head. “So, you see, the whole wager was irrelevant after all.”

Ned looked at her, feeling sick. “When you kissed me in the carriage, you already knew you weren’t free to do so.”

Florence looked stricken. “I shouldn’t have but it was a moment of weakness. Of selfishness. I told you the truth: I wanted a memory of someone I like kissing me. My father promised me he wouldn’t reveal the engagement until after the ball. That’s why I didn’t tell you Lord Stretford was going to be there.”

Ned put his hands to his lips and stared out of the window. His stomach churned as if he were still being tossed across the Atlantic Ocean. Would he have kissed her if he had known? His sense of honour wanted to say he wouldn’t. His sense of honesty knew he would have done it like a shot and damn Stretford.

“I don’t think I’d want you to visit me in Yorkshire. I’d gladly have Miss Wakechild as a guest, but never Lady Stretford.”

“Oh.”

He turned around to look at Florence. Her expression was pensive and he wanted to reach out and kiss the lips that she was worrying with her teeth. Rational thought and caution flew out of the window. He reached for her hand and she allowed him to take it.

“Because I would be spending every moment reliving our kiss in my mind and heart, and eating myself alive with regret that you were not free to kiss me again. Because I love you, Florence.”

“You love me?”

He’d been hoping that she might return the words, but she just stared at him, eyes wide.

“More than anything. Not only that, but I’m in love with you. I know I shouldn’t speak but I can’t remain silent. Call it a moment of weakness. Of selfishness. I would never forgive myself if I didn’t tell you. Even though everything feels hopeless now.”

He sat back, weary beyond measure.

“We’ve made rather a mess of matters, haven’t we?” Florence said quietly, in what Ned considered to be the world’s largest understatement.

“I think we have,” he agreed.

Florence stood. “I need to go. I have to speak to my father. Somehow I have to explain the whole thing from start to finish. I’ll still pay you the fee we agreed,” she added. “Come by the hotel later today.”

Ned waved a hand. “I won’t take it.”

She stood hesitantly in the doorway. A waitress approached.

“Can I help you, miss?”

Florence smiled at her. “No, thank you. I’m not sure what help anyone can give me now.”

She glanced at Ned then left.

He sat back and drank his tea. It was mediocre at best, but he didn’t care. Florence was engaged. Whatever he had hoped might happen was beyond him. He should have told her he loved her as soon as he realised. Told her the truth too. It might not have made a difference but he would never know.

ChapterTwenty-Four

After paying for the tea, Ned presented himself at the door of Sturges-Lake, Shote, and Lake, Attorneys at Law, and asked to speak to Mr Macallister. Shortly after that, he was escorted into an office to speak with Mr Hiram Sturges-Lake himself. The signet ring and watch inscription acted as enough validation of his identity. Within ten minutes, he had been shown a telegram from the firm of solicitors which his family had used for generations. It confirmed that Mary, Dowager Countess of Ayesgarth, had indeed given birth to a daughter and owing to the lack of a son, the title had passed to Ned.

“May I offer you my sincere congratulations, Lord Ayesgarth.”

The address was like a punch in the guts. The urge to refuse the title was still there. Could he do it? If his father had officially disowned him, it would never have been an issue. Florence’s words came back to him. He was too brave to run away.

Was he?

“It’s been quite a quest to locate you, your lordship, if you’ll permit me the liberty,” Sturges-Lake said with a manner that suggested he didn’t much care whether or not Ned was going to permit it. “I believe my associate in Great Britain only discovered you were heading to America thanks to a friend of yours in Liverpool who said you were travelling with a party called Wakechild.”

“That would be a Mr Van Hoon?” Ned asked.