The wedding was at half past eleven.
“It is quarter to eleven,” Hastings said grimly. “We have been trying to get you ready for the past two hours. The first footman couldn’t even make you stir. The second you threw across the room. I managed to get you into your morning coat and you had to eject your ill-digested supper all over it.”
“You are joking.” He had no recollection.
“I wish I were. That was an hour ago. Your morning coat is ruined; you’ll need to wear mine. And if you ruin mine, I swear I will set my dogs on you.”
Fitz pressed damp fingers into his temple. It was quite the wrong thing to do: Barbed wires of agony dragged through his brain. He hissed with pain. “Why did you let me get so drunk?”
“I tried to stop you—you nearly broke my nose.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Your behavior last night, Lord Fitzhugh. One of the girls Copley hired ran off, by the way, screaming that she could not possibly perform the unnatural acts you wanted of her.”
Fitz would have laughed if he could. Twenty-four hours ago he’d been a virgin—he might still be one, for all he knew. “That’s impossible,” he muttered weakly.
“It happened,” said Hastings, his expression a mix of impatience, sorrow, and futility. “Enough, you need to pull yourself together. The carriage leaves at eleven—we should have reached the church at eleven.”
Fitz covered his eyes. “Why is this happening to me?”
“I don’t know. I don’t know.” Hastings’s voice caught. His hand clamped hard over Fitz’s shoulder. “What can I do?”
What could he do? What could anyone do?
“Just—leave me alone for now.”
“All right. You have ten minutes.”
Ten minutes.
Fitz buried his face in his hands. How could he pull himself together, when his entire life had fallen apart? Not in ten minutes, that was for certain. Not in a hundred and ten years.
Miraculously the groom’s party arrived before the bride’s party, but only by mere seconds. Hastings tried to get Fitz to run into the church, so that he wouldn’t be seen still outside when the bridal carriage drew up. But Fitz could not have broken into a sprint had someone held a knife at his back.
He pushed away Hastings’s hand. “I’m here. What more do they want?”
The church was only ten minutes by carriage from his new town house. He should have been at the church at least an hour ago, cooling his heels in the vestry until it was time to stand before the altar.
And he would have been, God, he would have been, were he marrying Isabelle. He’d have risen with the sun and made ready before any of the ushers. He’d have been the one knocking on their doors to make sure they got up on time and dressed properly. And had there been loose women at the party to commemorate the end of his bachelorhood, he’d have steered them to his classmates—it was not for him to sully his body the night before his wedding.
But here he was, sullied, ill groomed, and late—and for all that, more than good enough for the ceremony that would seal the sale of his name and, eventually, his person.
A relentlessly bright sun made his head pound harder. The air in London was nearly perpetually dirty—sometimes one could taste the grit. But all the torrential rains from his dreary final week of freedom had washed it clean. The sky was a wide-open, cloudless blue, stupidly lovely, perfect for any wedding except his own.
Miles of white organza had been jammed into the interior of the church. Thousands of lilies of the valley, too, their smell thick as incense. His still-fragile stomach shuddered.
The pews were seated to capacity. As he started down the aisle, a sea of faces turned toward him, accompanied by a roar of whispers—no doubt comments on his almost unforgivable tardiness.
Yet as he progressed toward the altar, row by row, they fell silent. What did they see on his face? Revulsion? Grief? Wretchedness?
He could see nothing before him.
Then all he could see was Isabelle, rising from her seat in the pews and turning toward him.
He stopped and stared. Her eyes were red and puffy, her cheeks sharp, her skin pale as ice—and she was beautiful beyond measure.
She gazed back at him. Her lips parted and formed the words Run away with me.
Why not? Let Henley Park rot. Let his creditors stew. And let the Graveses find someone else to shackle to their daughter. This was his life. And he would live it as he pleased.
All he had to do was stretch out his hand. They’d find their own place and forge their own destiny, take life by the horns and wrestle it to the ground.
He lifted his hand an inch, then another. Forget honor, forget duty, forget everything he’d been brought up to be. All they needed was love.
Love would make a pariah of her. She would lose her family, her friends, and all her prospects. And should something happen to him before they both came of age—he’d have condemned her for life.