The Bridgertons Happily Ever After

Violet in Bloom


Romance novels, by definition, wrap up neatly. The hero and heroine have pledged their love, and it is clear that this happy ending will be forever. This means, however, that an author can’t write a true sequel; if I brought back the same hero and heroine from a previous book, I’d have to put the previous happy ending in jeopardy before assuring them of another.

So romance series are instead collections of spin-offs, with secondary characters returning to star in their own novels, and previous protagonists popping by occasionally when needed. Rarely does an author get the chance to take a character and watch her grow over many books.

This was what made Violet Bridgerton so special. When she first appeared in The Duke and I, she was a fairly two-dimensional, standard Regency mama. But over the course of eight books, she became so much more. With each Bridgerton novel, something new was revealed, and by the time I finished On the Way to the Wedding, she had become my favorite character in the series. Readers clamored for me to write a happy ending for Violet, but I couldn’t. Truly, I couldn’t—I really don’t think I could write a hero good enough for her. But I, too, wanted to learn more about Violet, and it was a labor of love to write “Violet in Bloom.” I hope you enjoy it.


Violet in Bloom:

A Novella


Surrey, England

1774

“Violet Elizabeth! What on earth do you think you’re doing?”

At the sound of her governess’s outraged voice, Violet Ledger paused, considering her options. There seemed little chance she could plead complete innocence; she had been caught red-handed, after all.

Or rather, purple-handed. She was clutching a breathtakingly aromatic blackberry pie, and the still-warm filling had started to ooze over the lip of the pan.

“Violet . . .” came Miss Fernburst’s stern voice.

She could say that she was hungry. Miss Fernburst knew well enough that Violet was mad for sweets. It was not entirely out of the realm of possibility that she might abscond with an entire pie, to be eaten . . .

Where? Violet thought quickly. Where would one go with an entire blackberry pie? Not back to her room; she’d never be able to hide the evidence. Miss Fernburst would never believe Violet was dumb enough to do that.

No, if she were stealing a pie in order to eat it, she would take it outside. Which was precisely where she’d been going. Although not exactly to eat a pie.

She might make a truth of this lie yet.

“Would you like some pie, Miss Fernburst?” Violet asked sweetly. She smiled and batted her eyes, well aware that despite her eight and a half years, she didn’t look a day over six. Most of the time she found this vexing—no one liked to be thought a baby, after all. But she was not above using her petite stature to her advantage when the situation warranted.

“I’m having a picnic,” Violet added for clarification.

“With whom?” Miss Fernburst asked suspiciously.

“Oh, my dollies. Mette and Sonia and Francesca and Fiona Marie and . . .” Violet rattled off a whole list of names, making them up as she went along. She did have a rather absurd number of dollies. As the only child in her generation, despite having a raft of aunts and uncles, she was showered with presents on a regular basis. Someone was always coming to visit them in Surrey—the proximity to London was simply too convenient for anyone to resist—and it seemed dollies were the gift du jour.

Violet smiled. Miss Fernburst would have been proud of her, thinking in French. It was really too bad there was no way to show it off.

“Miss Violet,” Miss Fernburst said sternly, “you must return that pie to the kitchen at once.”

“All of it?”

“Of course you must return all of it,” Miss Fernburst said in an exasperated voice. “You don’t even have a utensil with which to cut yourself a piece. Or consume it.”

True. But Violet’s ambitions for the pie had not required utensils of any kind. She was already in deep, though, so she dug herself further in by replying, “I couldn’t carry it all. I was planning to go back for a spoon.”

“And leave the pie in the garden for the crows to ravage?”

“Well, I hadn’t really thought of that.”

“Hadn’t really thought of what?” came the deep, booming voice that could only belong to her father. Mr. Ledger walked closer. “Violet, what on earth are you doing in the drawing room with a pie?”

“Precisely what I am presently attempting to ascertain,” Miss Fernburst said stiffly.

“Well . . .” Violet stalled, trying not to glance longingly at the French doors that led to the lawn. She was sunk now. She’d never been able to fib to her father. He saw through everything. She didn’t know how he did it; it must have been something in her eyes.

“She said she was planning a picnic in the garden with her dollies,” Miss Fernburst reported.

“Really.” Not a question, a statement. Her father knew her far too well to make it a question.

Violet nodded. Well, a little nod. Or maybe more of a bob of the chin.

“Because you always feed actual food to your toys,” her father said.

She said nothing.

“Violet,” her father said sternly, “what were you planning to do with that pie?”

“Ehm . . .” Her eyes couldn’t seem to leave a spot on the floor about six feet to her left.

“Violet?”

“It was only going to be a small trap,” she mumbled.

“A small what?”

“A trap. For that Bridgerton boy.”

“For—” Her father chuckled. She could tell he hadn’t meant to, and after he covered his mouth with a hand and a cough, his face was once again stern.

“He’s horrid,” she said, before he could scold her.

“Oh, he’s not so bad.”

“He’s dreadful, Father. You know that he is. And he doesn’t even live here in Upper Smedley. He’s only visiting. You’d think he would know how to behave properly—his father is a viscount, but—”

“Violet . . .”

“He is no gentleman,” she sniffed.

“He’s nine.”

“Ten,” she corrected primly. “And it is my opinion that a ten-year-old ought to know how to be a good houseguest.”

“He’s not our houseguest,” her father pointed out. “He’s visiting the Millertons.”

“Be that as it may,” Violet said, thinking that she’d very much like to cross her arms. But she was still holding that accursed pie.

Her father waited for her to finish the thought. She did not.

“Give the pie to Miss Fernburst,” her father ordered.

“Being a good houseguest means that you don’t behave horridly to the neighbors,” Violet protested.

“The pie, Violet.”

She handed it to Miss Fernburst, who, in all truth, didn’t look like she much wanted it. “Shall I take it back to the kitchen?” the governess inquired.

“Please do,” Violet’s father said.

Violet waited until Miss Fernburst had disappeared around the corner, then she looked up at her father with a disgruntled expression. “He put flour in my hair, Father.”

“Flowers?” he echoed. “Don’t young girls like that sort of thing?”

“Flour, Father! Flour! The kind one uses to bake cakes! Miss Fernburst had to wash my hair for twenty minutes just to get it out. And don’t you laugh!”

“I’m not!”

“You are,” she accused. “You want to. I can see it in your face.”

“I’m merely wondering how the young fellow managed it.”

“I don’t know,” Violet ground out. Which was the worst insult of all. He’d managed to cover her with finely ground flour and she still didn’t know how he’d done it. One minute she’d been walking in the garden, and the next she’d tripped and . . .

Poof! Flour everywhere.

“Well,” her father said matter-of-factly, “I believe he’s leaving at the week’s end. So you won’t have to endure his presence for very much longer. If at all,” he added. “We’re not expecting to visit with the Millertons this week, are we?”

“We weren’t expecting to visit with them yesterday,” Violet replied, “and he still managed to flour me.”

“How do you know it was he?”

“Oh, I know,” she said darkly. As she was sputtering and coughing and batting at the flour cloud, she’d heard him cackling in triumph. If she hadn’t had so much flour in her eyes, she probably would have seen him, too, grinning in that awful boy way of his.

“He seemed perfectly pleasant when he and Georgie Millerton came for tea on Monday.”

“Not when you weren’t in the room.”

“Oh. Well . . .” Her father paused, his lips pursing thoughtfully. “I’m sorry to have to say it, but it’s a lesson in life you’ll learn soon enough. Boys are horrid.”

Violet blinked. “But . . . but . . .”

Mr. Ledger shrugged. “I’m sure your mother will agree.”

“But you’re a boy.”

“And I was horrid, I assure you. Ask your mother.”

Violet stared at him in disbelief. It was true that her parents had known each other since they were small children, but she could not believe that her father would ever have behaved badly toward her mother. He was so kind and thoughtful to her now. He was always kissing her hand and smiling at her with his eyes.

“He probably likes you,” Mr. Ledger said. “The Bridgerton boy,” he clarified, as if that were necessary.

Violet let out a horrified gasp. “He does not.”

“Perhaps not,” her father said agreeably. “Perhaps he is simply horrid. But he probably thinks you’re pretty. That’s what boys do when they think a girl is pretty. And you know I think you’re uncommonly pretty.”

“You’re my father,” she said, giving him a bit of a look. Everyone knew that fathers were required to think their daughters were pretty.

“I’ll tell you what,” he said, leaning down and touching her gently on the chin. “If that Bridgerton boy—what did you say his name was, again?”

“Edmund.”

“Edmund, right, of course. If Edmund Bridgerton bothers you again, I shall personally call upon him to defend your honor.”

“A duel?” Violet breathed, every inch of her tingling with horrified delight.

“To the death,” her father confirmed. “Or perhaps just a stern talking-to. I’d really rather not go to the gallows for running through a nine-year-old boy.”

“Ten,” Violet corrected.

“Ten. You do seem to know a lot about young Master Bridgerton.”

Violet opened her mouth to defend herself because, after all, it wasn’t as if she could have avoided knowing a few things about Edmund Bridgerton; she’d been forced to sit in the same drawing room with him for two hours on Monday. But she could tell that her father was teasing her. If she said anything more, he’d never stop.

“May I go back to my room now?” she asked primly.

Her father nodded his assent. “But there will be no pie for pudding this evening.”

Violet’s mouth fell open. “But—”

“No arguments, if you please. You were quite prepared to sacrifice the pie this afternoon. It doesn’t seem right that you should have some now that you’ve been thwarted.”

Violet clamped her lips together in a mutinous line. She gave a stiff nod, then marched away toward the stairs. “I hate Edmund Bridgerton,” she muttered.

“What was that?” her father called out.

“I hate Edmund Bridgerton!” she yelled. “And I don’t care who knows it!”

Her father laughed, which only made her more furious.

Boys really were horrid. But especially Edmund Bridgerton.

London

Nine years later

“I tell you, Violet,” Miss Mary Filloby said with unconvincing certitude, “it is a good thing we are not raving beauties. It would make everything so complicated.”

Complicated how? Violet wanted to ask. Because from where she was sitting (at the wall, with the wallflowers, watching the girls who weren’t wallflowers), ravishing beauty didn’t seem like such a bad thing.

But she didn’t bother to ask. She didn’t need to. Mary would take only one breath before imploring:

“Look at her. Look at her!”

Violet was already looking at her.

“She’s got eight men at her side,” Mary said, her voice an odd combination of awe and disgust.

“I count nine,” Violet murmured.

Mary crossed her arms. “I refuse to include my own brother.”

Together they sighed, all four of their eyes on Lady Begonia Dixon, who, with her rosebud mouth, sky blue eyes, and perfectly sloped shoulders, had enchanted the male half of London society within days of her arrival in town. Her hair was probably glorious, too, Violet thought disgruntledly. Thank heavens for wigs. Truly, they were the great levelers, allowing girls with dishwater blond hair to compete with the ones with the shiny, curly locks of gold.

Not that Violet minded her dishwater blond hair. It was perfectly acceptable. And shiny, even. Just not curly or gold.

“How long have we been sitting here?” Mary wondered aloud.

“Three quarters of an hour,” Violet estimated.

“That long?”

Violet nodded glumly. “I’m afraid so.”

“There aren’t enough men,” Mary said. Her voice had lost its edge, and she sounded somewhat deflated. But it was true. There weren’t enough men. Too many had gone off to fight in the Colonies, and far too many had not come back. Add to that the complication that was Lady Begonia Dixon (nine men lost to the rest of them right there, Violet thought morosely), and the shortage was dire indeed.

“I have danced only once all night,” Mary said. There was a pause, then: “And you?”

“Twice,” Violet admitted. “But once was with your brother.”

“Oh. Well, then that doesn’t count.”

“Yes, it does,” Violet shot back. Thomas Filloby was a gentleman with two legs and all his teeth, and as far as she was concerned, he counted.

“You don’t even like my brother.”

There was nothing to say that wasn’t rude or a lie, so Violet just did a funny little motion with her head that could be interpreted either way.

“I wish you had a brother,” Mary said.

“So he could ask you to dance?”

Mary nodded.

“Sorry.” Violet waited a moment, expecting Mary to say, “It’s not your fault,” but Mary’s attention had finally been ripped from Lady Begonia Dixon, and she was presently squinting at someone over by the lemonade table.

“Who’s that?” Mary asked.

Violet cocked her head to the side. “The Duke of Ashbourne, I believe.”

“No, not him,” Mary said impatiently. “The one next to him.”

Violet shook her head. “I don’t know.” She couldn’t get a very good look at the gentleman in question, but she was quite sure she didn’t know him. He was tall, although not overly so, and he stood with the athletic grace of a man who was perfectly at ease in his own body. She didn’t need to see his face up close to know that he was handsome. Because even if he wasn’t elegant, even if his face was no Michelangelo’s dream, he would still be handsome.

He was confident, and men with confidence were always handsome.

“He’s new,” Mary said assessingly.

“Give him a few minutes,” Violet said in a dry voice. “He’ll find Lady Begonia in due course.”

But the gentleman in question didn’t seem to notice Lady Begonia, remarkable as that seemed. He loitered by the lemonade table, drinking six cups, then ambled over to the refreshments, where he gobbled down an astonishing amount of food. Violet wasn’t sure why she was following his progress through the room, except that he was new, and she was bored.

And he was young. And handsome.

But mostly because she was bored. Mary had been asked to dance by her third cousin, and so Violet had been left alone in her wallflower’s chair, with nothing to do besides count the number of canapés the new gentleman had eaten.

Where was her mother? Surely it was time to leave. The air was thick, and she was hot, and it didn’t look as if she was going to gain a third dance, and—

“Hullo!” came a voice. “I know you.”

Violet blinked, looking up. It was him! The ravenously hungry, twelve-canapé-eating gentleman.

She had no idea who he was.

“You’re Miss Violet Ledger,” he said.

Miss Ledger, actually, since she had no older sister, but she didn’t correct him. His use of her full name seemed to indicate that he had known her for some time, or perhaps had known her quite a long time ago.

“I’m sorry,” she murmured, because she’d never been good at faking an acquaintance, “I . . .”

“Edmund Bridgerton,” he said with an easy grin. “I met you years ago. I was visiting George Millerton.” He glanced around the room. “I say, have you seen him? He’s supposed to be here.”

“Er, yes,” Violet replied, somewhat taken aback by Mr. Bridgerton’s gregarious amiability. People in London weren’t generally so friendly. Not that she minded friendly. It was just that she’d grown rather un-used to it.

“We were supposed to meet,” Mr. Bridgerton said absently, still looking this way and that.

Violet cleared her throat. “He’s here. I danced with him earlier.”

Mr. Bridgerton considered this for a moment, then plopped down in the chair next to her. “I don’t think I’ve seen you since I was ten.”

Violet was still trying to recollect.

He grinned at her sideways. “I got you with my flour bomb.”

She gasped. “That was you?”

He grinned again. “Now you remember.”

“I’d forgotten your name,” she said.

“I’m crushed.”

Violet twisted in her seat, smiling despite herself. “I was so angry . . .”

He started to laugh. “You should have seen your face.”

“I couldn’t see anything. I had flour in my eyes.”

“I was surprised you never exacted revenge.”

“I tried,” she assured him. “My father caught me.”

He nodded, as if he had some experience with this particular brand of frustration. “I hope it was something magnificent.”

“I believe it involved pie.”

He nodded approvingly.

“It would have been brilliant,” she told him.

He quirked a brow. “Strawberry?”

“Blackberry,” she said, her voice diabolical with only the memory of it.

“Even better.” He sat back, making himself comfortable. There was something so loose and limber about him, as if he fit smoothly into any situation. His posture was as correct as any gentleman’s, and yet . . .

He was different.

Violet wasn’t sure how to describe it, but there was something about him that put her at ease. He made her feel happy. Free.

Because he was. It took only a minute at his side to realize that he was the most happy and free person she would ever meet.

“Did you ever find the opportunity to put your weapon to use?” he asked.

She looked at him quizzically.

“The pie,” he reminded her.

“Oh. No. My father would have had my head. And besides that, there was no one to attack.”

“Surely you could have found a reason to go after Georgie,” Mr. Bridgerton said.

“I don’t attack without provocation,” Violet said with what she hoped was a teasingly arch smile, “and Georgie Millerton never floured me.”

“A fair-minded lady,” Mr. Bridgerton said. “The very best kind.”

Violet felt her cheeks turn ridiculously warm. Thank heavens the sun had nearly gone down and there wasn’t much light coming through the windows. With just the flickering candles to light the room, he might not realize just how pink her face had gone.

“No brother or sister to earn your ire?” Mr. Bridgerton asked. “It does seem a shame to let a perfectly good pie go to waste.”

“If I recall correctly,” Violet replied, “it didn’t go to waste. Everyone had some for pudding that night except me. And anyway, I don’t have any brothers or sisters.”

“Really?” His brow furrowed. “Strange that I don’t remember that about you.”

“Do you remember much?” she asked dubiously. “Because I . . .”

“Don’t?” he finished for her. He chuckled. “Don’t worry. I take no insult. I never forget a face. It’s a gift and a curse.”

Violet thought of all the times—right now included—that she’d not known the name of the person in front of her. “How could such a thing be a curse?”

He leaned toward her with a flirtatious tilt of his head. “One gets one’s heart broken, you know, when the pretty ladies don’t remember one’s name.”

“Oh!” She felt her face flush. “I’m so sorry, but you must realize, it was so long ago, and—”

“Stop,” he said, laughing. “I jest.”

“Oh, of course.” She ground her teeth together. Of course he was teasing. How could she have been such a dolt as to not realize it. Although . . .

Had he just called her pretty?

“You were saying you have no siblings,” he said, expertly returning the conversation to its previous spot. And for the first time, she felt as if she held his full attention. He didn’t have one eye on the crowd, idly scanning for George Millerton. He was looking at her, right into her eyes, and it was terrifyingly spectacular.

She swallowed, remembering his question about two seconds too late for smooth conversation. “No siblings,” she said, her voice coming out too fast to make up for her delay. “I was a difficult child.”

His eyes widened, almost thrillingly. “Really?”

“No, I mean, I was a difficult baby. To be born.” Good heavens, where had her verbal skills gone? “The doctor told my mother not to have more.” She swallowed miserably, determined to find her brain again. “And you?”

“And me?” he teased.

“Do you have siblings?”

“Three. Two sisters and a brother.”

The thought of three extra people in her often lonely childhood suddenly sounded marvelous. “Are you close?” she asked.

He thought about that for a moment. “I suppose I am. I’ve never really thought about it. Hugo’s quite my opposite, but I would still consider him my closest friend.”

“And your sisters? Are they younger or older?”

“One of each. Billie’s got seven years on me. She’s finally got herself married, so I don’t see much of her, but Georgiana’s just a bit younger. She’s probably your age.”

“Is she not here in London, then?”

“She’ll be out next year. My parents claim they’re still recovering from Billie’s debut.”

Violet felt her eyebrows rise, but she knew she shouldn’t—

“You can ask,” he told her.

“What did she do?” she said immediately.

He leaned in with a conspiratorial gleam. “I never got all the details, but I did hear something about a fire.”

Violet sucked in her breath—in shock and admiration.

“And a broken bone,” he added.

“Oh, the poor thing.”

“Not her broken bone.”

Violet smothered a laugh. “Oh no. I shouldn’t—”

“You can laugh,” he told her.

She did. It burst out of her, loud and lovely, and when she realized people were staring at her, she didn’t care.

They sat together for a few moments, the silence between them as companionable as a sunrise. Violet kept her eyes on the lords and ladies dancing in front of her; somehow she knew that if she dared to turn and look at Mr. Bridgerton, she’d never be able to look away.

The music drew to a close, but when she looked down, her toes were tapping. His, too, and then—

“I say, Miss Ledger, would you like to dance?”

She turned then, and she did look at him. And it was true, she realized; she wasn’t going to be able to look away. Not from his face, and not from the life that stretched in front of her, as perfect and lovely as that blackberry pie from so many years ago.

She took his hand and it felt like a promise. “There is nothing I would rather do.”

Somewhere in Sussex

Six months later

“Where are we going?”

Violet Bridgerton had been Violet Bridgerton for precisely eight hours and thus far she was liking her new surname very much.

“Oh, it’s a surprise,” Edmund said, grinning wolfishly at her from across the carriage.

Well, not exactly from across the carriage. She was practically in his lap.

And . . . now she was in his lap.

“I love you,” he said, laughing over her squeal of surprise.

“Not as much as I love you.”

He gave her his best look of condescension. “You only think you know what you’re talking about.”

She smiled. It was not the first time they had had this conversation.

“Very well,” he allowed. “You may love me more, but I will love you better.” He waited a moment. “Aren’t you going to ask what that means?”

Violet thought of all the ways he had loved her already. They had not preempted their marriage vows, but they had not been precisely chaste.

She decided she had better not ask. “Just tell me where we are going,” she said instead.

He laughed, letting one of his arms steal around her. “On our honeymoon,” he murmured, his words falling warm and delicious over her skin.

“But where?”

“All in good time, my dear Mrs. Bridgerton. All in good time.”

She tried to scoot back over to her own side of the carriage—it was, she reminded herself, the proper thing to do—but he was having none of it, and he clamped down with his arm. “Where do you think you’re going?” he growled.

“That’s just the thing. I don’t know!”

Edmund laughed at that, big and hearty and so perfectly, splendidly warm. He was so happy. He made her happy. Her mother had declared that he was too young, that Violet should look for a more mature gentleman, preferably one who had already come into his title. But from that first shining moment on the dance floor, when her hand met his and she took her first true look into his eyes, Violet could not imagine a life with anyone but Edmund Bridgerton.

He was her other half, the spoon she was made to nestle into. They would be young together, and then they would grow old together. They would hold hands, and move to the country, and make lots and lots of babies.

No lonely households for her children. She wanted a passel of them. A gaggle. She wanted noise and laughter, and everything Edmund made her feel, with fresh air, and strawberry tarts, and—

Well, and the occasional trip to London. She was not so rustic that she did not wish to have her gowns made by Madame Lamontaine. And of course she could not possibly go a full year without a visit to the opera. But other than that—and a party here and there; she did like company—she wanted motherhood.

She craved it.

But she hadn’t realized how desperately she wanted it until she’d met Edmund. It was as if something inside of her had been holding back, not allowing her to wish for babies until she’d found the only man with whom she could imagine making them.

“We’re almost there,” he said, peeking out the window.

“And that would be . . . ?”

The carriage had already slowed; now it ground to a halt, and Edmund looked up with a knowing grin. “Here,” he finished for her.

The door swung open, and he alighted, holding out his hand to help her down. She stepped carefully—the last thing she wanted was to fall facedown in the dirt on her wedding night—then looked up.

“The Hare and Hounds?” she asked blankly.

“The very one,” he said proudly. As if there weren’t a hundred inns spread across England that looked precisely the same.

She blinked. Several times. “An inn?”

“Indeed.” He leaned down to speak conspiratorially in her ear. “I suppose you’re wondering why I’ve chosen such a spot.”

“Well . . . yes.” Not that there was anything wrong with an inn. It certainly looked well kept from the outside. And if he had brought her here, it must be clean and comfortable.

“Here’s the rub,” he said, bringing her hand to his lips. “If we go home, I shall have to introduce you to all of the servants. Of course there are only six, but still . . . their feelings will be terribly injured if we do not lavish the appropriate amount of attention on them.”

“Of course,” Violet said, still a little awed by the fact that she would soon be mistress of her own home. Edmund’s father had given him a snug little manor house but one month earlier. It wasn’t large, but it was theirs.

“Not to mention,” Edmund added, “that when we don’t come down to breakfast tomorrow, or the next . . .” He paused for a moment, as if pondering something terribly important, before finishing with “or the next . . .”

“We won’t be coming down to breakfast?”

He looked her in the eye. “Oh no.”

Violet blushed. Right down to the tips of her toes.

“Not for a week, at least.”

She swallowed, trying to ignore the heady curls of anticipation that were unraveling within her.

“So you see,” he said with a slow smile, “if we spent a week, or really, perhaps two—”

“Two weeks?” she squeaked.

He shrugged endearingly. “It’s possible.”

“Oh my.”

“You’d be so terribly embarrassed in front of the servants.”

“But not you,” she said.

“It’s not the sort of thing men find embarrassing,” he said modestly.

“But here at an inn . . .” she said.

“We can remain in our room all month if we wish, and then never visit again!”

“A month?” she echoed. At this point she could not be sure if she had blushed or paled.

“I’ll do it if you will,” he said devilishly.

“Edmund!”

“Oh, very well, I suppose there might be a thing or two for which we will have to show our faces before Easter.”

“Edmund . . .”

“That’s Mr. Bridgerton to you.”

“So formal?”

“Only because it means I get to call you Mrs. Bridgerton.”

It was remarkable, how he could make her so ridiculously happy with a single sentence.

“Shall we head inside?” he asked, lifting her hand as a prompt. “Are you hungry?”

“Er, no,” she said, even though she was, a little.

“Thank God.”

“Edmund!” she laughed, because by now he was walking so quickly she had to skip to keep up with him.

“Your husband,” he said, drawing up short for the express purpose (she was sure) of making her crash into him, “is a very impatient man.”

“Is that so?” she murmured. She was beginning to feel womanly, powerful.

He didn’t answer; they’d already reached the innkeeper’s desk, and Edmund was confirming the arrangements.

“Do you mind if I don’t carry you up the stairs?” he asked once he was done. “You’re light as a feather, of course, and I’m manly enough—”

“Edmund!”

“It’s just that I’m rather in a rush.”

And his eyes—oh, his eyes—they were filled with a thousand promises, and she wanted to know every one of them.

“I am, too,” she said softly, placing her hand in his. “Rather.”

“Ah, hell,” he said hoarsely, and he scooped her into his arms. “I can’t resist.”

“The threshold would have been enough,” she said, laughing all the way up the stairs.

“Not for me.” He kicked open the door to her room, then tossed her onto the bed so that he could shut and lock it behind them.

He came down atop her, moving with a catlike grace she’d never seen in him before. “I love you,” he said, his lips touching hers as his hands came under her skirt.

“I love you more,” she gasped, because the things he was doing—they ought to be illegal.

“But I . . .” he murmured, kissing his way down to her leg and then—good heavens!—back up again. “I shall love you better.”

Her clothes seemed to fly away, but she felt no modesty. It was astounding, that she could lie beneath this man, that she could watch him watching her, seeing her—all of her—and she felt no shame, no discomfort.

“Oh God, Violet,” he groaned, positioning himself awkwardly between her legs. “I have to tell you, I don’t have a whole lot of experience with this.”

“I don’t, either,” she gasped.

“I’ve never—”

That got her attention. “You’ve never?”

He shook his head. “I think I was waiting for you.”

Her breath caught, and then, with a slow, melting smile, she said, “For someone who’s never, you’re rather good at it.”

For a moment she thought she saw tears in his eyes, but then, just like that, they were gone, replaced by a wicked, wicked twinkle. “I plan to improve with age,” he told her.

“As do I,” she returned, just as slyly.

He laughed, and then she laughed, and they were joined.

And while it was true that they both did get better with age, that first time, up in the Hare and Hounds’s finest feather bed . . .

It was bone-crackingly good.

Aubrey Hall, Kent

Twenty years later

The moment Violet heard Eloise scream, she knew something was dreadfully wrong.

It wasn’t as if her children never yelled. They yelled all the time, generally at each other. But this wasn’t a yell, it was a scream. And it wasn’t born of anger or frustration or a misplaced sense of injustice.

This was a scream of terror.

Violet ran through the house, with speed that ought to have been impossible eight months into her eighth pregnancy. She ran down the stairs, across the great hall. She ran through the entry, down the portico stairs . . .

And all the while, Eloise kept screaming.

“What is it?” she gasped, when she finally spied her seven-year-old daughter’s face. She was standing at the edge of the west lawn, near the entrance to the hedgerow maze, and she was still screaming.

“Eloise,” Violet implored, taking her face in her hands. “Eloise, please, just tell me what is wrong.”

Eloise’s screams gave way to sobs and she planted her hands over her ears, shaking her head over and over.

“Eloise, you must—” Violet’s words broke off sharply. The baby she was carrying was heavy and low, and the pain that shot through her abdomen from all the running hit her like a rock. She took a deep breath, trying to slow her pulse, and placed her hands under her belly, trying to support it from the outside.

“Papa!” Eloise wailed. It was the only word she seemed able to form through her cries.

A cold fist of fear landed in Violet’s chest. “What do you mean?”

“Papa,” Eloise gasped. “Papapapapapapapapapa—”

Violet slapped her. It would be the only time she would ever strike a child.

Eloise’s eyes went wide as she sucked in a huge breath of air. She said nothing, but she turned her head toward the entrance to the maze. And that was when Violet saw it.

A foot.

“Edmund?” she whispered. And then she screamed it.

She ran toward the maze, toward the booted foot that was sticking out of the entrance, attached to a leg, which must be attached to a body, which was lying on the ground.

Not moving at all.

“Edmund, oh Edmund, oh Edmund,” she said, over and over, something between a whimper and a cry.

When she reached his side, she knew. He was gone. He was lying on his back, eyes still open, but there was nothing of him left. He was gone. He was thirty-nine years old, and he was gone.

“What happened?” she whispered, frantically touching him, squeezing his arm, his wrist, his cheek. Her mind knew she could not bring him back, and her heart even knew it, too, but somehow her hands would not accept it. She could not stop touching him . . . poking, prodding, yanking, and all the while sobbing.

“Mama?”

It was Eloise, come up behind her.

“Mama?”

She couldn’t turn around. She couldn’t do it. She couldn’t look at her child’s face, knowing that she was now her only parent.

“It was a bee, Mama. He was stung by a bee.”

Violet went very still. A bee? What did she mean, a bee? Everyone was stung by a bee at some point in their lives. It swelled, it turned red, it hurt.

It didn’t kill you.

“He said it was nothing,” Eloise said, her voice trembling. “He said it didn’t even hurt.”

Violet stared at her husband, her head moving from side to side in denial. How could it not have hurt? It had killed him. She brought her lips together, trying to form a question, trying to make a bloody sound, but all she could get out was, “Wh-wh-wh-wh—” And she didn’t even know what she was trying to ask. When did it happen? What else did he say? Where had they been?

And did it matter? Did any of it matter?

“He couldn’t breathe,” Eloise said. Violet could feel her daughter’s presence growing close, and then, silently, Eloise’s hand slipped into her own.

Violet squeezed it.

“He started making this sound”—Eloise tried to imitate, and it sounded awful—“like he was choking. And then . . . Oh, Mama. Oh, Mama!” She threw herself against Violet’s side, burying her face where there had once been a curve of a hip. But now there was just a belly, a huge, massive belly, with a child who would never know its father.

“I need to sit down,” Violet whispered. “I need to—”

She fainted. Eloise broke her fall.



When Violet came to, she was surrounded by servants. All wore masks of shock and grief. Some could not meet her gaze.

“We need to get you in bed,” the housekeeper said briskly. She looked up. “Have we a pallet?”

Violet shook her head as she allowed a footman to assist her into a sitting position. “No, I can walk.”

“I really think—”

“I said I can walk,” she snapped. And then she snapped on the inside, and something burst inside of her. She took a deep, involuntary breath.

“Let me help you,” the butler said gently. He slid his arm around her back, and carefully helped her to her feet.

“I can’t—but Edmund . . .” She turned to look again, but she couldn’t bring herself to do it. It wasn’t him, she told herself. That’s not how he is.

That’s not how he was.

She swallowed. “Eloise?” she asked.

“Nanny has already brought her up,” the housekeeper said, moving to Violet’s other side.

Violet nodded.

“Ma’am, we must get you to bed. It’s not good for the baby.”

Violet placed her hand on her belly. The baby was kicking like mad. Which was par for the course. This one kicked and punched and rolled and hiccupped and never, ever stopped. It was quite unlike the others. And it was a good thing, she supposed. This one was going to have to be strong.

She choked back a sob. They were both going to have to be strong.

“Did you say something?” the housekeeper asked, steering her toward the house.

Violet shook her head. “I need to lie down,” she whispered.

The housekeeper nodded, then turned to a footman with an urgent stare.

“Send for the midwife.”



She didn’t need the midwife. No one could believe it, given the shock she’d had and the late state of her pregnancy, but the baby refused to budge. Violet spent three more weeks in bed, eating because she had to, and trying to remind herself that she must be strong. Edmund was gone, but she had seven children who needed her, eight including the stubborn one in her belly.

And then finally, after a quick and easy birth, the midwife announced, “It’s a girl,” and placed a tiny, quiet bundle in Violet’s arms.

A girl. Violet couldn’t quite believe it. She’d convinced herself it would be a boy. She would name him Edmund, the A-G alphabetization of her first seven children be damned. He would be called Edmund, and he would look like Edmund, because surely that was the only way she would be able to make sense of all this.

But it was a girl, a pink little thing who hadn’t made a sound since her initial wail.

“Good morning,” Violet said to her, because she didn’t know what else to say. She looked down, and she saw her own face—smaller, a bit rounder—but definitely not Edmund’s.

The baby looked at her, straight into her eyes, even though Violet knew that could not be true. Babies didn’t do that so soon after birth. Violet should know; this was her eighth.

But this one . . . She didn’t seem to realize she wasn’t supposed to stare her mother down. And then she blinked. Twice. She did it with the most startling deliberation, as if to say, I’m here. And I know exactly what I’m doing.

Violet caught her breath, so totally and instantly in love she could hardly bear it. And then the baby let out a cry like nothing she had ever heard. She wailed so hard the midwife jumped. She screamed and screamed and screamed and even as the midwife fussed, and the maids came running in, Violet could do nothing but laugh.

“She’s perfect,” she declared, trying to latch the tiny banshee onto her breast. “She is absolutely perfect.”

“What shall you name her?” the midwife asked, once the baby had busied herself trying to figure out how to nurse.

“Hyacinth,” Violet decided. It was Edmund’s favorite flower, especially the little grape hyacinths that popped up each year to greet the spring. They marked the new birth of the landscape, and this hyacinth—her Hyacinth—she would be Violet’s new birth.

The fact that as an H, she would follow perfectly after Anthony, Benedict, Colin, Daphne, Eloise, Francesca, and Gregory . . . Well, that simply made it all the more perfect.

There was a knock at the door, and Nanny Pickens poked her head in. “The girls would love to see Her Ladyship,” she said to the midwife. “If she’s ready.”

The midwife looked at Violet, who nodded. Nanny ushered her three charges inside with a stern “Remember what we talked about. Do not tire your mother.”

Daphne came over to the bed, followed by Eloise and Francesca. They possessed Edmund’s thick chestnut hair—all of her children did—and Violet wondered if Hyacinth would be the same. Right now she possessed just the tiniest tuft of peachy fuzz.

“Is it a girl?” Eloise asked abruptly.

Violet smiled and changed her position to show off the new baby. “It is.”

“Oh, thank heavens,” Eloise said with a dramatic sigh. “We needed another one.”

Beside her, Francesca nodded. She was what Edmund had always called Eloise’s “accidental twin.” They shared a birthday, the two of them, a year apart. At six, Francesca generally followed Eloise’s lead. Eloise was louder, bolder. But every now and then Francesca would surprise them all and do something that was completely her own.

Not this time, though. She stood beside Eloise, clutching her stuffed doll, agreeing with everything her older sister said.

Violet looked over at Daphne, her oldest girl. She was nearly eleven, certainly old enough to hold a baby. “Do you want to see her?” Violet asked.

Daphne shook her head. She was blinking rapidly, the way she did when she was perplexed, and then all of a sudden she stood up straighter. “You’re smiling,” she said.

Violet looked back down at Hyacinth, who’d dropped off her breast and fallen quite asleep. “I am,” she said, and she could hear it in her voice. She’d forgotten what her voice sounded like with a smile in it.

“You haven’t smiled since Papa died,” Daphne said.

“I haven’t?” Violet looked up at her. Was that possible? She hadn’t smiled in three weeks? It didn’t feel awkward. Her lips formed the curve out of memory, perhaps with just a little bit of relief, as if they were indulging in a happy memory.

“You haven’t,” Daphne confirmed.

She must be right, Violet realized. If she hadn’t managed to smile for her children, she certainly hadn’t done so in solitude. The grief she’d been feeling . . . it had yawned before her, swallowed her whole. It had been a heavy, physical thing, making her tired, holding her down.

No one could smile through that.

“What is her name?” Francesca asked.

“Hyacinth.” Violet shifted her position so the girls could see the baby’s face. “What do you think?”

Francesca tilted her head to the side. “She doesn’t look like a Hyacinth,” Francesca declared.

“Yes, she does,” Eloise said briskly. “She’s very pink.”

Francesca shrugged, conceding the point.

“She’ll never know Papa,” Daphne said quietly.

“No,” Violet said. “No, she won’t.”

No one said anything, and then Francesca—little Francesca—said, “We can tell her about him.”

Violet choked on a sob. She hadn’t cried in front of her children since that very first day. She’d saved her tears for her solitude, but she couldn’t stop them now. “I think—I think that’s a wonderful idea, Frannie.”

Francesca beamed, and then she crawled onto the bed, squirming in until she’d found the perfect spot at her mother’s right side. Eloise followed, and then Daphne, and all of them—all the Bridgerton girls—peered down at the newest member of their family.

“He was very tall,” Francesca began.

“Not so tall,” Eloise said. “Benedict is taller.”

Francesca ignored her. “He was tall. And he smiled a great deal.”

“He held us on his shoulders,” Daphne said, her voice starting to wobble, “until we grew too large.”

“And he laughed,” Eloise said. “He loved to laugh. He had the very best laugh, our papa . . .”

London

Thirteen years later

Violet had made it her life’s work to see all eight of her children happily settled in life, and in general, she did not mind the myriad tasks this entailed. There were parties and invitations and dressmakers and milliners, and that was just the girls. Her sons needed just as much guidance, if not more. The only difference was that society afforded the boys considerably more freedom, which meant that Violet did not need to scrutinize every last detail of their lives.

Of course she tried. She was a mother, after all.

She had a feeling, however, that her job as mother would never be so demanding as it was right at this moment, in the spring of 1815.

She knew very well that in the grand scheme of life, she had nothing about which to complain. In the past six months, Napoleon had escaped Elba, a massive volcano had erupted in the East Indies, and several hundred British soldiers had lost their lives at the Battle of New Orleans—mistakenly fought after the peace treaty with the Americans had been signed. Violet, on the other hand, had eight healthy children, all of whom presently had both feet planted on English soil.

However.

There was always a however, wasn’t there?

This spring marked the first (and Violet prayed, the last) season for which she had two girls “on the market.”

Eloise had debuted in 1814, and anyone would have called her a success. Three marriage proposals in three months. Violet had been over the moon. Not that she would have allowed Eloise to accept two of them—the men had been too old. Violet did not care how highly ranked the gentlemen were; no daughter of hers was going to shackle herself to someone who would die before she reached thirty.

Not that this couldn’t happen with a young husband. Illness, accidents, freakishly deadly bees . . . Any number of things could take a man out in his prime. But still, an old man was more likely to die than a young one.

And even if that weren’t the case . . . What young girl in her right mind wanted to marry a man past sixty?

But only two of Eloise’s suitors had been disqualified for age. The third had been just a year shy of thirty, with a minor title and a perfectly respectable fortune. There had been nothing wrong with Lord Tarragon. Violet was sure he’d make someone a lovely husband.

Just not Eloise.

So now here they were. Eloise was on her second season and Francesca was on her first, and Violet was exhausted. She couldn’t even press Daphne into service as an occasional chaperone. Her eldest daughter had married the Duke of Hastings two years earlier and then had promptly managed to get herself pregnant for the duration of the 1814 season. And the 1815 one as well.

Violet loved having a grandchild and was over the moon at the prospect of two more arriving soon (Anthony’s wife was also with child), but really, sometimes a woman needed help. This evening, for example, had been an utter disaster.

Oh, very well, perhaps disaster was a bit of an overstatement, but really, who had thought it a good idea to host a masquerade ball? Because Violet was certain it had not been she. And she had definitely not agreed to attend as Queen Elizabeth. Or if she had, she had not agreed to the crown. It weighed at least five pounds, and she was terrified it would go flying off her head every time she snapped it back and forth, trying to keep an eye on both Eloise and Francesca.

No wonder her neck hurt.

But a mother could not be too careful, especially at a masquerade ball, when young gentlemen (and the occasional young lady) saw their costumes as a license to misbehave. Let’s see, there was Eloise, tugging at her Athena costume as she chatted with Penelope Featherington. Who was dressed as a leprechaun, poor thing.

Where was Francesca? Good heavens, that girl could go invisible in a treeless field. And while she was on the subject, where was Benedict? He had promised to dance with Penelope, and he had completely disappeared.

Where had he—

“Ooof!”

“Oh, my pardon,” Violet said, disentangling herself from a gentleman who appeared to be dressed as . . .

As himself, actually. With a mask.

She did not recognize him, however. Not the voice nor the face beneath the mask. He was of average height, with dark hair and an elegant bearing.

“Good evening, Your Highness,” he said.

Violet blinked, then remembered—the crown. Although how she might forget the five-pound monstrosity on her head, she’d never know.

“Good evening,” she replied.

“Are you looking for someone?”

Again, she wondered at the voice, and again, she came up with nothing. “Several someones, actually,” she murmured. “Unsuccessfully.”

“My condolences,” he said, taking her hand and leaning over it with a kiss. “I myself try to restrict my quests to one someone at a time.”

You don’t have eight children, Violet almost retorted, but at the last moment she held her tongue. If she did not know this gentleman’s identity, there was a chance that he did not know hers, either.

And of course, he could have eight children. She wasn’t the only person in London to have been so blessed in her marriage. Plus, the hair on his temples was shot through with silver, so he was likely old enough to have sired that many.

“Is it acceptable for a humble gentleman to request a dance with a queen?” he asked her.

Violet almost refused. She hardly ever danced in public. It wasn’t that she objected to it, or that she thought it unseemly. Edmund had been gone for more than a dozen years. She still mourned him, but she was not in mourning. He would not have wanted that. She wore bright colors, and she maintained a busy social schedule, but still, she rarely danced. She just didn’t want to.

But then he smiled, and something about it reminded her of the way Edmund had smiled—that eternally boyish, ever-so-knowing tilt of the lips. It had always made her heart flip, and while this gentleman’s smile didn’t quite do that, it woke something inside of her. Something a little bit devilish, a little carefree.

Something young.

“I would be delighted,” she said, placing her hand in his.