What a fool she had been to trust Felton. There was another way, surely. Her mother had always told her she was excellent at solving problems.

This was simply a temporary challenge. She wiped at her eyes and quickened her pace as she barreled down the well-appointed hallway of her father’s Cumbria estate. If only her heeled slippers weren’t a shy too big. She wouldn’t risk a sprain for the sake of a husband, no matter how deep his pockets were.

Lily had to draw the line somewhere.

Another set of footsteps tagged behind in a perfect echo. Lily held her chin high to the quiet murmurings of the servants who passed and tried their best to fade into the worn silk wall coverings. No one ever knew what to say to Lily when she was always the betrothed and never the bride.

“Perhaps you should head to your room and remove your wedding dress first,” her friend Kate’s soft voice cautioned from behind.

“No need.” Lily stretched onto her tip-toes, reached above the doorframe to her father’s office, then clutched the spare key to the door in her palm. She wiggled the key into the keyhole, then shoved her shoulder against the door to counteract the early summer humidity. The door burst open, and she stumbled inside, wiping her palms against her thighs as she righted herself.

Heavens above, her father’s office was a jumble of books and stuffed mallards. Where even to begin?

“I fear we are only at the start of this mess.” Miss Katherine Bancroft stood in the doorway, radiating the most infuriating sense of calm.

Lily threw her hands onto her hips and huffed away a rogue brunette curl from her eyes. “If I were desperate, I would be running after Felton. We both know what a prize he is, which is why I am here.”

Kate bit back a smile and nodded. That wide mouth of hers, the same one the scandal rags loved to gossip about after an unfortunate run-in with England’s most notorious rake, finally parted with a soft laugh. “Let us have some tea and maybe take a walk...”

“You don’t need to watch over me. I am fine. If anything, I am quite happy I avoided another mistake. He would have bored me to tears talking insistently about his beloved stamp collection.”

“Even so.” Kate stepped inside the office and shut the door quietly behind her. The silence ate up the space between them. “He is a cad.”

Lily refused to cry. The men in her life didn’t deserve her tears. She pressed her lips into a firm line and nodded.

Kate, steadfast and even-tempered, waited her out. She looked divine in a simple green dress. Her reputation couldn’t withstand anything other than modesty after last year’s scandal.

“I know it is around here somewhere,” Lily mumbled, more to herself. She couldn’t stand around and be subject to anymore pitying stares. “Father always has Williams bring it here instead of the breakfast table, so he can spare himself from his daughters’ company.”

“Bring what?”

Lily waved off her friend, concentrating on the stacks of papers piled around her father’s massive desk. It was more fitting of a king than a man who sat back and squandered his daughters’ dowries on hunting expeditions and an exorbitant habit for taxidermy. She shuffled through papers madly, chucking one pile to the floor as she moved on to another.

“Maybe I can help look for… wait, what are you searching for?”

Kate unpinned the sea-green bonnet from atop her black hair, then removed her gloves and set them aside on a carved stool by the door.

“No,” Lily said without thinking, “there is no need for help. I have the situation well in hand.”

She scowled. The puffed sleeves of her yellow gown were scratchy. She had endured several long and tortuous visits with the modiste for the dress. Not to mention the rest of her trousseau.

What would become of that now?

She snickered to herself, moving aside an empty teacup as she remembered all the fine fripperies that had been bought for her husband’s viewing. The silks and ribbons and garters, much more decorative than functional. She had been excited to have a wardrobe her husband would love. Like a fool, she wished only to make him happy. Now, she had trunks packed at her childhood home, ready to leave for a bridal tour that would never be and new clothes she dared not wear.

And she had so wished to travel to Venice, finally.

Kate creeped into the middle of the room as papers rained down around her tall frame. She quietly crossed her arms and tapped her slipper, waiting.

“I don’t want to rush this search. It’s only that I am sure the others will catch up. You are an excellent sprinter, however.”

Lily paused, laughed, then swiped up another armful of papers, unlodging the inkwell from its home in the process.

“Oh, drat.” She dove to the floor, wincing when the sound of ribbons tearing from her dress echoed in the heavy silence as she clutched the ink safely in her hands. She exhaled and rolled to her back as the dust motes danced in the sun shining down through the window.

When she was much younger, and Mama was still alive, she remembered studying the atlas in this very spot with father’s magnifying glass.

Perhaps she was being a bit overzealous in her search.

Except…

“Hazzah!” Lily rolled to her side and stretched her hand under the tattered velvet armchair. “I found it!”

“I’m not sure how you could find anything with the way you have torn⁠—”

“Nonsense. I said I would find it, and I have.” Lily snatched the folded newspaper from underneath the chair along with a stray bottle of Scotch. She rose to her elbows, then to her hands, trying to gain enough balance to stand, but the frills on her dress had the advantage, and she fought to gain balance.

Kate rushed over to help her up, bracing her legs wide, so the dress wouldn’t claim them both and drag them down to the dusty carpet underfoot. “Your stepmother outdid herself with this monstrosity. There are enough frills here that Felton would have been searching for weeks on how to undress you.”

Lily would have liked that, perhaps. She’d had two men propose to her, and neither had even dared to steal a kiss. Was it so wrong to wish to share passion with a man? Was she truly so repulsive?

“No matter.” She turned abruptly, snapping open the newsprint with a dramatic flair. “I won’t be wearing it again.”

A fine, lady-like hand folded over the top of the newsprint. Lily was met with Kate’s striking gray eyes. “You should wait for a note. Maybe nerves got the better of him. The chapel was quite packed.”

“Quite.” Lily swallowed back that nervous feeling that had been clawing at her all morning. She folded the paper down and clutched it to her middle.

The crowded chapel was a fact she had not been able to forget, nor probably ever would. What a fool, what a beautiful fool she had been, waiting for Felton to arrive. All eyes had been upon her, and all she could do was stare at the stone floor of the chapel and beg her father to help.

“What am I saying?” Kate said, smoothing out Lily’s hair. “The man is an arse for treating you as he did this morning, and I hope he is run over by a carriage.”

Lily chuckled, focusing on the freckles smattered across her friend’s cheekbones instead of making eye contact. She would not cry. “Or becomes infected with a terrible disease.”

“Something much more wicked than the plague, I think. Anything less wouldn’t be sufficient.”

“No...” She swallowed and shifted her feet. The heeled slippers were not only impractical but uncomfortable. She glanced at her empty ring finger as she brought the newspaper back up into view. “Well, disease or carriage accident notwithstanding, I am not holding my breath to be rescued. I have a solution to the mess.”

Kate pursed her lips, sidestepping Lily to make her way to the sofa. Lily had always been quite envious of her friend. Kate was her opposite in most things: tall where Lily was short, cheery where Lily was introspective, self-assured where Lily was prone to falter.

That was why she must carry on with this plan. After the disaster of her wedding morning, Lily must not falter. She did not want to give him the satisfaction of causing her downfall in society. She did not want the pity or speculation as to why she had lost yet another bridegroom. She certainly did not warrant the gossip that was sure to start.

“My dearest Lilybell,” Kate hedged. “Your plans⁠—”

“I know, I know. But if you would hear me out.”

With a graceful flick of her wrist, Kate sat on the sofa, or rather the sofa cushion nearly swallowed her up after years of far too much of use. “Go ahead.”

Lily’s heart thrummed in her chest as she thumbed through the newsprint until she found the inky column that held her future. “Here.” She smacked her hand against the inky words. Newton had famously stated two objects in motion would attract. Surely, the same went for the marriage market.