Never Had a Dream Come True (30 page)

“Well, then,” Sin said, with one last glance toward his wife, “why don’t we all go and pack our things, so we can leave first thing in the morning. I’ll go talk to Fanny, and hopefully she won’t be too upset about it. It is, after all, for the greater good.”

“Greater good?” Penny laughed at his choice of words. “Am I now a charity, of sorts?”

“Not at all. But it will bring the whole family to peace if you and Uncle Rake finally make up and do what you have been supposed to do from the beginning—live happily ever after.”

Penny felt almost lighthearted as she left her sister’s bedroom. She could hardly believe she would have closure at last on the whole Rake affair. Soon she would know if he loved her as much as she thought he did, and then they would, as Sin with such extraordinary insight had just said, live happily ever after.

She had never had a dream come true, but if everything worked out as she wished, soon she would have.

“I dare say every eligible bachelor of south Scotland is present tonight,” Miss Lydia Woodley exclaimed with as much happiness as a well-behaved daughter of a local country squire dared to express in the company of others as she stared starry-eyed into the fashionable crowd surrounding them.

The Assembly Rooms in Gretna Green were filled to the brim with ladies and gentlemen who had come to socialize with their peers, to dance, to laugh, and to flirt at the annual January Ball.

“I think I have to agree with you,” Penny said as she looked around, somewhat amazed at how many people were present. “I thought the weekly Tuesday dance was well attended, but this is entirely something else. There must be a couple of hundred here, instead of the normal fifty or so.”

After spending almost a month in the little town, Penny had started to recognize some of the faces who attended the same functions she was invited to, but tonight those faces had disappeared in the teeming, colorful crowd.

“Oh, look,” Lydia breathed happily, as she nodded toward a stylish and handsome man who stood causally by the entrance door looking out on the crowd with the most perfect bored expression. “Lord Elmsley has arrived! Oh, I can hardly believe he’s actually here. He is the most handsome man I know, and I have dreamt about this ever since I met him for the first time.”

Penny nodded, trying to look as impressed as Lydia seemed to want, but she found the man of Lydia’s dreams to look just like any other gentleman she met: nothing out of the ordinary. No amused smoky eyes, no patronizingly arched eyebrow, and no wicked grin.

Poor Lord Elmsley. Here he was, the most sought-after bachelor of this part of the country, and she didn’t find him the least attractive. But, fortunately for him, Lydia did.

That kind young woman, whom Penny had met during her first week in Gretna Green, had immediately taken her under her wing and introduced her to the life and the people of her little rural town.

Charmaine, who found the effervescent Lydia a bit tiresome but not as tiresome as spending time alone with Penny, was more than happy to act the role of companion on different outings. Lydia declared frequently that for her it was heaven on earth to suddenly have a new friend who came with the perfect chaperone for daily trips, and she seemed to have a never-ending list of must-see places and must-visit people.

All in all, the days and the weeks had passed quite quickly and Penny had not had too much time to think about Rake during the daytime. But in the solitude of the night, when she lay alone in her bed, she couldn’t think about anything but him, and even her dreams were filled with him.

“You are the most understanding friend I have, when it comes to Lord Elmsley,” Lydia had admitted earlier while waiting for his arrival. “Everyone else thinks I’m daft to dream about him, even my sisters do, as they find me quite uninteresting compared to the other unmarried ladies. But you don’t, which makes me think you too know how it is to love someone who is quite unapproachable.”

“I too have a man of my dreams,” Penny had said, not able to keep the emotion out of her shaking voice. “I spend every day, every hour, and every minute longing for him, wishing for him to come here and fulfill my heart’s boldest wish.”

Lydia had given her a radiant you-and-I smile, and Penny had hugged her new friend tightly. In some strange way it felt good to have someone who was going through the same thing and who understood how she felt. Charmaine was trying hard to be understanding and supportive, but she had her sudden marriage with the brooding Sin to handle, which drained the energy out of her.

As if on cue, her sister, beautiful as ever in a vivid blue dress, joined them with three glasses of a suspect greenish liquid and handed Penny and Lydia one each.

“Are you sure it’s lemon?” Penny asked with a grimace and took a sip of the vile fluid, the only thing being served during the evening.

Charmaine frowned down into her glass. “I think so. I’m sure I tasted a hint of lemon last Tuesday when I had a glass.”

“If I’m going to come here one more Tuesday to have one more glass of this, I’m going to turn into a prune or something else as wrinkly. Lord, it’s vile.”

Lydia, who must have felt the need to defend her hometown’s refreshments, took a big sip.

“It’s not so bad,” she declared through her pursed lips. “It’s actually quite refreshing.”

Charmaine couldn’t help but laugh, and immediately the surrounding men took a step closer to them. Even Lord Elmsley’s gaze stopped roaming for a second, taking in the radiant beauty, and an appreciative little smile started to play on his lips.

“Oh, he’s coming here!” Lydia seemed close to fainting, and she took deep breaths to calm herself. Penny patted her hands.

“I told you Charmaine is like a jar of honey to a bear: men can’t withstand her, and they come running.”

“I beg your pardon?” Charmaine said, profoundly offended, but Penny ignored her sister’s outburst.

“It’s even better now she’s married, because she’s off the maybe-wife list, and instead you will stand next in line to be courted.”

“Or you.” Lydia breathed, as Lord Elmsley closed in on them. “You are much prettier than I am. If he has to choose between the two of us, he will most certainly choose you. I know I would.”

“Then we will make sure he chooses you.”

Charmaine rolled her eyes at them before she turned toward the man who stopped in front of her with an elegant bow. “Lady Chilton.”

“Lord Elmsley. How nice to meet you again. Let me introduce my sister, Lady Penelope de Vere, and her friend, Miss Lydia Woodley.”

Lord Elmsley nodded coldly to Lydia before he bent his head over Penny’s hand and gave it a peck that came served with a lecherous glance from his blue eyes.

Oh, he was a libertine, all right, and if she hadn’t been too caught up in Rake’s web, her heart might have fluttered just a little in response. But as it was now, she only gave him an indifferent half-smile which made him frown a bit at her. He obviously wasn’t used to being met this coldly by a young miss.

“Lady Chilton, would you mind if I borrowed your sister for the next dance? It would be an honor for me.”

“Oh, the honor would be hers, I guarantee you,” Charmaine soothed him. “But unfortunately my sister will have to decline, as she has already promised my husband this dance.”

“I’m sad to hear this. Then maybe you would do me the honor?”

Charmaine declined most elegantly. “I already promised this one to our host. But Lydia here is, amazingly enough, still available.”

Lord Elmsley’s smile faded as he shot a fast look at the blushing maiden, and it wasn’t too hard to see he had no difficulty understanding why she wasn’t spoken for. As the gentleman he was, he couldn’t deny Charmaine her offer, and with a forced smile he held out his hand toward Lydia, who breathlessly let him lead her out onto the dance floor.

“We have to find Sin,” Charmaine said as the couple disappeared into the crowd. “He will have to remove himself from the gambling tables long enough to dance with you.”

“I can sit this one out.”

“No. You. Will. Not.”

Knowing too well there was no point in trying to revolt against Charmaine when she used that particular tone, Penny let her sister take the lead in the hunt for her unaware dance partner.

Sin left the gambling tables with a disappointed sigh. “I guess I have no say in this?”

“None.” Charmaine’s voice was cold as ice. “Penny needs you to dance with her.”

“For Penny I’ll do anything.” Sin said, just as icily, and Penny sighed. Those two were never going to have their happy ending if they didn’t get over their differences soon. So Charmaine had in some way lured Sin into marrying her. So what?

It wasn’t as if he had married a complete scarecrow, after all. Charmaine was every man’s dream. Unfortunately, it seemed she was the dream of every
other
man but Sin.

Penny could only hope the two of them would find a way out of this coldness between them, and as soon as Charmaine couldn’t hear them she told him so.

“You could be a bit nicer to her.”

“Why?” Sin snorted. “She’s not worth it.”

“You don’t know that.”

“I know exactly what she is like, so let us leave it at that.”

She shook her head sadly. “After the first week here I thought the two of you were warming up to each other, you seemed almost happy together for a while. But lately you have been behaving as if you were deadly enemies. What happened?”

“Nothing.”

“Nothing?”

He sighed. “Please, Penny. Leave it be.”

She couldn’t continue when he so directly asked her not to, and she nodded, resigned. “All right. But just think of one thing—your marriage is for the rest of your lives. Is this hatred between the two of you what you want to live with?”

“It’s not hatred. It’s more disappointment, I would say. And no, this is not what I want in my marriage. But your sister is quite a handful, and not so easy to get through to sometimes.”

“Tell me about it.” Penny sighed, and Sin chuckled.

“I guess you should know, my dearest little sister by marriage.”

They shared a loving smile, feeling the bond of sibling-hood between them, even though they were not blood relatives. But she had practically grown up beside him, and the bond was still there and had only become stronger by his marriage to her sister.

“I’m sorry to be the one saying this, but we can’t stay on much longer. Duty calls, you know.”

“I know.” She sighed, defeated, unable to hide the overwhelming sadness filling her heart. “We have been here for a month now, and he still hasn’t shown. I guess I must soon admit the truth—he doesn’t want me.”

“Maybe he never got the message?”

“Of course he did. He would never stay away from Pendragon knowing his best friend and his niece had their first babies, and Fanny promised to make sure he got the hint about me going to Gretna Green, so he could save me, even if she would have to spell it out to him.”

“It’s strange, though, him not showing up yet. We all know how much he cares for you, and to not come here for you… It doesn’t make sense.”

Penny wished she had the same confidence regarding Rake’s feelings toward her. But the more time passed, the more her sureness faltered, and now she was beginning to believe he would never love her.

She sighed heavily as the dance ended, and Sin laughed as he grabbed her hand. “You are pathetic.”

“I know I am, and I apologize. But do you know what? I think you’d better get used to it, because soon you will have to see me get more and more pathetic every day, for the rest of my pathetic life.”

“Are you trying to prepare yourself for a life as a spinster?”

She giggled as he gave her a look of exaggerated shock, and she whacked him on the shoulder in a sisterly fashion. “Behave, you vile monster. You should ease up on the laughter and instead consider how dark life will seem for you from now on.”

“Oh, really?” Sin laughed. “You can’t scare me. There’s no way you, my dear little Penny, could make my life into bloody hell.”

“Don’t tempt me,” she said between her teeth, together with her best version of an angry glare.

“You keep forgetting I’m not so easily scared,” Sin said as he halted at an empty sofa in the corner of the ballroom, where Charmaine’s maid stood, looking extremely uncomfortable. “I’m married to your sister, remember.”

“Are you now?” Penny tried her best to look just as wickedly amused as Rake in his best days. “And yet you seem to have no problem with her being surrounded by lecherous men, who all want her to admit to being lonely and to let them entertain her while her husband does his best to ignore her.”

Sin’s eyes darkened as he turned around and looked at his wife who, as Penny had said, was outrageously outnumbered by men who each wanted nothing more than to become her latest lover.

When he hesitated, she rolled her eyes toward his back. “You have to choose, Sin. Either you care or you don’t care. What you can’t do is stand at the side and watch your chance for marital happiness walk out the door on another man’s arm. I know Charmaine, and she’s pretty upset with you and feels quite abandoned. I’m a bit afraid she soon will do something drastic to catch your attention, and as she’s not as smart as I am she will probably put herself in a situation she can’t control.”

Without looking back, Sin barged across the dance floor, and Penny giggled as he without mercy grabbed his wife’s hand and hauled her away out through the front door. Charmaine’s expression was a funny mix of surprise and expectation, and Penny wished them all the luck possible. They were both too good to be avoiding each other as they did.

“Your sister is a happy woman,” Lydia said as she sank down in the sofa beside Penny. “It must be wonderful to have someone who loves you as much as her husband obviously does.”

“You think?” Penny lit up.

“Of course he does.” Lydia snorted. “Even a child can see he is crazy in love with her.”

What an uplifting thought, if it were true. Sin in love with Charmaine made it possible for a much better ending for that married couple than Penny had hoped for earlier.