"I have been thinking—doing much thinking at my club, riding through the park at dawn, in my study." His smile was crooked. "In all of the places that I would be certain not to run into you."
She smiled back. She'd been doing the same… in all the places she was certain not to run into him, like the streets of St. Giles after midnight. The bowels of London.
"You mentioned destiny. Your destiny. You said it was indelible, unchangeable. But Victoria, I do not believe destiny is a fixed thing. There is some choice that comes with it.
"For example. I was destined to love you—I know that is true, for I never forgot you from that summer. I did not even think to seek a wife until this Season… and you were in mourning for two years after you should have come out. As if you were waiting for me, and for the right time. Or as if I were waiting for you… to be ready.
"My destiny is to love you. But I have a choice as to how I can fulfill this certain thing, this destiny. I can love you and be with you, or I can love you from afar. After tonight it became clear to me that I cannot love you from afar. That I must love you with me." He took her hands and raised them, gloves and all, to kiss the backs of them, looking at her over them as he did so.
"Phillip—"
He moved her hands up to press against her mouth. "Victoria. Whatever is your destiny, you do have some choice. You can decide how to handle it, whether to embrace it or fight it. Whether to share it or hide it."
"Phillip, I swear to you… I swear that this thing between us is nothing that I can change and nothing that I can tell you about. But…" It was her turn to press gloved fingers to his mouth to keep him from responding. "But if you will still have me, I can promise you that I will make the choice to balance that part of my life with the life we'll build together. That is the part of my legacy that I can control."
Closing his fingers around her wrist, he tugged her hand away from his mouth. "Then, since there is not and could never be anyone for me but you, Victoria, we will have to let our destinies live together."
And he kissed her.
Chapter Twenty
Maximilian Is Pressed into Service
"I received this today." Max flung a thick ivory envelope onto Eustacia's piecrust table. It slid to the edge of the highly polished oak, knocking her stake aside. "I cannot believe she is going to go through with this madness."Eustacia knew what it was; she had received her invitation to Victoria's wedding a week earlier. She exchanged glances with Kritanu, who was working on fitting the wooden pieces of a new weapon he'd created. "I didn't realize you were on the guest list."
He snorted. "She's asked me to attend in order to make certain… as she puts it… 'nothing untoward happens.' She wants me to patrol for vampires while she gets married!"
Eustacia camouflaged her chuckle with a cough. "Well, she certainly can't be doing it herself, now, can she? And I am in no position to help out, with my arthritis. The rest of the family thinks I'm mad anyway. They would send me off to Bedlam if they saw me skulking about with a stake! Max, Max… I have my reservations about her choice, but I can't stand in her way. She deserves the chance to try it if she feels so strongly about it."
Max stalked over to the sideboard and helped himself to a glass of whiskey. "It's ridiculous. You could forbid her, Eustacia."
"And face the wrath of my niece Melly? I'd rather come up against Lilith in person than that." As a joke went, it was a feeble attempt, and she knew it. But Kritanu, bless him, gave a little laugh and went back to what he was doing. But not before she saw the sympathy in his jet-black eyes.
It had been so much simpler when it was just the two of them, fighting, studying, loving.
"Max, really. She's managed to help us locate and steal the Book of Antwartha; she's been hunting and executing vampires on a regular basis even while maintaining her societal duties. And it has been a great help to us for her to have access to some of these events, where she can move about freely and find and kill any vampires that have managed to penetrate that level of the ton. That is something not as easy for you or I to do, being from Italy, and something we have needed for a long time. As the Marchioness of Rockley, she'll have even more access to these kinds of venues. And perhaps even have the chance to do so at court."
"Yes, and when she's the Marchioness of Rockley, she'll have a husband who will want to follow her when she comes out on patrol, as he did two weeks ago. Or who won't let her go at all, and because he's her husband he'll be able to keep her in on the nights we might need her. Or enforce her presence at more and more of those ridiculous balls, or evenings at Almack's, or weekends in Bath… We have life-and-death business here, and my concern is that she'll be less available for help when we need it." As always, when he became impassioned about something, his English grew thicker with their homeland accent.
"You've never been one to want to work with someone, Max, so why are you so concerned about it now?"
"Lilith grows stronger every month, and we need to work together. All of us. And what happens, Eustacia, when Victoria begets an heir for the Marquess of Rockley? She can't be hunting vampires in that condition."
Porca l'oca! Max was right. Eustacia had her own worries, but she'd tried to push them away, tried to play devil's advocate with him because she didn't want the rift between him and Victoria to grow any wider. But she could not argue with his points, and indeed, had spent some sleepless nights worrying on them herself.
From all aspects, it could not work. She could not believe it would, had never known it to happen. Yet Eustacia had learned not to live by absolutes. Just because it hadn't happened didn't mean that it could not.
Time to change the subject.
"And the marquess—I presume he has recovered from his experience at the Silver Chalice and is not rushing about London trying to hunt vampires?"
Max grimaced, presumably a reaction to the large gulp of whiskey he downed. "He called on me the day following the incident. Did I not tell you that?"
"No… you did not."
"He wanted to know why I put the salvi in his drink. He was quite… agitated. We nearly came to fisticuffs. He appeared to be under the impression that I had taken Victoria to the Silver Chalice, and that it was I who influenced her so. He was babbling on about destiny… and from what I was able to glean, he had just come from her home. He left me with the impression that they were calling off the wedding. Which is the reason I was quite surprised to receive that."
Eustacia could think of nothing to say. She merely raised her eyebrows, hoping he would continue. When he did not, and instead sat glaring at the offending invitation, she prompted, "Whatever did you tell him? About the salvi?"
"I told him the truth—that it was for his protection. That he'd walked into a nest of vipers that he had no hopes of understanding, and that the only way I knew to get him out safely was to make him sick. Unfortunately, it did not work as planned."
And that he'd been bested by a non-Venator was probably the largest reason it sat like a stone in his belly.
"If he follows her again, he could easily jeopardize our work."
True. Too true. "Victoria will have to find a way to manage that, Max. I trust that she will be able to."
She prayed her niece would be able to.
"It would have to be raining today, of all days," Melly muttered to Winnie as she watched her beautiful daughter exchange vows with the catch of the Season. "A fortnight of sunshine, and today must be overcast!" Despite her annoyance, she cast a satisfied glance over her shoulder, gleeful at the expressions of some of the other mamas who hadn't been quite as successful in their matchmaking endeavors. Today was truly a coup!
Indeed, a soft, summer rain was falling on this, the day of the Marquess of Rockley's wedding. The sky was colored with pearl-gray clouds, and the steady rain brought the smell of peat and summer flowers to the air. The overflow guests were huddled outside the chapel under hastily erected tents, and more than one pair of spectacles had fogged or misted up. Melly's lorgnette was damp, but that was from tears of joy… not the rain.
"The drizzle isn't bothering them," Winnie whispered back. "I've never seen Victoria look so beautiful, and so happy." She dabbed at her eyes, then snorted, bull-like, into her lacy handkerchief.
Melly had helped her daughter dress at St. Heath's Row in a slip of soft lemon silk, with a lacy white gauze skirt over it. The lace was embroidered with seed pearls, twists of satin ribbon, and ocean pearls, giving the whole of it a gentle glittering sort of glow. Madame LeClaire had outdone herself!
Victoria's maid had drawn up only the topmost of her curls onto the crown of her head, leaving the rest of the unruly mass to cascade down her back and over her shoulders. Melly had forbidden the use of those ridiculous sticks in the bridal coiffure, and so more pearls, and also ice-white diamonds, had been woven into the corkscrew tresses. Still more created a wrap around the top of her cluster of curls, holding them in a crownlike position.
Moments after the heaviest of the rain showers eased, Victoria had walked down the aisle at the small stone chapel on the grounds of St. Heath's Row carrying a cluster of lilies of the valley and yellow roses. English ivy, wrapped around the stems, trailed to the ground at her feet.
The marquess was resplendent in a dove-gray coat and ink-black breeches. His boots shone like jet, and his waistcoat was rich claret patterned with black-and-gray paisley. His neckcloth, a solid color matching the waistcoat, had been tied to within an inch of its life, and was as crisp as a bloodstain on his perfect white shirt. Such exquisite fashion sense!
Rockley's thick walnut hair was brushed back high off his forehead, and did not dare fall from its place even when he tipped his head to look down at his bride. The long sideburns that framed the very edges of his cheeks had been trimmed and lay flat and smooth against his skin. His eyes, half-lidded as they always were, were fixed with great emotion on the glowing bride next to him as he spoke his vows clearly and for all to hear.
