Lady Bridget's Diary (Keeping Up with the Cavendishes #1)(81)

“And what about you, Bridge?”

“I wish to marry him as well,” she said. Of course after last night, she now had to, but truly, she was well aware of the consequences—-marriage, or spinsterhood—-and she decided he was worth the risk. She wanted to marry him with all her heart.

But James was looking at her intently now, as if trying to discern if she really meant it—-or worse, if he was going to allow it. Or, Lord above, was she supposed to have a talk with her brother about feelings and why she truly must marry Darcy? She’d much rather not. “So now that we have agreed to the match, I best let Josephine know. She’ll want to start planning.”

She stood to leave. James grabbed a handful of her skirt.

“Not so fast, little sister.”

She slunk back into her chair and nervously met her brother’s gaze.

“Ever since we arrived, you have called him Dreadful Darcy and thought he was the embodiment of everything you despised about England. Amelia said you kept an ongoing list of things you disliked about Dreadful Darcy in your diary.”

“Amelia! It’s one thing if she reads my diary, but she’s not supposed to gossip about it!”

“Never mind that now. You also fancied his brother. So much so that you asked me to lend him a thousand pounds. I’m just curious; what has changed?”

Very well, that was a fair question.

“It so happens that he is not the worst. Not at all. And I hadn’t known until it was almost too late,” Bridget explained. “You know how he went out and found Amelia. He is so protective of his brother. And he helped me find my diary when it was missing. He is so good.”

He was also a good kisser, amongst his other talents, but her brother didn’t need to know that.

“And he needs me. And I love teasing him—-I’m the only one who does. It’s such a trifling thing, but it isn’t really and—-” Fortunately James cut her off. She was rambling, trying to find a way to explain that she and Darcy fit together, and balanced out their strengths and weaknesses.

“You know what this means, don’t you?” James asked.

“I’m sure you’re going to tell me.”

“We need the rest of the family.”

He found a maid who could go find Amelia and Claire and tell them the duke had summoned them for an emergency meeting in the kitchens. Meanwhile, James and Bridget ate cake and drank tea while she tried to guess What This Means.

Finally, her sisters arrived, stomping loudly down the stairs, bickering over something or other.

“Oh, cake!” Amelia exclaimed.

“Is there any more tea?” Claire inquired.

James cleared his throat. “We have an important matter to discuss.”

“Yes, yes, Your Grace,” Claire said dismissively. “If it’s important, then I need some tea.”

“And I need cake or I shall perish,” Amelia replied.

James sighed wearily and did that thing where he gazed toward the heavens (or in this instance, the first floor) and muttered a request for the Lord to save him from his plague of sisters. Finally everyone was seated with slices of cake and hot cups of tea.

“Bridget is in love and wishes to marry,” James declared.

“I think that was made quite clear last evening,” Claire said. “The entirety of English society knows that she is in love and wishes to marry.”

“Darcy was here this morning requesting permission to wed her. Of course I have granted permission because I’m not an ogre. But . . .”

“If she marries, she stays in England,” Claire added.

“And we must stay together,” Amelia finished.

“But I could never choose between you or Darcy,” Bridget cried.

“We wouldn’t ask that of you,” Claire said, resting her hand over Bridget’s.

“But,” James said, pausing dramatically. “Do we all wish to stay in England, or does someone wish to return home?”

There was a long moment of silence as each one considered it. They had come to England expecting perhaps nothing more than an extended visit, for it was laughable that James would be a duke. But he was growing into the role more and more each day. If they stayed, it meant goodbye to America and hello forever to life in England.

Bridget wanted to be everywhere at once, and she wanted her siblings and Darcy by her side. She did not wish to choose.

She loved him, loved him in a way that was so right and good that nothing else mattered. And no one else would ever love her as Darcy did, completely and just the way she was. And he needed her. They balanced each other out, perfectly so.

“We could always take trips back to visit,” Amelia said in a small voice, breaking the silence.

“That is always an option,” Claire said.

They would stay.

“So it’s decided then,” James said, glancing at each of them.

And that was when Josephine arrived, resplendent in a rose silk dress that contrasted greatly with her simple and dim surroundings. Of course the sight of her down here stunned the siblings into silence. With her was Lord Darcy, looking perfectly out of place but determined to fit in, all the same.

“We have a vast house full of proper meeting rooms and I find you all in the kitchens,” she said.

“Cavendish family tradition,” James said. And then to Darcy he stood, offered his hand, and said, “Welcome to the family.”