Romancing the Heiress(3)
Author: Darcy Burke

 

“You are too kind,” Leah said softly before taking her leave.

 

The walk along the High Street to the gardens took almost no time at all, but Leah relished every moment, and not just because she was free of the Selkirks. She enjoyed the familiar sights and waved at a few people she knew and who recognized her. Most importantly, the gardens were just ahead.

 

As she carefully crossed Garden Street to the main gate, she lifted her gaze to the wrought iron arch, which had been installed when she was very young—an occasion she didn’t recall but had heard about. The sign hanging from the center emblazoned with “Marrywell Botanical Gardens” had been painted since she was last here.

 

The day was cloudy, but the sun kept trying to peek through here and there. The air was mild, the breeze light or nonexistent. It was a near perfect spring day, and as much as Leah adored Hyde Park, there was nowhere else she would rather have been than right here in these botanical gardens. There was just one thing—one person—missing.

 

As Leah walked toward the dais, which was the focal point of the matchmaking festival and where her friend Queen Sadie of the May would announce her choices for the seven maidens fair on the first night, she imagined years gone by. Pausing on the path, Leah closed her eyes for a long moment, allowing memories of music and laughter to wash over her.

 

“Leah Webster?”

 

Leah’s eyes flew open, and she instantly fixed on the large figure approaching her. Tall, handsome, his dark red hair a trifle too long, Phin looked nearly exactly as she remembered him. No, that wasn’t true. When she’d left, he’d been a boy of eighteen, his face rounder, his body lankier. Now, his shoulders were wider, his frame larger, and his features were more angular, his chin somehow more square.

 

Now that he was here, the day was truly perfect.

 

 

 

 

 

Chapter 2

 

 

 

 

 

Phineas Radford blinked as he saw the woman standing with her eyes closed, her head tilted up slightly so that her face looked as if it were being kissed by the sun, which had just slipped free from a cloud. She looked happy—peaceful—and a blade of jealousy sliced through him.

 

Then he felt a sliver of recognition.

 

Continuing toward her, he thought he might know her. That blonde hair, just visible against the brim of her bonnet, her taller-than-average height, the set of her shoulders…

 

“Leah Webster?” It couldn’t be. She’d left Marrywell years ago. The lack of sleep and overall exhaustion from working so hard in the gardens was robbing Phin of his senses.

 

But then she tipped her head down, and he saw the crook in her nose. That feature was undeniably Leah. She hated it, but Phin had always found it gave her an aura of strength and, silly as it sounded given her background, aristocracy. This always made her giggle. How he’d missed that laugh, and he hadn’t even realized it until that moment.

 

“Phineas Radford,” she said as he drew closer. Her full lips spread into a sly smile, the kind that might have been flirtatious if she hadn’t been his oldest friend in the world.

 

“It is you!” Phin rushed forward and swept her in his arms, lifting her from the ground and twirling them in a circle.

 

She laughed—it wasn’t the giggle he remembered, and he wondered if she was too old for such things now. He mentally calculated how old she must be, but of course he knew, for she was always one year older than him and he was twenty-five.

 

“It is me,” she said. “I’m surprised you recognized me.”

 

He set her down, but didn’t let go immediately. “How could I not?”

 

“My nose will always reveal me,” she said with a sigh. “And don’t deny it. I saw where your eyes went.”

 

“Very well. Your nose is distinctive, but I’ve always told you how wonderfully patrician it makes you appear.” He moved his hands to hers and gave them a squeeze as he regarded her. “Indeed, you look marvelously elegant. I’m no expert on fashion, but that traveling costume is akin to what Sadie was wearing when she visited last autumn. And you know she’s now married to a duke. At least, I assume you know. She has mentioned that you still correspond.”

 

“We do. Unlike you and I. It wasn’t well done of you not to reply to my letters.”

 

He sheepishly released her hands. “No, it wasn’t. But I am not a very good correspondent. I confess I’d hoped you might visit before now. It’s been what, seven years?”

 

“Six years, eight months, and twenty-three days.”

 

Phin stared at her, then let out a hearty bellow. “You counted?”

 

She shrugged. “It’s an approximation.”

 

“Why do I think it’s not, that it’s an exact accounting? If I pressed, I wonder if you might know down to the last second. You always were good with numbers.”

 

Swatting his arm, she narrowed one eye at him. “Don’t tease me anymore. We’re too old for that.”

 

“Are we?” He sighed. “I suppose we are. You certainly seem it.” One of her slender blonde brows shot up in reaction, and he hastened to add, “Not older—more sophisticated. You look as though you belong in London, not Marrywell.” Why was she here after all this time? He didn’t think it was to see her family, for there wasn’t any love lost there. “Did you come for the festival?”

 

“I did, in fact.”

 

He shook his head. “I can’t believe you aren’t wed.” She was clever and witty as well as being a true and loyal friend.

 

She laughed again. “I think everyone has forgotten that I left Marrywell to become a paid companion to Lady Norcott. There is no future of marriage in such an occupation. I am not here to make a match.”

 

“You’re here with Lady Norcott, then? Is she looking for a match?” He didn’t precisely recall the woman’s age, but thought she’d been…older. Perhaps as old as his beloved Gran.

 

“No, I’m afraid she died last year. I’m now in the employ of her niece, Mrs. Selkirk, as companion to her daughter, Miss Genevieve Selkirk. She’s the one on the hunt for a husband.”

 

“My condolences,” Phin said. “Your new charge has come to the right place, of course. I imagine you steered them here. Once a Marryweller, always a Marryweller, I say.” That was doubly true for him since his family had been one of the founding families of the town. And because his grandfather had ensured their family’s legacy was deeply entwined with that of Marrywell when he’d donated a large parcel of their estate for the use of the festival. The Marrywell Botanical Gardens probably ought to have been called the Radford Marrywell Botanical Gardens.