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  A Lady’s Choice

  For as long as she or anyone else can remember, the beautiful but cold Rachel Neville has always adhered strictly to society’s rules, and she is now reaping the rewards with an offer of marriage from an eminently suitable fiancé. Yet despite the secure future that lies ahead, Rachel is suddenly questioning her acquiescence to the strictures of the ton—and her future husband. Stranger still, she is preoccupied with thoughts of Colin Varens, a wholly unsuitable man whose proposals she has rejected several times.

  Colin can’t remember a time when his heartfelt declarations for Rachel weren’t being rebuffed, but the rough-and-tumble country gentleman has finally come to terms with the rejection—and Rachel’s betrothal—and has made peace with her as friends. But as he and Rachel spend more time together, he finds her once-haughty manner thawing into the warmth and vivaciousness that attracted him so many years ago, just as he is finding a growing strength and confidence of his own.

  As Rachel finds comfort in Colin’s strong embraces and the unfamiliar emotions simmering within, Colin must struggle with feelings he thought stifled once and for all and admit the hope he still carries in his heart. And as Rachel’s marriage draws near and both of them confront the reality of a life without the other, they will discover that the habits of a lifetime are not carved in stone, because a lady’s change of heart can change everything.

  Title Page

  Copyright

  A Lady’s Choice

  Donna Lea Simpson

  This is a revised edition of a book originally published as Rachel’s Change of Heart, copyright © 2003, 2016 by Donna Lea Simpson.

  Material excerpted from The Debutante’s Dilemma copyright © 2016 by Donna Lea Simpson.

  Cover design and illustration by Dar Albert, Wicked Smart Designs

  Published by Beyond the Page at Smashwords

  Beyond the Page Books

  are published by

  Beyond the Page Publishing

  www.beyondthepagepub.com

  ISBN: 978-1-946069-12-2

  All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this book. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented without the express written permission of both the copyright holder and the publisher.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events or locales is entirely coincidental. The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.

  The scanning, uploading, and distribution of this book via the Internet or via any other means without the permission of the publisher is illegal and punishable by law. Your support of the author’s rights is appreciated.

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Epilogue

  Excerpt from The Debutante’s Dilemma

  Books by Donna Lea Simpson

  About the Author

  Chapter One

  Rachel gazed steadily at her younger sister, Pamela, gloriously spring-like in her moss green wedding gown. Pamela sat at one end of the long table in the Haven House dining room with her new husband, Lord Strongwycke, at her side. Something was wrong with the picture. It was . . . misty. Rachel touched her eyes with one gloved hand and felt moisture seep through the fine silk of her gloves.

  She was crying. She swallowed hard around a knotted lump in her throat and looked to the left and to the right at her elegant fiancé, Lord Yarnell, and her grandmother, hoping no one had seen her mystifying descent into maudlin sentiment. It would not do to have anyone think her less than composed and ladylike.

  But Pamela was so utterly lovely, a vision in pale green silk with a circlet of ivory roses on her auburn curls and a glowing necklace of perfectly matched pearls around her slender neck. Rachel, mortified, felt the tears begin to trickle down her cheeks and drip unheeded from her chin. Her nose started to run, and she tried to sniffle without anyone noticing. What is wrong with me? she thought. Surely I do not envy my sister her husband?

  Someone was making a ribald toast. Heaven preserve them all, it was Grandmother, and the old lady was being crude again! No matter that the snowy-tressed grande dame was dressed elegantly in azure satin and diamonds, she still allowed her earthy wit free reign.

  It wasn’t seemly, what Grandmother was saying. It was something about the marital bed and . . . Rachel clutched her hands together under the lace-covered table and glanced once again at her fiancé, hoping he would not take offense. Yarnell was so very proper and stiff, formal in his manners. It was one of the things she had first admired in him. He would never make a scene or embarrass one with emotional outbursts.

  Not like—

  She glanced across the table at Sir Colin Varens, a family friend and neighbor of the viscount Lord Haven—Rachel’s older brother—and his family, north in Yorkshire. They had all known each other forever, but of late Rachel had been avoiding the baronet and his odd sister, Andromeda, especially since they had descended unexpectedly upon London in all their bucolic unsuitableness. At least now that she was engaged to be married he would not propose to her again, and that was a comfort.

  Colin cleared his throat noisily. “I, too, propose a toast,” he said, standing. He smiled down the long table at the newlyweds, his plain face registering all the joy of the occasion. “Here is to long life, long love, and hope for the future.”

  “Hear! Hear!” his sister said, her voice revealing her tipsy state as she raised her glass.

  “And here is to intelligent choices,” Grand said. “And good-looking, strong husbands and warm beds.”

  Pamela threw back her head and laughed, then gasped as her new husband did something naughty behind her back. There was general laughter, which even Belinda, Strongwycke’s young niece, joined in, although she looked a little bewildered. Rachel pinched her lips together and wondered when her family and friends would ever stop embarrassing her. She could see a similar look of disapproval on her mother’s face, across the table from her.

  “Kiss the bride, Strongwycke,” Colin hollered, winking across the table at the dowager.

  “Yes, kiss her! Give her something to think about!” Grandmother hammered on the table with her knobby, arthritic fist.

  The sun streamed in through a gap in the curtain and touched the couple, standing at the end of the table. Strongwycke gazed down at his slight bride and silence fell over the company. There was no mistaking the look on his handsome countenance. Tenderness, affection, joy—all were equally displayed, along with something else, something warmer and more intimate. As he took Pamela in his arms and pulled her close, kissing her mouth, Rachel felt again the pang of envy. They were so in love. She looked at her little sister’s beaming countenance. No one could mistake that for anythin
g but the glow of adoration. She glanced once more at her groom-to-be, Lord Yarnell, and saw the rigid expression of distaste on his face.

  “This will all be over in a few minutes,” Rachel whispered, putting her hand over his on the table.

  He withdrew his gloved hand quickly. “I should hope so. I’m not accustomed to displays of this kind in public.”

  “They’re not always like this,” Rachel pleaded. “My family can be as circumspect as anyone, but this is a special occasion.”

  Yarnell humphed and fell silent.

  The meal and multitude of toasts following it were over at last, and everyone accompanied the bride and groom out the front door to their waiting carriage. They were going north, first to stop off and visit Pamela and Rachel’s newlywed brother Lord Haven, and his bride Jane, at Haven Court in Yorkshire—because of the suddenness of the marriage the viscount and his new wife had not had time to travel south for the ceremony—and then they were going on to Strongwycke’s home, Shadow Manor, in the Lakes District. At her special request, they were leaving behind his niece, Belinda, the headstrong girl who had been the catalyst of their meeting, to stay in London with Sir Colin Varens and his odd—but endearing to some people—sister, Andromeda. The girl, just thirteen, had become fast friends with Andromeda and was to stay with her new ally for a month while Strongwycke and Pamela had some time alone together.

  The gathered company all crowded through the narrow doorway into the late-spring sunshine of the London street in front of Haven House—a tall, narrow, ugly London townhome—descended the steps and stood on the walk outside as Pamela and Strongwycke clambered into his elegant traveling equipage.

  Pamela’s mother said a tearful farewell to her least favorite child, then Sir Colin and Andromeda said good-bye, shaking hands with both the bride and groom through the open window of the carriage. Belinda clung to her new aunt’s hands for the longest time, and unexpectedly burst into tears, running back into the house followed by a concerned Andromeda. Sir Colin reassured the couple that the child would be just fine, and followed his sister into the house.

  Pamela beckoned to Rachel, who reluctantly approached the carriage. She was glad Yarnell had opted to wait inside while everyone else said their good-byes to the new couple. It would never do for him to see his fiancée tear up as she had at the dinner table.

  “Look after Belinda, Rach,” Pamela said, leaning out the window and casting a worried glance up at the house. A carriage trundled by past Strongwycke’s carriage and the team shied.

  “Look after Belinda? I understood she was staying with Andromeda and Colin.”

  “She is, but I would just feel better if you would look in on her every once in a while and write to me. You’re so sensible . . . Andromeda is not always so. And she does have some odd ideas. I fear they’ll both get into trouble.”

  Rachel felt a budding warmth for her highly emotional little sister, and took her bare hand. It was so small, she reflected, looking down at it and the lovely pearl and diamond ring on her wedding finger. And yet Pamela had become a woman in their short London Season, finding a husband that any lady would envy in the Earl of Strongwycke. “I will do it for you, Pammy,” Rachel said, lifting the small hand and rubbing her own cheek with it. “Now go,” she said, releasing her sister’s hand. “Go and don’t worry about anything. Go and be happy!” The treacherous tears threatened again and Rachel blinked them back.

  “I will,” Pamela said, her voice trembling. She glanced over her shoulder at her handsome groom, waiting patiently and smiling at the two sisters. “I know I’ll be happy. I love him so much,” she whispered. She gazed back into her older sister’s eyes, and the green became misty with worry. “Oh, Rach, do anything rather than marry without love!” she exclaimed.

  Strongwycke murmured something to Pamela as he touched her shoulder, and she nodded, saying, “I know we have to go. I’m ready.” She reached out of the carriage one more time and squeezed her sister’s hand. “I mean it, Rach; do anything rather than marry without love.”

  Rachel remained silent, knowing her voice would be clogged with tears and unwilling to display her emotion so openly. The earl called to the driver, and the handsome team of grays started on their journey. Rachel stood alone on the pavement for a long few minutes, watching the carriage trundle down the street toward the road out of London, and north to their home. Brilliant sun gleamed off the lanterns and a fresh breeze riffled the plumed headdress on the horses. They turned the corner and were gone.

  Gone. Gone together to their new life. No little sister anymore, but a married woman, and likely, soon enough, mother of a cheery brood, judging by the glint in the earl’s eye. Just like that the child became a woman. It seemed only moments had passed since Pamela was racing across the moors and up and down the fells of Yorkshire in joyous abandon, but those days were gone forever.

  Rachel finally turned and stared up at the tall, dark house, one of a line of several tall, dark, narrow houses joined together and sharing walls. The façades, once clean stone, were now dark with coal smoke. She thought about her sister’s last words. Pamela just did not understand. Some people were made for love, and some people inspired it. Everyone loved Pamela. How could one not? She was funny and sweet and impetuous, good-natured, endearingly naïve.

  All the things Rachel was not. I am cold like ice and hard like diamonds, she thought, trying to derive comfort from that thought. She made her way up the steps into the front hall past the butler, who held the door open for her then closed it firmly and retreated to his other duties. Rachel stood in the gloomy hallway listening to the babble of cheerful noise as everyone, from the sounds of it, competed to make Belinda forget the touching scene they had just taken part in. Soon, the girl’s voice was raised in laughter.

  Rachel did not want to join them, though her fiancé, the eminently suitable marquess Lord Yarnell, was there, probably mortally offended by half the cheery games now taking place. Sighing deeply, she knew she could not just retreat upstairs, which was all she really wanted to do. She wished to crawl into her bed and pull the covers over her head. Why was she feeling so low?

  This should signal the beginning of her true enjoyment of the Season. She was engaged and could relax now. She had found her ideal life partner, an irreproachable man of distinction. Now was her hour of triumph; she would plan, with her mother, a spectacular wedding to celebrate that triumph, and then settle into the life she was born to lead.

  The doors to the drawing room opened and Colin slipped out into the dim hallway. “I thought I would find you here; I don’t know why, I just did.” He moved toward her in the gloom, dark eyes shadowed by his thick eyebrows.

  Rachel stepped back into the shadows of the staircase, loath to let her old friend and erstwhile suitor see the tears standing in her eyes. “I . . . was just coming to join everyone. Is Belinda all right?”

  “She’s fine. She just was overcome with the emotion of the moment, I think. But Andromeda has her laughing over some conundrum she has written. Andy is a great one for puzzles, you know.” He moved toward her.

  Rachel melted back farther into the shadows. “She always was. When we were children she could keep us amused for hours with riddles and picture puzzles. I had forgotten about that until now.”

  Colin took a deep breath and reached out. He had seen the tears in his old friend’s eyes; he wanted so badly to take Rachel in his arms. She shrank away, evading his grasp, and he could not but interpret her movement as distaste for even his touch. He had brought it on himself, he supposed, by his repeated unwelcome attentions over the years.

  That was finished. She was an engaged woman and he was over the silly infatuation that had made him her slave for so many years. But now he must show her that she need not avoid him. He would be a man about this.

  “Rachel, please,” he said, keeping his voice calm as he let his arms fall back to his side. “Have no fear. All I want from you now is your friendship.”

  She was silen
t. Her pale face glowed in the shadows, lighting up even the gloom of the dim hallway with her loveliness. Her eyes, the blue of the Yorkshire sky after a cleansing rain, gleamed softly in the thin thread of light from the parlor. He took a deep, steadying breath and moved forward again.

  Taking her in his arms, he hugged her tightly, ignoring the curvaceousness of her form, which had always stirred his amorous senses. “Believe me, my old friend, I understand now how unwelcome my attentions were all those years and I most sincerely apologize for making you uneasy. All I want now is for us to be comfortable together.”

  She laid her head on his shoulder and sighed deeply, all the tension draining from her sweet frame. He felt a rush of warmth.

  “That’s good,” he said, though she had not answered him in words. “That’s good.” He patted her head, feeling the soft curls wind around his blunt fingers. But he pushed her away finally, and said, cheerily, “There, now we can be friendly. I am so glad my absurd infatuation is over and I can see clearly now that we would not have suited. In fact, two less suitable people in the world could not be, am I right?” He forced a jocularity into his tone that he did not quite feel.

  “Yes, entirely correct,” she said, her tone brittle. She stood straight and said, “Let us rejoin the company then. I have a wedding to plan.”

  Colin threw a glance at the closed door of the drawing room. “You do mean to marry him, then?”

  “Of course! I’m engaged, Colin, I thought we had established that.” She gazed at him, her eyebrows drawn together.

  “It is just that he is . . .” He broke off, feeling the heat rise in his cheeks. “I will say no more. Just because the fellow does not suit my tastes doesn’t mean a thing, I suppose. Andy is always telling me I have no idea of elegance, nor any pretensions to refinement.”