He turned her toward Basil, who sketched a bow, then lowered his hand and helped her step up to the altar. When she finally stood beside him, he raised her hand to his lips, kissing the amethyst ring on her right hand before clicking his heels together with practiced ease.
He leaned down to whisper in her ear as he removed her veil. “No regrets?”
“None.”
“I promise you’ll never have them.”
“I accept your challenge,” she replied, returning Basil’s smile.
Together, they turned to Mr. Leyes, who stood like a rotund badger in front of his den, a book held open in each hand. He nodded to Prudence and Basil, then began reading from the first book, a copy of Fordyce’s Sermons.
Throughout Leyes’s literal depiction of a woman’s character, Basil held her hand in his, gently rubbing her knuckles with his thumb as brilliant light filtered through the windows behind the vicar’s back, bathing them in prisms of color.
Leyes paused, then said, “Is anyone present who can justifiably object to the joining of this man and woman in holy wedlock?”
Someone cleared his throat, and Prudence’s breath hitched. When the vicar craned his head to find the instigator, the room fell silent. Then Leyes nodded, smiling confidently at Basil, who turned to take hold of both her hands and gazed into her eyes.
“Basil Halford, Earl of Markwick, do you take Prudence Denzell, Duchess of Blackmoor, to wed?”
The doors to the chapel slammed open.
“I d—”
“He does not,” came a deep, angry voice from the back.
That voice! It can’t be . . .
Prudence’s body tensed. Surely she’d heard wrong.
She turned away from the vicar and Basil to see a cloaked man standing in dark silhouette, holding a silver cane. There was something ill-omened about the way he stood and angled his head. Her heart clenched, then raced.
“What is the meaning of this?” Basil asked, anger rolling off him in waves. “How dare you interrupt our wedding?”
“No one is going to marry my wife today.”
Christmas in the Scot's Arms (Highlander Vows: Entangled Hearts Book 3) Page 15
