by Denise Daye
“Good. So, I guess we have everything to really pull this insane plan off. Technically.” Emma shook her head again for the thousandth time in disbelief.
This was crazy.
“Let’s go over it again. That friend of yours, Skip, will borrow his friend’s carriage for a day. We will drive it out into the country—”
“With me as your lady’s maid.”
“Yes, with you as my lady’s maid. I am a rich heiress from America who hired you and Skip here in London. We were on our way to look at an estate when a group of thieves who never existed to begin with robbed us. Skip will lie and confirm that we were robbed. Did you find out the name of an estate for sale?”
“Yes. The estate agent I spoke to today said there is one for sale close to the Blackwell property. It is called Evergreen Castle. I said an heiress from America wanted to look at it, so if Blackwell asks around, that is what the estate agent will tell him.”
“Splendid. So, we will drive the carriage out near Lord Blackwell’s estate and have him come to my rescue.”
“Yes. But this is the part I do not understand. Why not choose some nice, rich fellow who is easy to influence? With your looks and charm, you can choose from plenty of decent rich men. Lord Blackwell is quite the opposite of decent, and rather cunning. He is a gamble.”
This was the part Lily and Emma had disagreed on all week. Emma could not get herself to deceive a nice man into marrying her. It went against her core beliefs as a human being. For years, she had watched her father abuse and cheat on her mother, but instead of using her looks and brains to break every man’s heart in revenge, she swore she would never hurt anybody the way her father had hurt her mother. So, no, she would not marry some nice guy for money and then just disappear back into the future and break his heart, making him the laughingstock of society. Emma had asked Lily to name the most notorious womanizer in all of London. She’d asked for a man who thought he was better than everyone else. A man who never felt the slightest bit of love in his heart for a woman.
Lily had answered all three of these requests with the same name—Lord William Blackwell, Duke of Blackwell Castle, and one of the most entitled, arrogant, and notorious men in all of society. This Blackwell was so famous, every woman in town knew him. Not because he had slept with all of them but because he didn’t think any of them were worthy of being with him. He treated servants the same as the ladies of society—with absolutely no respect.
Despite all of that, Emma was more than certain that she could make this Lord Blackwell marry her. If she wanted to, Emma could make a man believe that he needed her. Not out of love, but out of a want to possess her. Although she’d never used her dark talent, Emma was the master of playing games. A despicable skill she’d learned by watching her piece of shit father make women fall for him, again and again, no matter how many times he broke their hearts. A skill Emma never thought she would ever use. Until now.
“So, we stage that robbery near the Blackwell castle, where Lord Blackwell does his daily rides on his horse around noon. I will say that the robbers hit me on my head with a pistol when I refused to give them all of my possessions. There were three, all wearing masks. None of them said anything, as they all only gestured.” Luckily, Emma had just taken a blow to her head, when that car hit her, so that part was true. Emma had told Lily that she wanted to stay as close to the truth as possible. She’d learned that many years ago when dealing with her drunk father. He would believe her as long as the lie was close to the truth. She hated doing it, but in her childhood, it had often made the difference between her mother getting a beating or not.
“And if everything goes according to plan, he will take me in to assist a lady in need and try to help me get back on my feet. I will use this time to make him think that he needs to possess me.”
“Not fall in love?” Lily asked, confused.
“No, men like him don’t love. They want trophies; they want to possess. I just have to make it clear that possession means a ring on my finger. After that, I will have the money and time I need to find my way back home.” Lily seemed to have mixed feelings about this part too. Emma noticed it immediately.
“What is it?”
Lily fetched a hairbrush out of her bag and waved Emma to sit down next to her on the floor.
“You know that there are certain things in a marriage that happen between a man and a woman,” Lily said in a tone appropriate for a fifteen-year-old who’d never been kissed by a boy before.
Emma sat down next to Lily, who started brushing her hair.
“Lily, this might come as a shock to you, but I am not a virgin.”
Lily stopped brushing her hair for a second.
“So, you are not a lady in waiting where you come from?”
Emma laughed wholeheartedly. Even in terrible times like these, Lily was able to make her laugh.
“No, Lily. I’m not. Where I come from, men and women can be romantic with each other before marriage. It’s totally normal and widely practiced.”
Lily leaned sideways next to Emma to be able to see her face.
“Are you certain? And that is deemed as acceptable?”
Emma felt a little bit of pride for her time and how far women’s rights had come. Sure, sexism was still a very real thing, but women didn’t have to prostitute themselves out seven days a week for a piece of hard bread and an empty studio. At least not in most parts of the world.
“It is, yes. Women can have as many relationships as they want to before they settle on someone they think worthy of marriage.”
“That sounds incredible. I wish I could reside where you are from,” Lily said in a tone of sadness.
Emma was not a virgin, but she was also not someone who would have sex with just anybody, especially not for wealth. That was totally new territory for her, and even if Blackwell was a real ass, she still felt terrible about the whole thing. But what else was she supposed to do? She’d played with the idea of being a high-class prostitute, but now it wasn’t just her own life she had to think about, it was Lily’s as well. Lily had done so much for her. She’d saved her life, for heaven’s sake. How could she let her down? She was so hopeful that this would work and land her a job at an estate as a lady’s maid, away from the constant fear of abusive customers. Emma couldn’t even imagine the bunch of sickos Lily had to do business with.
Emma looked at Lily’s reflection in the window. She held a hair pin in her hand like it was part of a mathematical equation before remembering what to do with it. She tucked it under Emma’s hair on the side of her head.
“Ouch!” Emma cried out in protest.
“Sorry. I shall be more careful. It has been a while…”
Great. She worried that Lily’s experience as a lady’s maid was a bit of an overstatement and that this might turn into a painful night. Then there was still that elegant green dress that Emma had to put on. Late Victorian fashion was stunning, sure. Dresses were more comfortable in 1880 than those Queen Elizabeth movie dresses. As the Victorian era was sort of the start of women being allowed to be more active in their daily lives, it also made dresses more wearable while at the same time dragging an elegant tail in the back. Still, there was that horrible hourglass corset that Emma was not looking forward to.
Out of nowhere, her new lady’s maid got serious. “Emma?” Lily put the brush and pins aside and walked around to face her.
“Yes?”
“When you figure it out, I mean how to go back home…can I come with you?”
Emma hadn’t expected the question. But…why the hell not? Lily lived in the equivalent of female hell.
“I mean…I could not imagine what it would be like to go to university and be with a man for love.”
This very sentence broke Emma’s heart. How could Emma deny her that? The fundamental rights of every woman? Emma stood up and grabbed Lily’s hands as a gesture of her deepest sympathy.
“I promise you, from the bottom of my heart, I will do whatever
I can to take you with me.”
Lily threw herself around Emma’s neck.
“Thank you. I do not know how to ever repay you,” Lily cried, holding on to Emma as if her life depended on it—which, it kinda did. Emma lovingly wiggled herself out of Lily’s firm, slightly choking grip.
“You don’t have to thank me. You saved my life, too, remember? We better get going.”
Lily nodded with an expression of hope and happiness.
“Can I get a box like yours when we get there?”
“Sure, but first, we have to make me look like a lady, open the wound on my head again, fake a robbery, get Lord Blackwell to marry me, and then find a way back home.”
“No problem.” They both laughed like they had been best friends all their lives.
Chapter 4
Neither Emma nor Lily were able to rest even for a minute that night.
L ily seemed to have forgotten how to put on a lady’s dress and how to make up Emma’s hair, so it took them hours just to get Emma ready the next morning. Emma had never felt so lost without Google before, which prompted Lily to ask if Mr. Google was an all-knowing scholar.
They also went over the plan again and did some fine-tuning. Emma added that they should cut the horses loose and say that the thieves did it to avoid being followed. Surely Lord Blackwell would help to get them back to Skip. Lily also taught Emma everything she knew about being a lady, which honestly wasn’t much. Emma wasn’t too worried, as she had seen countless period movies with her mother, so she knew a few things about the respectable behavior of ladies. And then there was also the good ol’ “Sorry, I’m American.” Lily said that the British pictured Americans as some sort of wildlings shooting pistols into the air while riding horses over oil-rich fields.
Fair enough. That would help her get away with a lot.
It was barely light out when Skip arrived. Emma couldn’t believe it. There he was. With a carriage. It was an older model and out of fashion, but it would do the job. Lily gave Emma a powerful pat on her shoulder, which made her stumble forward a bit.
“Told you not to worry about Skip. He is one of us.” Skip was a tall, skinny redhead barely older than twenty. He was sitting on the driver's bench in front of the carriage and was dressed the part but still looked kind of misplaced, like he was only a temporary carriage driver.
“Howdy!” Skip removed his hat with a cheeky smile, turning it into a jolly greeting. Emma offered her hand for a handshake but withdrew it right away. Shoot. She and Lily had talked about this. Ladies did not greet servants with handshakes. In fact, handshakes were uncommon for ladies with anybody. She knew that but was so used to handshakes, this would undoubtedly happen again.
“Nice to meet you, Skip. Thanks for doing this. It would also be just fine if you’d rather not get involved. No hurt feelings.”
“Oh, please! I’m glad I can finally pay Lily back for wot she’s done for me and me sisters,” he said in a strong Cockney accent.
He helped Emma into the carriage and took a few steps back to get a better look at her.
“By God, yer did not tell me that she was the prettiest girl in all of England, Lily!”
“I did not want to give you false hope. Your pockets are as empty as they are old, and a good heart is not going to get us out of here,” Lily teased him.
Indeed, Emma looked nothing short of stunning. Even without the jewelry that she traded for the green dress, she felt confident she could easily pass for a true lady. It had taken Lily hours, but she’d managed to turn Emma from a twenty-first-century student into a period princess. The dress looked like it was made for her. The green silk matched her eyes perfectly, and her strawberry-blonde hair, which Lily had fashioned into an elegant bun, made her eyes and dress stand out even more.
Skip shook his head and closed the carriage door. “Remember, Lily, the lady has to get in and out of the carriage first,” he reminded her. Lily had gotten in first, a grave transgression for a lady’s maid.
“Oh, bloody hell. Of course...”
Skip nodded his head and took his seat on the front bench of the carriage behind the horses. He gave the horses a signal that sounded like a whistle, and off they went in a steady but fast clip.
Emma took a deep breath, in and out, but met with some resistance from the cruel corset cinching her ribs to her spine. There was no turning back now. This was it. Her heart pounded against her chest like it wanted to escape. Lily, on the other hand, seemed surprisingly relaxed and cheerful, but that was the innocent, child-like character Lily was able to maintain despite her horrendous line of work.
The ride to the Blackwell property was only going to take two to three hours, so they decided they would stop somewhere to go over the plan with Skip again—for the millionth time.
They found a nice spot behind a tree line, right where Lord Blackwell would do his daily rounds on his famous black stallion, Thunder. This was public information. Blackwell was a hot commodity and had a regular spot in the usual gossip of society, and it was well known that he was a passionate horseman who also loved to stick to his schedule and his schedule alone. To the minute.
Great, I will not only be marrying a prick but a prick with OCD. Emma tried to stay positive, telling herself that she would get out of here in no time anyway, so she might not even have to stay married to this duke for very long. She and Lily would just disappear into thin air and wake up in the twenty-first century before the year was over.
“It’s time,” Skip announced looking at his pocket watch. He got out of the carriage and back on the bench. The horses started moving again. Emma directed her nervous gaze at Lily.
“It will be fine,” Lily said. “Just be yourself. With all your education and wit, they won’t doubt that you are a lady. I never thought anything else of you from the minute I saw you passed out on the side of the road.”
Lily’s words did make Emma feel better. Then the carriage stopped abruptly, shaking Emma and Lily in their seats. Oh God! It was really happening! Emma leaned out the window and watched Skip jump off the carriage to cut the horses loose, but the horses didn’t move an inch. “Bloody hell.” He took off his coat and swung it wildly into the air to scare them. Much to Emma’s relief, it did the trick, and the horses launched in different directions, one down the road, the other over a field. Skip then surveyed the area anxiously, something Emma did as well, to make sure nobody had seen him. Nobody was in sight. This was it. Emma’s only chance to get her and Lily out of female hell. Lily seemed to hear every word of Emma’s encouraging thoughts out loud, using this moment of determination to swing the carriage door open and jump out onto the street to join Skip. They whispered to each other, but Emma was too far to hear what they were talking about. Suddenly, they both stared in the same direction. Lily turned around and gave Emma a hectic sign to move backward, deeper into the carriage, out of sight. Wait? Was somebody coming? Yes! Emma heard horses and voices. Jesus. Somebody’s coming! Emma scratched the scab off her head wound. Blood came running down her face. Not like a river, but enough to make it noticeable. A feeling of shame overcame her, spreading through her body and into her throat to form a lump that threatened to choke any attempted sound. She felt like a total fraud. What the hell was she doing here? She had to remind herself again and again that this was the only way out. She needed to get back home, taking poor Lily with her, and that ruthless Lord Blackwell was her ticket out.
Emma heard a man’s voice, but she couldn’t understand what was being said. Why the hell was Lily not playing her part? She was supposed to yell at Lord Blackwell for help. Were they already discovered? At the very first stage of the whole plan? Were English Victorian prisons as bad as American ones? Could she choose to be sent to the colonies? Were there colonies? Emma’s head was spinning. She started to feel nauseous.
Get it together! Take a deep breath! Deep breath! Get it together. Suddenly, the voices got louder and more frantic.
“What is going on? Is anybody hurt?” a
man’s voice shouted like thunder in the clouds. Emma saw Lily rushing toward the carriage door. She opened her mouth to say something, but before she could even get a word out, a man pushed her aside. His tall stature blocked the whole door as he leaned into the carriage. He was lean and wore an elegant black day suit that fit him like it was hand-tailored, which it probably was. His face had a noble handsomeness to it. His neatly combed brown hair matched his beautiful brown eyes perfectly, which hypnotized Emma for a moment. She could never have dreamt that Lord Blackwell would have such warm, beautiful, kind-looking eyes. She was truly amazed by the sheer grace of this man.
Emma glanced over to Lily, whose head was shaking a strong no from behind the man’s shoulder.
The man seemed to study Emma for a second, gazing from her face to her head wound. Slowly, like he would approach a wounded animal, he took a step into the carriage.
“Do not be scared. It looks like you are hurt. May I assist you out of the carriage to examine your wound in the light?”
Still hypnotized by this man, Emma nodded a soft yes to him. Where the hell was her voice? She scolded herself silently, Say something!
The man gently took Emma’s left hand to help her up on her feet. He then placed his other hand around her waist to get a steady grip on her so she wouldn’t fall on her way out of the carriage. His touch made her shiver but in a weird, warm way.
He noticed her shiver but mistook it for fear. “Do not worry. I shan't hurt you. I promise. You are safe now,” he said in that calming, beautiful voice of his.
Beautiful voice? When had she ever noticed a man’s voice to be beautiful? She tried to step out of the carriage, but the small doorway forced her to briefly press against her rescuer’s chest and stomach. Her whole body erupted in tingly shockwaves. This man was nothing but lean muscle. It must have been all those years without the touch of a man that made her react so strongly to this one…or, at least that’s what she told herself.
The man walked Emma slowly toward a spot under a tree a few feet away from the carriage. Lily and Skip stared at the whole scene like bystanders at an accident. Skip was holding one of the horses that had run off and another horse that appeared to belong to the gentleman. It was a pretty white horse, but it surely did not look like the world-famous “Thunder” to Emma. The man took off his coat and laid it on the ground under the tree for Emma to sit on. The sky was cloudy and looked like it could rain at any moment.
