A Bride for the Baron. Jo Ann Brown
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she emerged from the carriage, she would come face-to-face with the disaster.
“It can only get better from this point,” he said quietly, as if she had spoken her thoughts aloud.
She clutched his hand as she climbed out of the carriage. When he winced, she realized she had a death grip on his fingers. She released his hand, but he took hers and placed it on his sleeve. Without saying a word, he led her around the carriage. The wind battered them. Ashes rose into the air in miniature cyclones before falling, turning the ground into a gray wasteland.
Vera’s knees threatened to collapse beneath her when she saw nothing remained of the church. The stone walls had fallen to the ground, scorched by the power of the fire. Upon first glance, the vicarage appeared as if it had survived with less damage. Smoke stains, like dark gray fingers clawing out of the windows and the doorway, warned that the fire had reigned inside the cottage, gutting the interior. The roof was gone, and she wondered if it had burned or fallen into the flint cottage.
“Say the word,” Lord Meriweather murmured, “and we can go back to Meriweather Hall at any time.”
She looked past him. “Where is Gregory?”
“Over by the church.” He continued to keep his hand over hers on the sleeve of his dark brown greatcoat as they walked to where her brother stared into the church’s cellar.
The few men who had been gathering up debris and piling it near the edge of the cliff stopped working as they watched her and Lord Meriweather come toward the church.
“Maybe you should wait here,” he said. “I don’t know how stable the foundation is.”
She shook her head, and they walked to where her brother had not moved. His shadow dipped over the edge of the cellar, and he seemed unaware of anything or anyone else.
“Gregory?” she called.
He was silent.
“Gregory?”
When her brother gave her no answer, she glanced at Lord Meriweather. Again his mouth was taut, and furrows had dug back into his face.
He drew his arm out from under her hand and strode to her brother. “Vicar!” His voice was as sharp as the crack of a whip.
Gregory flinched, then turned to look at them. Tears filled his eyes when he saw Vera. She ran, wending her way past the gravestones in the churchyard, and flung her arms around him.
“Do you know what happened?” she asked.
“All I can figure,” her brother said, “is that another section of roof fell in and struck the wood stove. Embers must have fallen out. That set the church on fire.”
Vera shook her head. “Gregory, that can’t be what happened. We didn’t use it anymore.”
“It is the only explanation I have.” His shoulders sagged, and Vera embraced him again.
* * *
Edmund Herriott, Lord Meriweather, stepped away to let Miss Fenwick and her brother comfort each other. He spoke to the men cleaning the site and was glad to see many were his tenants. He thanked them. Was he expected to do more? He had no idea. Now that his cousins Sophia and Catherine were both married and gone, he would need to turn to Lady Meriweather to help him make proper decisions.
Or any decisions at all.
He refrained from grimacing as he walked around the ruined church. How was Meriweather Hall going to function if its baron could not even decide which cravat to wear each morning? Now there was the matter of rebuilding the church and the vicarage. He did not want to burden Lady Meriweather, but he was unsure where else to turn.
His gaze settled on Miss Fenwick. He had suspected, since shortly after his first meeting with the vicar’s sister, that she handled many of the parish responsibilities. Mr. Fenwick was a learned man who made every effort to serve his congregation, but the vicar’s duties often kept him riding from one end of the parish to the other. Would Miss Fenwick help Edmund, too?
Miss Fenwick went with the vicar to examine the damage, and Edmund looked away. He did not want her to discover him staring at her. She was his cousin Catherine’s best friend, but Edmund had to own that he scarcely knew the vicar’s sister. Any time they had spent together prior to the journey back to Sanctuary Bay had included her brother or his cousins, and there had been no time to learn more about her during the days in the carriage because Miss Kightly’s prattle had monopolized the conversation from morn until they stopped at another coaching inn each night.
The sickening reek of wet ashes erupted with each step as Edmund walked around what was left of the church. The roof had burned. The joists supporting the floor had failed, and everything that had not been consumed by the flames had fallen into the cellar.
But there was another odor. Fainter, yet there nonetheless. He sniffed and frowned. Brandy. There must have been a lot of brandy to leave the scent after a fire. That could mean one thing and one thing only.
The rattle of carriage wheels resounded, startling him. He turned as a small carriage rolled to a stop beside his carriage, its wheels crunching on the filthy snow. Edmund recognized it, even before he saw the baronial crest on the door. It was from Meriweather Hall. Who had driven here after them?
When the door opened and Miss Kightly stepped out of the carriage with the help of a footman, Edmund was not surprised that she had been unwilling to remain at Meriweather Hall as he had requested. An astounding beauty with golden hair and perfect features, she was, as always, a pattern-card of style. The crimson pelisse she now wore was the lone bright spot among the ruins. She held on to her ermine-lined bonnet to make sure it was not twisted off by the wind as she hurried to them.
Tears blossomed in her eyes when she placed her fingers lightly on Miss Fenwick’s arm. “I had no idea there would be this much devastation. I know my great-uncle will be willing to help you rebuild.” She gave Edmund a swift smile because she must know that Edmund, like most of the people in North Yorkshire, considered her great-uncle, Sir Nigel Tresting, a very eccentric man. “He likes coming here for services.”
“That is very kind of both of you,” Miss Fenwick said.
“I am sorry this has happened to you.” The blonde flung her arms around Miss Fenwick, giving her and her brother a big hug.
Edmund looked away, feeling as he had too often, like an outsider in this close-knit seaside community. Before the war, his only worries had been how to keep his import and construction businesses profitable. That had changed when he had inherited the title of Lord Meriweather. Now, he had three vital duties. He needed to keep the estate running and make sure its residents saw to their responsibilities. He must attend sessions of Parliament. Last and most important, he had to find a woman to wed and give the baronage an heir, as well as a spare or two.
He had been somewhat successful with the first two, even though he still had much to learn. On the last, he had failed. Oh, he had thought he was on his way to success on the third when he had begun courting Lady Eloisa Parkington after the young woman had shown her interest in him. He had bought her items she admired, and he had escorted her to gatherings where the door might otherwise have been closed to her after her family’s reputation was sullied by her older siblings’ wild behavior. He even, to quiet her pleading, had introduced her to a man he had served with during the war, a man who had recently become a marquess. Edmund had regretted the decision when Lady Eloisa had quickly persuaded the marquess to propose to her.
Introducing them had been the last decision Edmund had made, and it had been as wrong as too many others had been when he had watched men die on the battlefield following his orders. The night he had heard of Lady Eloisa’s betrothal was the night he admitted that he would be a fool to attempt to decide anything else on his own.
He was not going to think about that now. He went back to the hole that once had been the church’s cellar. Kneeling on its edge, he scanned the dusky shadows. Again he sniffed. Again he caught a hint of brandy.
One of his tenants,