Always the Widow (Never the Bride #9) - Emily E.K. Murdoch

Chapter One

Try as she might, Elizabeth Howard could not stop from shaking as she entered Lenskeyn House. The memories…they were painful. Five years had passed since she entered this house as a new bride, but the remembrance of that day seared her mind.

It was almost as though she had traveled back in time. Today, as that day had been, the house was decorated for a wedding.

She had been so happy, arriving on the arm of her new husband—Lord Elmore Howard, younger brother of the Earl of Lenskeyn. She had been so proud, so honored to be chosen.

Before she had known his true nature.

Elizabeth shivered as she passed the threshold into the great hall, which was packed with society’s peers. None noticed her nervous entrance, her black mourning gown simple and unadorned. They were too busy laughing with the happy couple: Albemarle Howard, the Earl of Lenskeyn, and Miss Theodosia Ashbrooke—the Countess of Lenskeyn as she was now. Elizabeth watched them greet guests and swallowed down her pain.

Coming back to this place had been a mistake. Too many of her nightmares were here…and now Elmore was dead four weeks. It was almost a pretty house, really.

If only she could forget the man she had married.

He is gone, she told herself silently as she moved to the edge of the room to avoid notice. She was free.

Almost. Just one last duty to perform, and then she could leave the Howard family behind and mourn quietly at home.

“Congratulations!”

Another gentleman approached the happy couple with a hearty handshake for her brother-in-law. Elizabeth watched the bride and groom as they beamed at their guests, never once leaving each other’s sides.

A wistful smile crept over her face, despite her nerves. Albemarle and Theodosia looked far happier than she had ever felt in her five years of marriage. It was a mystery how others managed to find someone so compatible with them.

Her smile faded. But then, she had thought Elmore perfect when she had first married him.

The wooden box in her hands grew heavier as her thoughts turned dark, but it was nothing to the weight of her heart.

A wedding, Elizabeth thought wryly. It should be the happiest place in the world. Was it widows who were bad luck at a wedding or babies?

Not that she could have brought the latter, she thought darkly. Five years of marriage and no child. It was cruel, the hand Fate had dealt her.

But now, she was almost free of the Howard family, free of her clinging, irritating mother-in-law, free of the brother-in-law who had never paid her any attention, and free of the new sister-in-law who would undoubtedly be more of the same.

She shifted the wooden box in her arms, and guilt seared through her heart once more. Elizabeth pushed it aside firmly. She had done what she had needed to do. She just had to get it over with, and then she could leave.

But despite her best intentions, it was another twenty minutes or so before Albemarle and Theodosia were unencumbered with guests. Elizabeth watched them, her curiosity growing as she observed more of them.

Albemarle, the elder brother, had lived abroad for the entirety of her foolish marriage to Elmore. He had not even returned for their wedding, something his mother, the dowager countess, had taken as a personal insult.

Elizabeth had hardly cared. She had been so focused on Elmore, she had barely noticed who else was at their wedding.

As though her thoughts could attract his attention, Albemarle turned and spotted her. Muttering something to his new bride, the pair of them started to approach her.

Elizabeth swallowed. She knew Theodosia, of course, had even had her over to tea a week or so ago with some other ladies of the ton—but it had been a mere formality. They were not intimate.

Why, only a week ago, she had been society’s matchmaker, and now she was a countess and her sister-in-law.

Theodosia was a witty woman. She would realize the truth. She would announce it to the world, here, at Lenskeyn House, and Elizabeth would be ruined.

“Lady Howard,” Albemarle said in a quiet voice.

Elizabeth tried her best to smile. “Congratulations on your marriage, your lordship, Lady Howard.”

“We are honored that you came,” said Theodosia in a low voice like her husband.

Elizabeth nodded. The sooner she got these words out, the sooner this would all be over. “I wanted to. And I also wanted to…to give you this.”

The damned wooden box, the secret she had been carrying for years, had never felt so heavy,