That first visit of hers to the Cynster Stable and the house had been an unmitigated success.
Her second visit, a few weeks later, to meet his parents and siblings, had been even more heartening. His parents—and Pru and Toby, too—had been hugely impressed by Adriana’s connection with The Barbarian, so much so that his mother and Pru had immediately moved to test whether Adriana’s talent extended to other skittish Thoroughbreds.
And so it had proved.
Everyone had been utterly delighted. “She’s a natural,” his mother had declared.
His father had clapped him on the back. “Trust you to find such a rare lady to marry.”
To say his family had welcomed Adriana with open arms and taken her to their hearts would be a gross understatement. They were utterly captivated by her and in awe of her ability with horses.
As a wedding present, Nicholas’s parents had formally deeded the Newmarket farmhouse to him and Adriana. Despite that, Adriana had made it clear that she expected his family to use the residence exactly as they previously had. The Lord knew, it was large enough to accommodate everyone easily.
When, tomorrow, they left Aisby Grange as a married couple setting out upon the journey of their shared life, he felt confident that the road ahead of them—while not necessarily smooth all the way and doubtless strewn with their fair share of challenges—would be one they would conquer. That the future that lay ahead would be one they would successfully shape and negotiate.
The previous waltz had ended, but now the musicians played the introduction to another. He looked at Adriana—his wife, his helpmate.
His heart.
“Mrs. Cynster.” When surprised and delighted, she looked up at him, he raised her hand to his lips and kissed her fingers. “Can I persuade you to dance with me, my love?”
She smiled radiantly, joy dancing in her eyes, and simply said, “Always.” She stepped toward the dance floor and, still beaming, tugged. “Come on.”
He laughed and followed her, then swung her into his arms and whirled her into the throng.
* * *
Later, when the merriment of the wedding breakfast was inevitably sliding toward its end, Nicholas fetched up beside several of his married male cousins and cousins-in-law, who were standing in a loose group to one side of the ballroom. He’d left Adriana in deep conversation with what he thought of as the gaggle of his married female cousins and cousins-in-law. Among others, the group included Louisa, Antonia, and Therese; a more powerful gathering of younger major hostesses was difficult to imagine.
“Welcome to the fold, old man.” Michael thumped Nicholas’s shoulder.
“Took you long enough,” Christopher observed.
“This,” Drake said, tipping his head at the gathering around them, “is now something of a tradition.”
Nicholas frowned. “What tradition?”
“Where we guess who’ll be next to fall into matrimony’s loving arms,” Devlin, Therese’s husband, explained.
Gregory grinned. “It might interest you to know that, at my wedding, I correctly foretold that you would be the next of our company to fall at Fate’s feet.”
Nicholas stared at him. “You’re joking.”
“He’s not,” Drake said.
“But the question before us now,” Christopher said, “is who do we think will fall next?”
“Justin, Evan, Aiden, and Julius are the most likely,” Michael pointed out.
They were tossing around names when Toby wandered up and joined them. He listened for several minutes, like the others, his gaze raking the crowd, then Drake looked at him and asked, “So, speaking for the younger group, who do you think it’ll be?”
Toby tipped his head. “You always concentrate on the males. What of the females?”
“Too hard to predict,” Devlin said, and by their nods, he spoke for the rest of group.
“Hmm, possibly,” Toby allowed. “But for what it’s worth, my suggestion would be that, in keeping with Nicholas’s choice of wife being utterly unexpected and that he wasn’t really looking when he found her, I’ve got my eye on Meg as being the most likely to give rise to the next Cynster wedding.”
“Meg?” Nicholas located his and Toby’s younger sister in the crowd. She was talking avidly with several other young ladies of her age. Puzzled, Nicholas frowned. “She’s been immersing herself in the social round since she came out. Surely her finding a husband shouldn’t come as any surprise.”
