Richmond Park outside London, May 1837

“Here are Sally and Charles,” Amy said, waving to the newcomers from where she stood with Morwenna on a rise above the river.

As her friends’ elegant carriage rolled onto the broad field beside the Thames, Morwenna looked up from the baby daughter sleeping in her arms. Now everyone she loved was here, it was a celebration indeed. “Oh, how lovely. I thought they might have stayed in Italy this spring.”

“You know they hate to miss Vernon’s picnic.”

Every May, Vernon and Helena, Lord and Lady West, invited family and friends to this extravagant open-air gathering. Morwenna wasn’t sure what had started the tradition. It wasn’t anyone’s birthday, and when she’d asked if the date marked some anniversary, her brother-in-law smiled at his striking wife and didn’t answer.

Today the weather was perfect. Through some alchemy, it usually was, although once or twice they’d had to retreat to the Wests’ elegant house in Mayfair. Morwenna looked around at a scene that could have graced a medieval tournament. Flower-bedecked tents and pavilions, bowers of cushions and divans, tables groaning with food and wine. And for the guests’ entertainment, horses, gigs, dogs, boats, a maypole, archery butts, and a string quartet, doing their best to be heard above the shrieks and laughter of a crowd of overexcited children.

“I haven’t seen the Kinglakes since Christmas.” Sally and Charles had stayed at Belleville for a couple of weeks over the Festive Season. Morwenna had worried that her stylish, fastidious friends might find her rambunctious family too much to handle en masse, but it had turned out to be a happy reunion. She and Robert rarely came to London, and even when they did, Sally and Charles were often away traveling.

How she loved her life on the beautiful and now prosperous estate that Robert had bought from Silas seven years ago. Seven eventful years for the family, as a quick check around the field proved.

Silas and Caro were here with their four children, their oldest Roberta now fourteen and growing into a beauty like her mother. Traces of gray showed in Silas’s thick tawny hair, while Caro glowed with the contentment of a life well lived. Helena and Vernon, of course, with their three children. Fenella and Anthony Townsend had brought their son and daughter, Henry and Emily, while their older boys, Carey Townsend and Brandon Deerham, had come along to help keep the boisterous youngsters under control.

The first three Dashing Widows had found love and fulfillment and paved the way for the second trio of Dashing Widows to make their way to happiness.

Morwenna was certainly happy with how everything had worked out. Robert had wanted a big family, and fate had delivered one. Her sons, seven-year-old Michael and six-year-old Frederick, both lean and dark like their father, were playing around the boats along the riverbank. Robert’s fascination with sailing had continued into the next generation.

Her daughters Kate and Bella trailed their older sister Kerenza about the field, no doubt driving her mad. At twelve, Kerenza had to cope with endless adoration from the little girls of three and four, although most of the time, she took it in her stride. Kerenza, Morwenna was pleased to say, took most things in her stride.

She stared down at Jane, six months old, and already promising to be another child who wasn’t too fussed about unimportant things.

A bark caught her attention. Kerenza had stopped to lift Kate onto a fat piebald pony, while Bella played with Kerenza’s dog Rascal. Rascal more than lived up to his name. Morwenna often wished they’d called the black spaniel Little Angel.

“Goodness me, you’re so dreamy at the moment. It’s hardly worth trying to talk to you,” Amy said crossly. “Did you hear me say the news is all over Town that the King is ill? It looks like we might have a queen on the throne before the end of the year.”

“That’s nice,” Morwenna said, although she hardly cared. Her days as part of London society seemed long ago now.

Amy sighed impatiently. “I’m sure I wasn’t nearly so besotted with my babies.”

That caught Morwenna’s attention. “I’m sure you were—and are.”

Amy had borne her first child, golden-haired Charlotte, five months after Robert came home. Wilfred arrived two years later. The strikingly good-looking Dacre children were hanging around their cousins on the riverbank, under the watchful eye of Miss Carroll and their father Gervaise, Lord Pascal.

These days, Amy and Pascal didn’t spend much more time in Town than Morwenna and Robert. London’s handsomest man had, much to the fashionable world’s astonishment, become a dedicated farmer. He and his wife devoted most of their attention to a thriving estate in Shropshire, where Amy received great acclaim for her experiments in cattle breeding.

“Who knew I’d find my children even more interesting than my prize Herefords?” Amy paused to admire the sleeping baby. “You’re so lucky that Anne is such a quiet child. Both of mine howled like banshees for the first two years.”

Morwenna smiled down at her daughter, loving her pink cheeks and soft, light brown curls. She was going to grow up to be one of the leonine Nashes. “After Bella, I deserve a quiet baby. I swear she didn’t sleep a wink until she was three.”

“She’s still a bundle of energy,” Amy said, glancing across to where Bella rushed over to torment her cousin Wilfred, Amy’s dark-haired son.

Sally and Charles, both as always dressed in the first stare of fashion, approached them up the hill. Once the flurry of greetings was over, Sally was holding Anne, and Charles had gone in search of Silas who was, as usual at these picnics, talking horses with their host.

“Isn’t she beautiful?” Sally said softly, running an elegant finger down the baby’s rounded cheek.

“Well, I think so.” From habit, Morwenna searched her friend’s face for some sign of regret or resentment that she’d never had children. But Sally and Charles were so wrapped up in each other, she supposed they were happy as they were. “She’s grown since you last saw her.”

The Kinglakes had made Anne’s acquaintance last Christmas, not long after she arrived in the world. Sally lowered her voice, although only Amy and Morwenna were within earshot. “We’re not telling anyone yet, just in case, but…”

Amy’s face lit up with joy. “Sally, are you going to have a baby?”

Eyes bright with tears, Sally nodded. “In October, if all goes well.”

“Charles will be overjoyed.”

Sally accepted Morwenna’s handkerchief and balancing Anne on one arm, wiped her eyes. “He’s pleased and worried in equal measure—I’m thirty-nine after all. But the doctors say I’m as healthy as a horse. And I feel marvelous.”

“Oh, Sally, I’m so happy for you.” Morwenna laid her hand on Sally’s arm.

“How are my favorite girls getting on?” Robert said from behind her.

“Why, thank you, kind sir,” Sally said, turning and batting her eyelashes at him.

“Of course you’re my favorite,” he said, kissing her cheek and taking his newest daughter into his arms. Anne opened bright hazel eyes and gave a satisfied murmur at the move. She adored her papa beyond anything in the world, except perhaps Rascal.

“What about me?” Amy asked.

“You’re all my favorites.” Robert smiled at his sister. “Don’t you know that?”

These days, Robert smiled a lot, and a large gathering like this presented no difficulties. He was no longer the troubled, damaged man who had come back to Morwenna almost eight years ago. Even the horrific slash on his face had faded to a subtle silver. In her opinion, the scar made him look rather dashing.

It had been nearly a year before he told her the full story of his captivity in South America, and she still occasionally woke from nightmares inspired by the horrors he’d described. But that long, sleepless night when he’d relived every harrowing detail for her had been like lancing a wound. Since then, he’d risen above his ordeal with a courage that awed her.

“Good try, brother,” Amy said without rancor.

“You’re definitely my favorite youngest sister.” He tilted his chin toward the activity down in the field. “I believe the races are about to start.”

Contests of horsemanship always formed part of the picnic’s entertainment. Morwenna watched Silas and Vernon, still best friends, still competitive, mount up. Pascal was already sitting on his chestnut mare, although with Vernon riding last year’s Derby champion, he didn’t stand a chance of winning. But that hardly mattered when a man looked as spectacular in the saddle as he did.

Everyone, adults and children, started to move toward the makeshift course to watch the fun. All except Morwenna and Robert who lingered behind on the rise with their new daughter. Amy was right. Morwenna was besotted. And so, she was delighted to note, was Jane’s papa.

“Anthony’s playing umpire again,” Robert said, frowning into the sun. At the finish line, Anthony Townsend, Lord Kenwick, towered over his delicate blond wife Fenella.

“At least he’s big enough to stop any fights,” Morwenna said with a fond laugh.

“Not that he gets much practice with his perfect wife and perfect children,” Robert said wryly. “He should come and pour oil on troubled waters at my house. That would really test his skills.”

Morwenna cast him a sardonic glance. “Your children are perfect.”

He rolled his eyes. “When they’re asleep. Maybe.”

“You wouldn’t have it any other way.”

He shook his dark head. “No, I love their spirit. They get it from their mother.”

She arched her eyebrows. “Are you saying she’s not perfect either?”

His smile held such a wealth of unconditional love, her breath caught. “She’s perfect for me.”

“Oh, Robert…” Even after all these years, he maintained the ability to turn her heart to syrup.

He leaned in, juggling the baby, and kissed her. “I love you, my darling.”

“And I love you.” She blinked away the misty haze in front of her eyes. “We’ve been lucky, haven’t we?”

They had, despite their years of heartbreak and separation. Robert had needed a long time to recover from his captivity and find his way on land instead of on the water, but they had made a good life in Devon. And Morwenna could never doubt how much he loved his family. And her. “Yes, we’ve been blessed.”

Holding Anne with one powerful arm, Robert slung the other around his wife’s shoulders. As Helena called “go” to start 1837’s Dashing Widows Stakes, Morwenna leaned against her husband in perfect contentment. She barely spared a glance for the riders down in the field.

As far as she was concerned, it didn’t matter a fig who won the Dashing Widows Stakes today. What mattered was that in the game of life, all the Dashing Widows had emerged victorious.