Mrs. Bell agreed to accompany them back to Edinburgh, bringing Mrs. Young with her. The morning of their departure, Dr. Thornton decided to ride in with them as well. It was clear that Alice was the main cause of his enthusiasm about joining the company on their journey to the city.

Nonetheless, the trip went off without her or the doctor verbally or physically assaulting each other, and she and Millie were deposited safely at the Pennington’s Heriot Row town house.

Upon their arrival, Phoebe was delighted to learn her parents were due in the city in a day or two. Since giving up traveling to London to sit in Parliament, Lord and Lady Aytoun enjoyed coming to Edinburgh for part of every July to attend the annual races at Musselburgh, the theatre, and a few social engagements. With Mrs. Bell in town, Phoebe was relieved Ian could speak with them here rather than go to Baronsford. A consultation had been immediately arranged with the specialist Thornton knew.

Phoebe felt it would be best if their news could be kept private until everyone was together, and she’d sworn Millie to secrecy. She wanted the engagement to come fresh to her parents and not as a foregone decision. She’d also tucked her ring away for now, until the formal announcement could be made.

Once Lord and Lady Ayton arrived, a dinner was arranged that included Ian and his mother and a handful of other guests. If her parents were surprised by having the Bells attend, they said nothing to Phoebe about it.

The evening of the gathering, Millicent Pennington could not have been more genuinely and evidently pleased to visit with Mrs. Bell. The two chatted away amiably in the salon before dinner, and Phoebe kept a polite distance from her intended, who was constantly sending teasing looks at her from across the room.

During the dinner itself, she felt her nerves beginning to fray but managed to carry on a reasonably coherent conversation with a family friend who was seated next to her. After retiring with the other ladies to the drawing room, Phoebe caught her mother giving her worried looks as she realized she was pacing back and forth between the pianoforte and the windows like a caged tiger.

As the men filed in and rejoined the ladies, Phoebe felt the blood drain out of her body entirely. Ian and her father were not with them, and she heard someone tell her mother the two men had disappeared into the library a quarter of an hour earlier.

Minutes ticked away like hours, and Phoebe’s agitation grew. Staring at the mantle clock would not make the hands move quicker, no matter how hard she tried.

What was taking so long, she anguished. The request for the earl’s permission should have been brief. The answer even more brief.

Her father wouldn’t refuse him. He couldn’t.

Ian was the perfect matrimonial candidate for any young woman. What he lacked in title, he made up for with his military record, his civic service as Deputy Lieutenant of Fife, his substantial holdings in Fife and in Edinburgh, and the fortune his father had made in America.

Damnation. If there was a more ideal man, she’d never encountered him.

Phoebe stopped pacing, realizing a number of guests standing nearby were looking at her. She smiled weakly, praying she hadn’t said any of that out loud.

Still the hands on that clock would not move, and Phoebe was beginning to wonder if the blasted thing was broken.

Two of the women approached her and asked Phoebe if she was familiar with the new novel Persuasion, and whether she’d known it was the work of a woman. She tried twice but couldn’t focus enough to make an intelligible answer. Another lady approached and asked her to play a piece on the pianoforte. Phoebe went immediately to Millie and whispered, “Please. I beg you. Save me from them.”

Gracious as always, the younger sister nodded and sat at the instrument. A moment later, the sounds of music filled the room, and Phoebe slipped out the door.

“What’s the matter with you?” her mother called out, catching up to her in the hallway outside of the drawing room.

“I need air, Mother.” Phoebe looked in the direction of the library, then back to her mother.

“Are you unwell?”

Where they were standing, they were protected from the eyes and ears of their dinner company. Phoebe looked back at the library door again. How long had those two been cloistered away in that room? Her father had a temper, but he had no reason to be critical of Captain Bell. None whatsoever.

“Mother,” she said, “I think you should go right in there and tell Father he is being rude, ignoring the guests as he is.”

Millicent put a hand on her hip, one eyebrow raised, looking at Phoebe as if she’d grown a second head.

“Tell me, young lady. What is it?”

Phoebe took a deep breath.

“I’m to be married,” she whispered, although it sounded more like a squeal. “To Captain Bell. That is, if you and Father agree to it. But I’m worried. I don’t understand what is taking them so—”

The rest of the words were lost as her mother pulled her into her arms.

“But what if he says no?” Phoebe said in panic, holding tight. “I’m disagreeable, temperamental, independent, impertinent. What if Father tries to talk him out of marrying me?”

“Good gracious! My Phoebe. A married woman.”

Millicent was talking as if their marriage were a real possibility. Phoebe wished she could share her mother’s enthusiasm. Still, she held on to the thought that the countess had a great deal of influence over her husband.

Before they could exchange another word, the door of the library opened, and Ian emerged. She and her mother were standing with their arms around each other’s waist. He gave no sign to her but closed the door behind him. Her father wasn’t with him.

“No,” she sighed. Leaving her mother, she walked toward Ian, a million arguments coming to mind that she was going to barrage the earl with.

Compromise. The word came to her like a bolt from heaven. Compromise was the order of the day. She would beg him, promise to change, to be the daughter he wanted her to be, but in return he must agree to this marriage.

She was too upset to notice the smile on Ian’s face until they met in the middle of the hallway.

“Well?” she whispered as he took her hands in his.

“He didn’t refuse. But he’d like to speak to you before he says anything more.”

Phoebe looked toward the library and braced herself. There was no time like the present. With a glance back at her mother—who nodded to her encouragingly—she walked directly to the library, knocked once, and entered, closing the door behind her.

The Earl of Aytoun was standing in the center of the room, clutching his walking stick with the carved lion’s head handle. He frowned fiercely at his daughter.

“Phoebe,” he began brusquely, “what are you doing ruining this young man’s life?”

“Ruining?” Objections arose in her, but she could not voice them. His words stung her.

Her father didn’t waste any time, however, and continued on. “I’ve been having you followed. I know what you do. Where you go. I know you’re writing for the Edinburgh Review. I know what you write and under what name. I know you employ a former constable as a bodyguard. He’s a good man, but that’s not enough, apparently. I know you put your life in danger.”

His sharp tone made it clear that all his information had come from a paid informant, and not from Grace and Hugh.

“You’ve had me followed?” she asked, fighting through an avalanche of emotions as she tried to fathom his first statement.

“You showed up at your sister’s wedding last month, battered and bruised. And you would not say a word about how it came about.”

She recalled the argument with her father the day after she arrived back at Baronsford, following the incident in the Vaults. She’d offered no answers to his questions, not even attempting to fabricate a story, as she had with Ian. It was only because of Jo and her wedding that the two of them had put their quarrel aside.

“Of course I’ve had you followed. What father wouldn’t?”

Phoebe recalled the moments while she was sitting in the carriage in the Grassmarket when she thought she was being watched. There was also the day at Bailie Fife’s Close, feeling that someone was following her. And there had to be other times.

He leaned on the walking stick, suddenly looking tired. “I was worried about you. I still am. Not a day goes by that I don’t imagine some trouble you might be getting into. And I understand your desire for independence. I respect it. This is the way your mother and I raised you. Raised all of our children. But a line exists between pursuing a life for oneself and risking that life unnecessarily.”

For all that he’d learned about what Phoebe was doing, she realized he wasn’t censuring her for her work but for the dangers she was exposing herself to. She looked up at the tall, imposing man that she’d always adored and yet had made miserable for much of her adult years. Her mother always said the two of them were “cut from the same cloth.” Headstrong. Proud. Passionate. Looking at her father now, she also saw him aging, tired, but stoic in the face of his advancing years. And still loving her in spite of all the trouble she’d given him.

Her heart ached for what she’d done to him and to her mother; she knew no pain was endured by one without the other feeling it as well.

“Father, I’ve always viewed you as a great man.” She took a step toward him. “A man of vision, a romantic, a hero, a voice for justice and good. I can name a hundred qualities that I’ve always known exist in you and Mother. And as an adult, I’ve wished I could emulate a portion of who you are and what you’ve done.”

Phoebe struggled to keep her voice steady as she said words she should have spoken long ago. “I am sorry,” she whispered, meaning it heart and soul. She took another step toward him. “For all the pain. For all the worry. For not thinking through my actions and seeing how they affected those who love me, those whom I love.”

He stretched a hand out to her, and she closed the distance, moving into his embrace.

“Captain Bell,” he said gruffly, holding her. “The man is still grieving his sister’s death. When I said ruin—”

“I know,” she interrupted, remembering her own thoughts when she’d been ready to lose hope in the well. How her death would affect him had tormented her. But her love for him had also strengthened her. “I cannot be reckless, not any longer. He means too much to me. Caution, attentiveness, responsible action. This is your daughter from now on.”

“And you’re willing to do all of this? For him? For yourself?”

“I’m more than willing. I’m determined,” she told him, pressing her face to his heart. “I love him, Father.”

He smiled and hugged her fiercely before letting her go.

“Do you know,” he told her, holding her hand as he sat back against a writing table, “I tried to warn him about your stubbornness and uncontrollable nature. And he told me there is nothing about you that he doesn’t know. Without blush or stammer, he said that in all you are, and all you do, he loves and cherishes you.”

“He said that to you?” she asked.

“Phoebe . . .” Her father smiled. “Ian Bell is the perfect man for you.”