“Your carriage waits, wife,” Lachlan said.

Still she did not move.

“Your carriage might wait, but I will not.” He picked her up then, her weight insubstantial. And still he could not quite get over the softness.

She made a noise halfway between a squeak and growl, clinging for a moment to his shirt before releasing her hold on him and going limp, her hands dangling at her sides, her expression one of fury. “I can walk,” she said as he began to stride toward the church doors.

“But you weren’t.”

“I would have!”

“I was tired of waiting,” he growled, pushing the doors open, early morning sunlight washing over them both.

The carriage was just outside, two shiny black horses, a driver and footman. When he saw Lachlan approaching, the footman scrambled down the side of the carriage and held the door for them. Lachlan deposited Penelope inside, and she moved to the far corner, putting as much space between the two of them as possible. “You were waiting for all of ten seconds,” she said.

“No,” he said, his voice like a stranger’s. “I’ve been waiting for fifteen years. I will wait no longer.”