48
Lorna

ASHEVILLE, NORTH CAROLINA
APRIL 29, 1924

Lorna tied the sash of her dress into a smart bow. She settled the stylish cloche hat Arthur had gifted her over carefully curled hair. Although the attention wouldn’t be on her today, she wanted to look her very best for Cornelia’s wedding. She smiled at herself in the mirror. And for Arthur. Although they had only been invited to the reception at Biltmore House—along with 2,498 others—Arthur had arranged for them to slip into the church at the last minute to watch the ceremony from behind a curtain.

“But don’t be getting any ideas about our wedding,” he’d admonished. “I’m no Vanderbilt.”

Lorna flushed at the memory of how she’d assured him that she’d rather have him than the richest man in the world. An embrace had ensued that made her more eager than ever for their own wedding day to arrive.

“Where’s my girl?” Arthur’s voice boomed from the front porch. Lorna hurried out to greet him with a chaste kiss. “I thought Vivian and Gentry were coming?”

“They are. They’ll meet us outside the church for the procession. Although it was all Vivian could do to contain Gentry once she heard we were going to be on hand to watch the ceremony. Isn’t it just like our sweet Nell to save the pews in the transepts for estate staff? I heard Mrs. Vanderbilt is even sending a car for old Frank the gatekeeper.” Arthur drew her into his arms. “My but that’s a fetching hat. Good enough for royalty.” She laughed, and this time the kiss was a bit less chaste.

Lorna dabbed at tears as she and Arthur slipped out of the church ahead of the wedding party. The service had been lovely, of course, but each moment had also been laced with the thought that soon she would say those same words, would commit her life, and would spend the rest of her days with this wonderful man by her side.

“A family,” she whispered. Yes. She would be part of a family once again.

Gentry caught sight of them and waved a gorgeous shawl in the air. Lorna recognized it as one her former protégé had woven with her mother. They hurried to join the pair in the throng waiting to see Tarheel Nell emerge from the church doors a wedded woman. She was surprised to see that even Boyd had turned up for the event. He gave her a rueful smile and ducked his head. “Once-in-a-lifetime chance, they say.” He mumbled the words, but his eyes were fixed on the doors just like everyone else’s.

Outside All Souls Cathedral, two rows of estate workers’ children in frilly white dresses held baskets and tall floral wands to form an aisle for Mr. and Mrs. John Francis Amherst Cecil to walk along. Cornelia finally appeared, a shy smile on her lips. She looked so elegant in her lacy dress, and her husband was the very picture of a proper English gentleman.

“Do you see the flowers on her veil and the toes of her slippers?” Arthur’s whisper tickled Lorna’s ear. “Chauncey Beadle, the old estate superintendent, sent her those from Florida. Isn’t it just like our Nell to wear them?” He took her hand, and the warmth she felt had little to do with Cornelia’s sentimental flowers.

As they watched the happy couple wave and accept well wishes, Vivian slipped up on Lorna’s other side. She wrapped an arm around Lorna’s waist and beckoned Gentry to join them. Boyd winked at Gentry, who rolled her eyes. He might be sixteen to Gentry’s twenty-one, but Lorna suspected he had a bit of a crush all the same.

Lorna looked at these people who, though they couldn’t take the place of her mother and father, had become her rock and her anchor. She remembered once thinking that if she found Gentry for Vivian, she could somehow put a broken family back together again. Something that could never be done for her. And while her own dear parents could never be replaced in her heart, she realized that family might not be as elusive as she once thought. She’d been hiding for such a long time, hoping no one would know her well enough to break her heart. But now she was known again, the good and the bad, and it was . . . wonderful.

Arthur squeezed her fingers, and she looked up at him, tears in her eyes. “I love you,” she said.

Such a look of love washed over his face that he didn’t need to speak a word to tell her exactly how he felt. Yet she was grateful just the same when he pressed his lips to her ear and whispered, “And I love you.”