We Are Friends (1/2)
Penelope Featherington would do anything to protect Colin Bridgerton from a bad match—even to herself. When her mother schemes, she runs. When she runs, he follows. And when it’s all over, wedding bells ring. But that’s only half the story.
Perhaps the real surprise was that it had taken so long for her mother to find them out. Colin had been the one to send the very first letter, back when he was newly away at Eton, and the second and third letter in the weeks after that. Of course, they had been children then, and it had not been such a terrible breach of propriety for a young boy to write to a young girl of his acquaintance. No, the breach came later, when Colin was on his first tour, and Penelope was a proper—if overlooked—debutante. He had, as always, written, she had, as always, responded, and they had continued their correspondence throughout his travels ever since. For eighteen years she had been writing letters to Colin Bridgerton. For eighteen years he had been writing letters to her. Truly, she barely thought it a secret anymore. Certainly the Featherington house staff knew. Varley knew. They all delivered Colin’s letters to her, after all, when they came in with the rest of the post. Even her older sisters knew—of her letters, at least. Had teased her for them mercilessly before they had husbands and babies and they stopped caring quite so very much about making their younger sister’s life miserable. Yet when, on the first warm day of spring in 1824, a letter from Colin Bridgerton somehow landed in her mother’s hands instead of her own, everything turned upside down.
