Mrs Hawkins stilled, that information seemingly new to her. It shouldn’t have been. Freddie was the next male Dashworth after Tobias; of course, he was the current heir to the dukedom. It wouldn’t last, meant nothing really, and Freddie had never called himself Earl of Blackmore or Lord Frederick but still… it wasn’t new news. Except that the reality of it did seem to be dawning on Mrs Hawkins. Gradually, her features relaxed, her pursed lips flattening as she thought through all the ramifications. She may not be getting a duchess as a daughter, but for now she would get a countess and there was a slim chance she might get a duke for a grandson.
Freddie’s gaze turned back to Emily. She’d said nothing since his second marriage declaration. Her skin had gone paler still and the pretty loops she’d worn her hair in when he’d first seen her in the garden were coming undone. He silently urged her to look at him, to see if he could guess what she was thinking in this moment, but she had resumed staring at the carpet, her shoulders slumped in defeat. Whatever Freddie’s proposal to her meant, it was not something that sparked joy. He’d known she hadn’t wanted to marry him, but her obvious distress was a knife to the heart.
‘I’d like a moment with Emily,’ he said, once again surprising himself with his stern approach to this.
‘Absolutely not,’ said Mrs Hawkins.
‘Of course,’ said Tobias at the same time.
Edward continued to smirk and Emily showed no reaction whatsoever.
‘I only wish for a moment of my betrothed’s time,’ Freddie continued, sounding more formal than he ever had prior to this moment. ‘It shall not take long.’
Edward’s smirk deepened. Freddie knew he was sounding like a pompous buffoon, but it was not as if he could ruin Emily any further; not that he had any intention of kissing her again, not when she was fading before his eyes. He only wanted a moment to comfort her, to tell her that if she wanted to get out of his arrangement, then he would make it happen. All he wanted was to see the colour back in her beautiful skin, to reassure her that this didn’t have to be a disaster, that he would get her out of an engagement with him if she really, trulycould not stand the thought. Or that if they had to marry he would do everything in his power to make sure that a union between them was not a painful experience for her, that he would try every moment of every day to make her happy. But he did not want an audience while he said it.
Although clearly disgruntled, Mrs Hawkins allowed Tobias to show her out of the room. Edward disappeared, taking a different route out of the room, no doubt to share the news with Christopher. The bastards would probably find the whole thing hilarious, but it was impossible to see the funny side with Emily’s pale face in front of him.
When the door was finally closed, he crossed the room and took her hands in his. She continued to stare at the floor; there was nothing of the vibrant, passionate woman he’d held in his arms earlier. Her skin was icy cold and he rubbed the backs of her fingers with his thumbs, trying to warm her up.
‘I am so sorry, Emily.’
She looked up at him then and his heart broke to see unshed tears glistening in her eyes. Her disappointment was heartbreaking for both of them.
‘It is me who is sorry,’ she croaked. ‘My mother could have left that alone, but she forced you into an impossible situation and now we will be bound together for the rest of our lives. I am desperately sorry, Freddie.’
‘No, it was all my fault. I should have known better.’ Emily was an innocent and he wasn’t. He’d known exactly what her eyes had been asking him and he knew he should have stepped away the minute he’d realised she was there. Everything that had happened afterwards was on him.
‘She will not rest until we are wed.’ Emily continued. ‘She has been desperate to get me off her hands since my come-out and this is the perfect opportunity for her.’ Freddie did not say that Mrs Hawkinswould definitely have preferred his older brother. He was reluctant to put any ideas in Emily’s head. If Emily had to marry a Dashworth, then it would be him. Tobias had had the opportunity to offer and he had not taken it. ‘I’ve ruined your life,’ said Emily, her voice breaking and the tears spilling over.
He pulled her closer, wrapping his arms around her shoulder, and she cried into the crook of his neck. All the while, his heart slowly cracked into a thousand pieces. He knew he was not good enough for her, that she would not have chosen to marry him if she’d been allowed to pick, but the idea that marriage to him was causing her this much anguish was enough to break him. Because he knew that, despite his great unworthiness, he could not regret this union, not completely. He would never have sought to saddle her with himself, but now that it had happened, he would do his best not to let her down, to try to be worthy of her even if he could never match her. Those were the words he should have said to her as they stood there, the enormity of what was happening to them slowly becoming a reality from which they could not escape, but instead, he held his tongue, the words refusing to emerge. Before long, they were interrupted anyway, her mother entering the room and tutting to find Emily in his arms once more. She bore Emily away and Freddie had to watch her leave, her shoulders hunched and miserable as her mother no doubt whispered poison into her ears.
Chapter Nineteen
At the great ball, given to celebrate the upcoming nuptials of Miss Emily Hawkins and Frederick Dashworth, the newly proclaimed Earl of Blackmore, Emily hid. She wasn’t proud of her behaviour. She was well aware that she was a coward, but if she had to listen to her mother introduce the engagement with the words, ‘My daughter and the Duke of Glanmore’s heir, Lord Frederick’, one more time, she would not be responsible for her actions. It had taken all her willpower not to scream the last time it had happened and that’s when she’d known that, for everyone’s sake but mostly her own, she needed to take herself off somewhere quiet.
The ballroom itself was crushed with people. No one wanted to miss a ball given to celebrate one of the Dashworth men marrying, especially as it meant the three other unattached brothers would be in attendance. Mamas from across the Ton all seemed to be reasoning that now one had fallen, the rest would be quick to follow.
The Hawkins’ ballroom had been polished to such a high degree that wherever Emily turned she could see lots of tiny reflections of herself. In each one she had the same expression, similar to someone being led to the hangman’s noose. Every time she attempted a smile, she looked like a mourner at a grand funeral. It was not a look to inspire joy and happiness and she could see that her demeanour washaving an impact on Freddie, because whenever they were together his eyes were becoming tighter and less full of his normal joie de vivre. They hadn’t married yet and she was already stripping him of the qualities that made him so beloved of the Ton.
She spotted her mother deep in conversation with one of her close confidants and promptly turned and squeezed her way through the crowds, murmuring apologies as she stepped on several toes. Eventually, she popped out from the densely packed people at the far end of the room. In the centre of the room, away from the dancers, Freddie was holding court surrounded by his many admirers. She could not guess at what he was talking about, but it must have been amusing because every so often everyone laughed, their smiles never fading. Goodness, how he was going to hate being married to her. Nobody hung on her every word like they did with him.
A brief scan showed that no one was looking at her and so she turned and quickly escaped into the empty corridor. She meant only to stand outside the door and breathe for a moment, but the deeper quietness of the rest of the house called to her. She took several slow, tentative steps away from the noise until before she knew it she was turning round a dark corner and leaning against the cool wall.
From this distance, she could not hear her mother’s shrill voice or the relentless chatter of what felt like thousands of people all crammed into the ballroom. She let her head fall back as the silence seeped into her bones. At this event, and at every one since the engagement had been announced, her mother had put on a very convincing show. Not a single person would doubt that Mrs Hawkins was anything but thrilled with the news that her youngest daughter was about to be aligned with one of the oldest dukedoms in Society. Perhaps she was. It was a coup even if it wasn’tthecoup of the season.
If Tobias didn’t marry and produce an heir, and with his lack of enjoyment of social events, it was a possibility, then Mrs Hawkinswould be grandmother to a duke through Freddie and Emily’s children. As it was she was going to be mother to a countess. The Hawkins family may be old and illustrious, but they did not have a single title amongst them and Emily was the first person to bring one in. It didn’t seem to matter that the title was not attached to land or that her mother would probably be long dead before her hypothetical grandson became a duke; she was still announcing the earldom far and wide.
Emily was fairly sure that Tobias’ death would be a cause of celebration for her mother, especially if the event could be managed within the next year or two, although Emily hoped her theory would never be put to the test. Not only did she not want Tobias, still a reasonably young man, to die, she also had no desire to become a duchess. To rise to such an eminent title would mean hosting yet more balls and spending more time with people who weren’t interested in her as a person. Enduring this would mean even more time away from reading books and that was not something to which Emily aspired.
At home, her mother treated the engagement very differently. Although it had been two weeks since the incident in the garden, her mother’s fury had not dimmed. At times, she appeared to vibrate with it; her disappointment in her youngest daughter’s behaviour was a living, breathing thing that seemed to take up rooms in the house. Even Emily’s father had taken to spending more time in his study than ever.
Her sisters knew nothing of what had transpired, but they were aware that their mother was very unhappy and they were keeping away until the storm had passed. Her mother allowed no time for Emily to spend with Freddie. Perhaps she was afraid more damage would take place or maybe she guessed that Emily would try to talk him out of his offer of marriage, which was a legitimate worry because given half the chance, she would do it. In the moments after he’dmade his offer, Emily had been more distressed at the situation as a whole; it had not occurred to her to tell Freddie that he did not need to sacrifice himself for her.
Later, as she’d lain in bed, the knowledge that she could have done so had hit her hard. Her mind had whirled from everything that had happened; the desperate way she had clung to Freddie as the leaves had swished and swayed above them; the dark horror of discovery; and the long, painful minutes in the duke’s study where she had felt like a discarded napkin. It had all piled on top of her rendering her mute. She hadn’t fought hard enough for her future, hadn’t defended herself from her mother’s onslaught. As the darkness of her bedroom had pressed down on her, she’d known then that she should have spoken up; she should have saved Freddie from his offer. She’d been the only one who could have done so, who could have refused. She could have screamed or begged until someone had listened to her.
As the long, lonely hours of the night had ticked steadily onwards, she’d resolved to say something in the morning. She’d drifted off just as the dawn light was trickling around the edges of the curtains and had slept the sleep of the exhausted. By the time she’d made it down for breakfast, the day after the fateful meeting in the garden, her mother had already sent the engagement announcement to theTimes. By mid-afternoon callers were streaming into the house with their congratulations. She’d been trapped and there was no going back, not unless she wanted to do some serious damage to her and Freddie’s reputations.
She understood why Freddie was going to marry her; he hadn’t really had any choice. The moment her mother had said that Emily was ruined, Freddie’s honour had been called into question and that was it; he’d had to offer her marriage and she had been too weak to protest.
