Rory winced. "My father's cousin is Avery. Kindard is a friend. Linley, a barrister. And I know why our name is on his list. My father hurt yours financially."
Money was the root of this? Fifi found that hard to believe. "Why? How?"
Rory took his time, but he began a tale that left her as appalled at her father as ever she'd been.
"Your poor mother! She must think us all animals that we would harbor such a man." She had to voice the obvious conclusion. Bitterness and sorrow choked her, but she managed to state the truth. ”Your mother does not wish us to marry."
The sadness in Rory's eyes struck her like a blow to her heart. She shot to her feet.
Rory was behind her, urging her to turn in his arms and look at him. "Listen to me, Fee. My mother is as horrified as you. She has always been affected by what happened that night with your father. She and my father never told a soul. Well, save for the footman who saved her and hurried her away. He came to our staff and served in the house in Wells as butler all his life."
"Oh, Rory! Scandal or not, it was a crime to attack her. How can your mother forgive such an assault?" Tears burned her cheeks. "She'll never consent."
"She has reservations."
"Reserva—!" Fifi pushed back from his embrace. "I would never forgive such a thing!"
Rory went still. "Oh, Fee, can you forgive that my father took his revenge by attempting to impoverish your family?"
"What?But Rory! That isnothingto raping a woman."
"It is not an eye for an eye, but something nefarious. And it did make your life more hell."
"But your mother knows...knowsthat each time she'd look at me that I was his daughter."
"Butnothim."
"How can she forgive that?" She strode away from him, hands fluttering in anguish, the urge to howl her anger out as her father had all those years here inside these walls.
"She doesn't forgive," Rory said, grief in his tone.
She hung her head, her hopes draining from her. "I thought not."
"But she will try to."
She stared at him. Struck by the impossible, she shook her head.
"She has promised me, she will try to. For me. Because I love you. And I will not give you up. Not to the past. Not to a conflict so old and not of my making, nor of yours."
"She'll tolerate me as your wife?"
"Not tolerate. Welcome you. Because she loves me and tells me that she's always known the woman I love would be a darling beyond compare."
Tears tumbled down her cheeks. "I don't know what to say."
But he caught her up in his arms and kissed her in triumph. "Say you'll marry me. Say you will help us all bury the past."
* * *
"Oh,Rory! I want to. I do!"
He balked. "What else is there to prevent us?"
"My mother."
"She's ill, darling. We'll take her with us. Provide for her."
"You do not know what you suggest!"
