Julianna meant those words. So much so that the tremble had returned. Tears stung her eyes. This was an emotional revelation, one she had envisioned many times. But she had been ill-prepared for the magnitude.
Hellie nodded curtly, forgetting her napkin and the stain spreading on her silk skirts altogether in favor of their conversation. “I want to meet her, Julianna. I do not pretend to understand the decisions you made. However, I promise to try because I love you. I have always loved you as a sister, and now you shall be one in truth.”
It was more than Julianna could ask.
She bowed her head, humbled. “Thank you, my dear friend.”
* * *
He was goingto be married.
Two years too goddamned late.
It was true. They could have shackled themselves to each other years ago, before she had left for New York City. Before Emily had been born. Before their lives had become a precarious game of maintaining propriety and claiming their daughter at the same time.
“A fucking mess is what it is,” he pronounced.
“Shelbourne, please, no epithets,” chastised the woman who would soon be his wife. Wrapping his mind around that shocking truth still required intense effort. “I will not have Emily cursing as her first words.”
“Her first word was Papa,” he reminded Julianna, as infinitely pleased now as he had been when their daughter had clapped and grinned and declared the word for the first time yesterday.
Neitherpanorbub. ButPapa. And she had been looking at him when she said it, grinning her adorable, mostly toothless smile. He wondered when infants were finished cutting their teeth. His knowledge of babes was admittedly nil. However, he suddenly found himself wanting to know everything there was to know about children. About babies.
About his daughter.
His perfect, adorable, sweet, amazing baby daughter.
He had only known of her existence for a sennight, and already, he was desperately in love with her. He could not recall what his life had been like without her in it. The pattern of his every day now revolved around when he could visit her, what she might be eating, saying, doing.
Lady Emily Davenport was a marvel.
His marvel.
Well, Julianna’s, too. But he would rather not think about his daughter’s mother in such glowing terms just now. Or ever.
“She has not been able to saymama,” Julianna defended stiffly. “I could not give myself that title before, for her sake.”
“Foryoursake,” he corrected bitterly. “And whose fault is that, hmm?”
“I should think we are equally at fault, my lord.”
The censure in her gaze and tone was not lost upon him. Nor was she entirely wrong. Sidney knew he was to blame for making love to her, for failing to take precautions, for bedding her before marrying her. If they had wed two years ago, they would not be where they were now—strangers, each untrusting of the other, watching their inquisitive child toddle about the salon at the Marquess of Leighton’s townhome.
But where would they be? That was the true question.
She had not wanted to marry him two years before. Indeed, she had turned him down in crushing, stunning form. Had laughed away his proposal and then promptly disappeared, taking his heart and soul—and,God help him, his child—away.
“We may be equally at fault for her birth, but the circumstances are your burden and yours alone,” he reminded her quietly. “I asked you to marry me. You refused.”
Refusedwas such a concise way of describing his humiliation.
Fortunately, he was no longer wallowing in the pain of the past. He was about to exact his revenge upon her in the form of their marriage. And what sweet revenge it would be. He had already been about to marry Lady Hermione Carmichael. Switching from one lady he did not like for another hardly signified. Except having Lady Julianna Somerset at his mercy—at last—would be well worth shackling himself to her.
And in truth, marrying her was the only way to protect his daughter and give her his name. It was his sole recourse.
“I did not want to marry you.”
She spoke so calmly, as though she had not torn him apart as if she were a fucking bayonet instead of a female, all finely dressed and perfumed.
