“He was bloodycrying, mate,” Montaigne said, near tears of laughter himself.
“We had to give him someveryspecific instructions,” Leith added.
“And you could hardly blame the lady for being so terrified,” Montaigne continued, wheezing from laughter. “My idiot cousin betrayed a seriously limited knowledge of female anatomy.”
By the end of the evening, John felt, as he always did, bolstered in spirit by his friends. Maybe, he thought, everything would work out with his father’s will. It seemed more possible when his best friends—high-ranking, powerful and the only people on earth who really knew him—resolved to stand by his side no matter what scandal came.
At the end of the evening, right before returning to their chambers, Leith stopped him.
“Just…be careful, mate,” he said, gesturing towards Catherine’s room.
John nodded. He took one look at Catherine’s door and then, swearing to himself, headed through his own.
Chapter Fifteen
When she hadarrived at her room the evening before, Catherine had found a steaming copper tub waiting for her and had felt deep relief at the sight. As she had taken off her clothes and lowered herself into the bath, her thoughts kept turning to the man who had presented her with such a thoughtful luxury.
For a moment in the tub, spurred by their visit to the Durdle Door, she let herself fantasize. She imagined what it would be like if she and John didn’t have the scandal between them. She imagined a reality in which her union to him wouldn’t mean she had betrayed her family. She imagined how, in another life, if he had compromised her as he had yesterday, he would ask her father—who, in this version of events, would still be living—for her hand in marriage. She knew, in another circumstance, John would do it. He was an honorable man. He had had his share of women, but none of them, she was sure, were maidens. No, if they were in any other scenario, he would offer for her. And, of course, her father would consent.
A rushed marriage wasn’t the best way for things to come about, but, if it ended with his daughter as a duchess, no father of the gentry—those without blood grudges against the family in question, that is—could be too displeased. After all, in marrying John, Catherine would, in a way, reclaim the title that her family had lost so long ago. If the scandal had never happened, her father could not have failed to be happy.
She closed her eyes and imagined her life as John’s wife. How he would take her every night. She would breathe him in, look into his green eyes, run her fingers through his curling dark hair, and know that he was hers, forever.
Catherine opened her eyes and shook her head. The close proximity of the carriage, the kiss near the cottagers’ huts—they had addled her mind.
She had forgotten the part where they had agreed to be friends. Whereshehad asked him not to kiss her.
And yet she hoped that he would come and supper in her bedchamber. She yearned for him to catch her lounging in this copper tub.
Catherine swore under her breath and sank beneath the water.
When she reemerged, she chastised herself.
In her little fantasy of an alternative present, she had forgotten the truth of the here and now.
Even if they had a million years together running around the countryside, John wouldn’t marry her.
In fact, she knew the idea of marrying her could only shame him. After all, the scandal was already a hurdle to any respectable gentleman and, along with her lack of substantial dowry, had never failed to keep suitors away. She had never even received a proposal and, little wonder, she thought, for even her supposed beauty was cursed, because it was so much like her aunt’s. And that was just for a normal gentleman, who had no connection to the whole affair. For John, the past made anything between them completely impossible. How could he ever marry a woman whose body screamed of the scandal that had ruined his family? That had marred his mother’s life and led her to an early grave?
It was insupportable.
Depressed by these reflections, but still internally hoping he would appear and catch her in her state of undress, Catherine lingered in her bath until the water went cold and her fingertips wrinkled.
Finally, she had to admit that she had waited long enough. Once she had dried off and redressed, she heard a knock on the door. She expected John but when she answered, it was a serving boy with a tray of dinner. The boy informed her that her husband, the supposed Mr. Aster, had encountered two old friends down in the pub. He didn’t want his wife to trouble herself about him for the rest of the evening.
So, Catherine had gone to bed early, turning over John’s whereabouts in her head. She assumed these “friends” didn’t spell trouble for them, because otherwise his message would have been more urgent.
Perhaps, it was that simple. He had run into old friends and would rather amuse himself with them than speak with her. Or, perhaps, the friends weren’t real at all, but rather he had found a woman with whom to spend the night.
And, really, he had every right.
She had no claim over him.
No matter how much that might hurt.
*
When she wokethe next morning, Catherine left her room in search of breakfast—and, if she was honest, John himself. When she entered the tavern, it was empty except for the keeper, who asked, “Breakfast, ma’am?” and she nodded her head, luxuriating in the unfamiliar feeling of pounds in her pocket.
