There was nothing more to say. For the second time in her life, Caroline had fallen in love, and she wished she might have done it with a less honourable man so she could have the luxury of hating him in peace.
As it was, she had nothing and no one but herself to blame.
#
Caroline had forgotten she and Louisa had planned on visiting the Royal Academy until she heard her friend stride through the house as though she owned it.
“In here, darling,” she called, pushing herself up from her reclined position on the sofa. The half-opened bottle of sherry was on the table before her, and she took hold of it, pouring herself a glass.
Louisa swept into the room and stopped. She frowned. “You look dreadful.”
“You are always a balm to my wounded feelings.”
“What happened to wound your feelings?”
Caroline was not a lady, and she did not succumb to ladylike habits; she tossed back her thimbleful of sherry. “George proposed,” she said shortly.
“Oh no.”
“Yes.”
Louisa sank into the sofa beside her. “And you refused him?”
“Must you really ask me that question? I am not so far gone that I would let him waste away his life with me.” Caroline wished she were in the mood for cake. Everything would be easier if she could eat her feelings into oblivion. Sadly, the very prospect of food made her feel ill. Hence the sherry.
Good decisions had never been her forte.
Louisa’s eyes were still wide. “Is he in love with you?”
“That’s what he claims,” Caroline said, pouring herself another drink. “Would you like one?”
“It’s ten in the morning, dearest.”
“Is it? I barely slept, so I suppose I have the luxury of classing today as last night still.”
Louisa looked at her with amusement. “So you love him too, do you?”
“You warned me I would fall in love and regret it, and you were right.” The lesson had been a cruel one, but she would learn from it. In time. “I love him far too much to marry him.”
“That logic is faulty and you know it.”
“That’s because I never told you the full of it.” Caroline reclined again, her head spinning and her body aching. Age, that was what it was—growing old was an indignity. “For the past ten years, I have been funding my daughter’s dowry and living situation.”
To her credit, Louisa barely blinked. “You have a daughter?”
“Not Augustus’s,” Caroline hastened to clarify. She had not become with child with her husband, thank the Lord. “Small mercies, I suppose.”
“Then whose?”
“No one of concern. He’s now portly and lives in the country with his much younger wife; I’ve had no occasion to meet him in town.” Another reason to be thankful, although it hardly felt as though she had amassed all that many. “The fact of the matter is, I am financially responsible for her, and if George were to marry me, his father has threatened to cut him off. I would not have the money to send to Jacqueline, and I could hardly expect him to bankrupt himself for the sake of a child that was never his.” She pressed her fingers against her forehead. “It would be easier for him to forget me, and I think it will be easily done once I am not seeing to his needs. He was not thinking clearly.”
“I think he is the best judge of that.”
Caroline poured herself another glass. “He doesn’t know about Jacqueline.”
“You never told him?”
“Why should I saddle him with the knowledge of another man’s child? Besides, I’m too old for him, and he would be penniless if we married. It’s better he forgets me.” She waved a hand. “Go, darling. Let me suffer in peace. I will finish this sherry and eat some cake and by the end of it, I will be myself again.” And prepared to do whatever she must to secure the future of her daughter.
