Tom’s wordsechoed in my thoughts far longer than I would have liked. The entire fortnight I remained in Kent was spent in a perpetual state of angst. Even the night before I left for town I wavered. Then dawn broke, and I understood with the kind of certainty I had never experienced before. I knew the effects of a marriage without love. Every day I watched unhappiness eat away at Sophie, until she became a kind of wraith haunting the house rather than living. I did not believe His Grace to be anything like my father, but now that I had experienced it, I could not imagine a marriage without love. Even if that marriage was not with Michael.
Of course, now I would have to tell my father that I refused to marry His Grace. I had never courted his ire before nor purposefully disappointed him. I could not think that anything would fully prepare me for his reaction. Kate offered to let me stay at Grayson House in the, entirely likely, event that my father tossed me out. The length of the carriage ride back to London I rehearsed my words.
When we arrived, I entered the house with a strange, unexpected calm. Unfortunately for my nerves, my father had not seen fit to cooperate with his presence.
That was two days ago. He had not returned home at a reasonable hour once in that time. With the delay, my calm wavered. An irrational part of me, certain that he knew my plan, felt he was avoiding me to ensure the entire process was even more unbearable. I spent the intervening hours in a perpetual state of nausea. The only benefit of the delay was that the servants seemed to have picked up on my unspoken tension. They began preparing me, and the house, for the oncoming storm. Without a word, my trunks were already packed for the inevitable.
When Hannah’s knock on the drawing room door finally came, I knew it was time. That didn’t stop my stomach from offering a disgruntled flip or my heart from pounding in my ears. Even though I spent the last two days preparing for this moment, I struggled to find the gumption with which I had entered the house.
For the first time in weeks, I stared at the double doors, counting my inhale and then exhale. Hannah kindly accompanied me on my trip to the gallows.
“Hannah, please have the carriage readied with my trunks.”
“It’s already being done, my lady.”
“Thank you.” Another deep breath before I turned to face her. “No matter what you hear, I don’t want you interrupting, do you understand?”
“But—”
“No. If you feel an intervention is necessary, you must send in at least two footmen. You are dismissed for the rest of the day.”
I was shocked when Hannah, always one for propriety, wrapped me tightly in her arms. I couldn’t help but return her embrace. As quickly as it had started, she pulled away and swept off without a word, presumably to alert the footmen.
Bolstered by Hannah’s unexpected affection, I knocked on the door before I could talk myself out of it. I took one last fortifying breath as I waited for my father to bid me entry. When it came, I closed the door behind me, avoiding eye contact as long as possible.
When I turned, it was clear that my father was worse for wear. He was disheveled, still in last night’s clothing and nursing a headache remedy with bleary eyes. Not the best moment for this conversation, but I refused to allow that to deter me. I had waited days for my opportunity, and there was no perfect moment in which my father would hear what I had to say with ready acceptance.
“Why are you here, Juliet?” he grunted.
In a tone that belied the tumultuous feelings inside, I said, “I have something I wish to discuss with you.”
“Does it have to be now?”
Something about those loathsome words strengthened my resolve. “Yes, I need to discuss it now.”
My words or resonance must have caught his attention because he actually looked up at me. He gestured for me to sit across from him with a grunt. I made my way farther into the room but refused his directive, instead remaining standing. Even with his interest peaked, he was my father and was therefore constitutionally incapable of fully committing to his daughter. He offered a dismissive “go-on” hand gesture. With a calm I had never before possessed, I spoke.
“I will not be marrying His Grace. I am aware of the arrangement between the two of you. I have no interest in being sold like chattel. Your gaming debts are your own, and they are for you to pay.”
For a moment there was nothing but stunned silence from my father. The only sound was the painfully loud ticking of the clock and the unbearable drumming of my heart. For all the times he had accused me of defiance and disrespect, I had never actually defied or disrespected him. I had now. It took all my strength to bite my tongue, to refrain from desperate, fawning, attempts to soothe. Not this time.
When he finally spoke, it was not the shouting I had anticipated. Instead, it was a venomous whisper. “Excuse me?”
“I will not be marrying His Grace.”
“You will not be marrying Rosehill? You think you can just walk in here and announce that? Just like the weather? You think to accuse me of accruing debts? You, the ungrateful, spiteful shrew that has been ruining my life since the day you were born? I don’t care what you think you know. You will marry Rosehill, and you will do it with a smile. Do you understand? If you leave here right now without another word, I will graciously forget this entire conversation.”
His words were hissed, droplets of spittle landing over his desk. The vein in his neck was ready to burst. His face turned a dark purplish color with ire. Suddenly, instead of terrifying, it was comical. The man whose approval I had strived for my entire life was utterly ridiculous. I wasted years of my life trying to do the impossible, and for what? The support of this spitting, throbbing, aubergine stuffed into a too small waistcoat? The good opinion of this depraved, abusive, lout who would be missed by no one but his debtors upon his demise?
In little more than a seething whisper, the words came tumbling out of me. “This ungrateful, spiteful shrew will not be marrying Rosehill. She will not be rectifying your debts with Mr. Wayland. She will not be your excuse to lure some other poor unsuspecting girl into a loveless marriage bed where you can once again fail to have a son. She will not be managing your estate with nonexistent funds because you’ve squandered them all at the gaming table. And she will not stand here and accept this abuse, not for one more second.”
With that I whirled away toward the door in a flurry of skirts, opening and slamming the door in the face of my father’s bluster. Both footmen stood outside at the ready, and I appreciated their efforts. One pressed his weight to the door in a preemptive measure while the other grabbed my upper arm and directed me quickly toward the carriage. I was already halfway down the hall when I heard the crash of a drinking glass against the study door. Before I escaped the house, I heard what I can only assume to be the entire contents of his study tossed about with a wordless snarl of rage.
The footman closed the door behind me, dampening the effect. The carriage pulled away before I was fully seated. I fell onto the bench and watched the only home I’d ever known shrinking smaller and smaller, knowing with resigned certainty that I would never set foot inside again.
Twenty-Five
HASKET HOUSE, LONDON-JUNE 20, 1814
