Sophie nodded, shushing her sister before guiding her back into the house. She shut the door behind them and turned the lock with a pointed click.
And then Benedict heard the most heart-wrenching sound in the world: not one but a series of muffled sobs—a torment no man could be expected to endure. The woman he adored, in anguish. And he was helpless to comfort her. Worse still, every single tear was his to own, each sound his to claim.
Benedict had thought he’d known self-loathing, but it was not possible for a man to hate himself more than he did as he listened to each sob.
Chapter Thirty-One
Eliza’s chest ached.Each sob held back ten others—trapped with nowhere to escape.
“Oh, Lizzie,” Sophie whispered, pulling her even tighter.
“I swore—” she gasped. “I swore I would never cry over”—gasp—“a man again. And him?—”
“I don’t understand. What has he done?” Sophie asked.
“You don’t know?” Eliza finally pulled her tear-streaked face away from Sophie’s shoulder. “I thought Mama might have told you.”
“No,” Sophie said as she brushed tears away from her sister’s cheeks.
“But you sent him away…”
“He made you cry. Of course I sent him away.”
“I am such a fool. I cannot even voice my humiliation.”
“Do not speak of my sister that way! I can speak without thinking, and I vex you more often than not, but I will not abide such an insult. You are many things, Eliza, but a fool has never been one of them.”
“He was using me the entire time. From the first moment.”
“What?”
“Papa… The night he won the money for the club? It was Lord Sinclair’s father he won it from.”
Sophie’s jaw dropped. “No!”
“It was all a scheme. They intended to humiliate Papa by humiliating me. And blackmail him for the money.”
“Oh, Eliza!” Sophie tugged her sister in for another embrace.
“The worst part—” Eliza whimpered into her sister’s nightdress. “The worst part is… they chose me because they knew—they knew after a single conversation—that you would never fall for such a scheme. They chose me because I am plain and dull and would be flattered by any attention?—”
“The cad! But, Lizzie, you could never be plain, nor dull. You are perhaps the most intelligent person I know. No one knows more about plants than you. I’m certain of it. You read nearly as much as Mama and Papa. No one so well-read could be dull. And your figure— I cannot stand beside you for fear of comparison.”
“Do not patronize me. I cannot bear?—”
“I am not. Have you failed to notice that not a single man has returned for a third call? No one has requested a fourth dance. I’ve been so jealous of your Lord Sinclair, so devoted to you from the first.”
“It was all a lie.”
“It may have begun that way. But there was no guile in his expression tonight. You’ve broken him, Lizzie. And Leo— That man is bizarrely steadfast given so little encouragement. I’m not certain what you see in him. I could never respect a man whose voice hit such a pitch when presented with a singular—tiny—frog in his bed, but?—”
“Hush, we were children. And you shouldn’t have been hiding amphibians.”
“May I hide small land mammals?”
Eliza huffed a single chuckle, the corners of her lips turning up.
“I am not suggesting you forgive Sinclair, Lizzie. No one could. You are not taking the right lesson from this moment. You are not unwanted or unloved. That man fell desperately in love with you entirely against his will. He’s risked Papa’s wrath by returning.”
