“What are you doing?” she hissed as he reached her.
“You are sitting in the wrong place. I have come to ask that you go to the correct one.”
“I am sitting exactly where I wish.”
“That is not what will happen today. You are to sit with me.”
“No. Even if I cannot escape this marriage, I will not pretend in public that it is a convenience for me.”
George bent slightly, keeping his voice low.
“You are creating a scene. We have already discussed this.”
“You created it,” she shot back. “I was sitting quietly.”
“If you do not come willingly, I may be forced to carry you.”
Her breath caught. He saw it; the brief, traitorous reaction before the indignation returned. She was flustered, and in spite of himself he delighted in it.
“You would not dare.”
“Oh, I most certainly would.”
They held each other’s gaze for slightly too long to be proper.
“That will not be necessary,” she muttered, standing abruptly. “I can walk.”
“Good.”
She brushed past him, clearly furious, and took the seat beside him. Her hands trembled as she folded them in her lap. George sat once again, and though his grandmother said nothing, her displeasure was palpable.
Lady Cassandra did not look at him again. George, however, found it impossible not to notice how flustered she was, and how deeply satisfying he found it.
Cassandra became aware of her troubles the moment she entered the church.
She felt everyone turn to look at her, already deciding what sort of woman she must have been. She took her place, only for the Duke to come and protest that she joined him. She felt as though she had been watched enough, and did not wish to worsen it, but he was more convincing than she had first thought.
But she did not look at him. She feared that if she did, she would see something that would make it all harder. The Dowager Duchess sat on his other side, rigid with her lips pressed thin, her gaze fixed straight ahead. Cassandra felt that gaze even without meeting it.
The service began, and she tried to settle her nerves. She had attended church countless times in her life, but that day every word seemed different. Her hands were clasped in her lap, and she realized that she was pressing her thumbnail into her palm and forced herself to loosen her grip. This was no moment for trembling. If she was to be examined, she could not appear weak beneath the scrutiny.
Her name was spoken first, then his. This was the first time the announcement was made, the first public declaration. She considered that, if she proved herself troublesome enough, the marriage could be halted without Cassandra bearing the fullweight of blame, for there was one part of the day that could be her saving grace.
“If any of you know cause or just impediment why these two persons should not be joined together in holy matrimony,” the priest announced, “you are to declare it.”
Cassandra could tolerate the silence that followed. When nobody stood, she reasoned that she could also be the one to do it, but her knees did not move. She waited for someone else to speak, anyone, but there was nothing, not even from the dowager. Society, it seemed, was perfectly content with this arrangement.
She became acutely aware of His Grace beside her. Of his stillness. Of the absolute confidence with which he occupied his place, as though the future had already been decided and there was nothing left to contest. It infuriated her, that certainty. It made her want to disrupt it if only to prove that she could.
The moment passed.
The priest nodded and continued, the ritual resuming as though nothing of consequence had been offered at all.
She was no longer merely threatened with marriage; she was being dragged toward it. She rose with the congregation when the time came, her expression composed, her posture impeccable, so that nobody would say she lacked dignity.
Cassandra followed her parents down the aisle, aware of the murmurs beginning to stir behind her. She kept her head high in spite of them, for she knew that if she was to endure it, she would do so without flinching. They had nearly reached the church doors when a familiar voice sounded at her side.
“Lady Cassandra.”
