Kitty stood, suddenly restless. She moved to the window and pulled the lace curtain aside, watching the street where an elegant barouche rolled by. “He didn’t even smile at me. He looked at me like… like a duty. And I suppose that’s what I am now.”
Her fingers gripped the sill.
“I wanted to marry for love.”
Jane’s voice softened. “I know, sweetheart.”
Kitty turned, her chest aching. “You remember my mother, don’t you?”
Jane’s expression changed—softened. “Of course I do.”
“She used to say—” Kitty’s voice wobbled, and she steadied it with a breath. “She used to say that love is the only thing that makes a life feel lived. That she would have rather been a governess with Papa than a duchess with anyone else. And Papa loved her. Truly. I saw it”
A silence stretched between them. Jane bowed her head, her expression unreadable.
“I wanted that,” Kitty whispered. “A connection that makes your heart ache and soar all at once. Not a cold contract built on scandal and obligation.”
Jane rose now, slow and graceful, and crossed to her. “I know. But there is something you must understand, Kitty.”
Kitty’s eyes met Jane’s, her expression brimming with the quiet warmth.
“Love doesn’t always come before the vows.”
Kitty’s brow furrowed.
Jane continued, voice quiet but firm. “You think your mother and father were blessed from the first moment. But your mother told me that when they wed, she feared she’d made a mistake. Your father barely spoke at first. But love grew like ivy between them.”
Kitty blinked.
“You see this as the end of your dream,” Jane said, brushing a curl from Kitty’s brow. “But it could be the beginning of something entirely unexpected. You may find that the duke is not so cold. That he has a heart…”
Kitty shook her head. “But I don’t feel anything for him, Jane. And now I must spend my life with a man I barely know?”
Jane smiled faintly. “That is rather the custom.”
Kitty groaned and returned to the settee, folding her legs beneath her like she used to as a child. “I had plans. To marry someone with poetry in his soul and flowers in his hands.”
“And you still might,” Jane said gently, retaking her seat. “But the poetry may not look as you imagined. It may be quieter. In the way he listens. Or in…preserving your reputation. Perhaps.”
Kitty stared at the steam curling from her cup. She wanted to believe Jane. She wanted to believe love could be forged, not just found. But her heart was not yet ready to let go of her imagined life.
“So this is truly happening?” she asked.
Jane nodded. “Yes.”
She offered a small, unconvincing smile before quitting the room, the door clicking shut with terrible finality behind her.
Saturday came all too quickly.
Kitty had calmed herself into believing that Norman would leave her alone, that he would be too occupied with his own affairs to trouble her until the wedding banns were read.
She was wrong.
The butler announced his arrival as the McGowans finished their tea, and a foul hush came over the room. Kitty obstinately stayed facing away as he entered but could feel the tension in the air—his presence settling on the room like an unwritten command.
“Your Grace,” Richard spoke up. “To what do we owe the pleasure?”
Norman had no patience for frills. “Tomorrow, you’ll accompany me to the parish, to hear the banns read for the first time.”
