“I heard you.”
“So, how can you deny the obvious truth? How can you look me in the eyes and tell me differently?” Yvette raised an eyebrow at the cook, daring her to argue. She almost hoped that she did…that there was a small part of Yvette who believed that hope was not utterly lost.
As predicted, Lucinda’s response was to look away, sadness painted across her face. And that told Yvette everything she needed to know.
Rather, it confirms it. I was wrong about everything, and all that’s left to do now is move on, pray that I can forget, and somehow pick up the pieces of my life. If such a thing is even possible… if I want such a thing in the first place.
Yvette had been feeling desperate these last two days. Lost. Utterly and hopelessly bereft of answers to the problems that assailed her. She was a stranger in the Duke’s house, she felt as if she did not belong, while also having nowhere else to go. Worse still, she had nobody to talk to about it.
That was another daunting reality that Yvette was forced to grapple. She could not return home, because she did not wish to be around her father and his lies. But she also had no real friends to seek out for comfort and advice. She was alone in this world and never had it been more apparent.
The only real sense of comfort that she was able to find was with Lucinda, the cook, as she helped the young woman nurse and care for her newborn child.
Yvette had not meant to burden the poor woman with her woes. The Lord knew that Lucinda had enough to deal with right now, and the last thing she needed was to have Yvette’s misery forcedupon her. But Yvette was sitting with the cook as she breastfed. She watched the scene before her, a tear leaking from her eye at its beauty. And before she could stop herself, all the hurt and confusion and pain that had been bubbling up inside of her these last few days came pouring out.
She told Lucinda who Hugh really was.
She told Lucinda how she had been lied to this entire time.
And she told Lucinda how wrong she had been about the Duke. She did not tell Lucinda about her feelings for the Duke, as that was not something she dared to divulge. But she alluded to their closeness while lamenting that she felt used and that nothing that she thought she knew was true.
To Lucinda’s credit, she did not ask Yvette to stop. She did not dismiss Yvette’s worries as unimportant. She simply sat by the window in the sun, allowing her baby to breastfeed, listening in silence as Yvette poured out her heart so that it bled across the room.
“I still think that the Duke is a good man,” Lucinda said after some time. She nursed her baby, cooing gently as she did. “Despite what you have told me, I feel that his heart was in the right place.”
“It is not that he did the wrong thing,” Yvette sighed. “In truth, his actions are honorable, and I understand well enough why he did as he did.”
“Then what is the problem?”
“Even if his actions were honorable, his chief concern was for his own reputation. He told me so himself.”
“And?”
“And?” Yvette scoffed. “Do you not think that is wrong? He lied to Hugh. To me! To all of us. And who knows how long that lie would have continued for, had my father not forced his hand.” She blew through her lips. “And do not get me started on my father.”
“I think you are being a tad unreasonable, Yvette.”
Yvette frowned. “And why is that?”
The baby stopped its feeding, so Lucinda pulled it away and tucked the babe into her arms. The sun shone across her face, and she smiled down at her child for a moment in admiration.
The sight made Yvette’s chest hurt.
It was funny how quickly things could change. A mere week ago, Yvette was convinced that she would never have a child of her own, and that she did not want one. Now that she did, the pain she felt came from the admittance that if she was to ever have a child, it would not be with the man whom she had thought that she loved… who she was desperate to still love, even as she struggled to find a reason why she should.
“You must remember, Yvette, that the Duke and his kind are not like us,” Lucinda began, still watching her baby as it drifted off to sleep. “Their world is not our own and we can’t apply our own morals to their actions.”
“Doing the right thing should not be a question of class,” Yvette argued. “Whether you are born poor or rich, it matters not.”
“Perhaps,” Lucinda said. “All I know is that the Duke did what he thought was right. He was not trying to hurt anyone. Surely, that is what counts?”
“He lied,” Yvette said stubbornly. “And not just to Hugh, but to me.”
“And?” Lucinda pressed. “I do not mean to be rude, Yvette, but why would he not lie to you? I know that the two of you are close, but you are a mere governess, he is a duke. What he does, he must think not just of himself but of everyone who works under him. His staff. His tenants. People he has businesses with. They are who he protects, and I have no doubt that his actions were done with them in mind.”
Yvette scrunched her face with annoyance, because Lucinda’s argument made a little too much sense. She had not considered it from that point of view before, and now she was starting to feel even more foolish.
“I just don’t like being lied to.”
