Relief crashed over Caroline like a wave.He didn’t know!She looked at Fitz, but he was staring at his father.Fitz dropped her hand, stepping away from her.
“You wanted me to marry,” Fitz said slowly, as if trying to understand.“A good woman, steadying influence, all of that.And now when I actually find one, when I could for once in my life do something to make you proud—still, once again, I am somehow in the wrong.”
Caroline froze.Was he saying…did Fitz actually want to marry her?She must have misunderstood, a misapprehension born of her own confused and confusing feelings.Fitz did not wish to marry anyone.
Things have changed, whispered a voice that felt as though it emanated more from the region of her heart than her head.For both of you.
No.Caroline set her jaw.They had a plan.She could not allow herself to believe in the possibility of anything else.
But there was Fitz, squaring off with his father in a way that seemed to take the older gentleman aback.Lord Alfred eyed his son.“If I could believe for one moment that you were serious about wishing to marry this young lady and be a good husband to her…but no, I know you, Fitzwilliam.You have never been serious about anything in your entire life.”
“Why should I be?Poor Rob is serious enough for all three of us, and Arabella has never had a moment of fun, if she could help it.Why do you care how serious I am, so long as I am willing to follow your orders and marry someone?”
“Someone!Fine, go find someone.Anyone else!”Lord Alfred’s face was going an unhealthy shade of red.“But not this girl.She is not for you.”
Not good enough for you, Caroline heard, and she flinched.That must have been what Fitz heard, too, because his voice went low and dangerous.“Why?Because I’m the son of a marquess?Your precious title has nothing to do with me, it means nothing to me—but Caroline means everything.I will marry her or no one.”
Caroline gasped, her ears ringing, but Fitz hadn’t even glanced at her and she didn’t know what was happening.Mama wrapped an arm about her shaking shoulders even as Lord Alfred’s eyes blazed with the fury of a man who was unused to being defied.
“So you will compromise her, ensuring she has no choice but to marry you, and I have no choice but to allow it?A match so unequal, it would be a scandal for the ages!I won’t allow?—”
“Still spouting the same nonsense, all these years later, Alfred?”Helena spoke for the first time, her words slicing through the argument like a raptor stooping to its prey.
“Helena,” Lord Alfred protested, anguish turning his voice raspy.
“You haven’t changed.Still obsessed with scandal and what the world thinks of you and your venerable family name.”Mama’s arm tightened, squeezing Caroline tight.“Still a coward.”
Lord Alfred winced.“I must apologize if I have offended, I am not making myself clear?—”
“Oh, you’ve been perfectly clear, Father.”Fitz stood straight and tall, his broad shoulders back and his head held high.“So let me be clear as well.I don’t care about the inheritance.You can keep your money and your orders and your opinions to yourself.I will marry Miss Caroline Quick, with or without your blessing.”
Caroline staggered; she would have fallen if her mother hadn’t been holding her up.
Mama cried, “This is beyond anything!Lord Fitzwilliam, I like you, but I will not watch history repeat itself.There will be no engagement!Caroline and I will leave this place, today, at once.Come, dearest.”
Breath coming in short, shallow gasps, Caroline felt as though the entire world had been turned upside down.Everything was happening so quickly, people shouting and saying things they didn’t mean, couldn’t mean, and there was no time for her to take it all in and make a sensible plan for how to react, there was only the sudden and sure knowledge that she could not stand another moment of it.
Caroline wrenched free of her mother’s grasp.Fitz reached for her at once, finally looking at her, his face registering concern, but Caroline backed away from him too.“Stop, all of you.Just stop!”
“Sweet,” Fitz said softly, his silvery eyes warm and entreating, but Caroline shook her head and wrapped her arms around her own midsection.The afternoon sun must be waning; the forest had turned cold.
“No.All of you standing here, wielding my future like knives in your battles with each other.I’m not a weapon for you to bludgeon your father with, Fitz.And you two are no better!”Caroline felt dampness on her cheeks and realized tears were tracking down her face.
Impatient, she dashed at them with the back of her hand.“Just…leave me out of it.Leave me out of all of it.”
“Dearest…”
“Sweet…”
“No!”Caroline backed away from their pleading eyes, their worried, upset expressions, their reaching hands.“I need to think.Please, just let me go.”
Without waiting for a response, she turned and ran, Fitz’s voice calling her name fading behind her until all she could hear was the wind rushing in her ears and the pounding of her own feet down the path.
ChapterNine
Fitz prowled down the garden path from shadow to shadow, ears alert to any sound, scanning his surroundings for movement, but after the hue and cry of the past few hours, all was quiet at last.
When he’d returned to the house with a stricken, silent Lord Alfred and Lady Quick, they had discovered that Caroline had not come back.Her mother appeared worried, but reassured everyone that Caroline simply needed some time alone, and she would no doubt reappear before supper.
