Despite Purity beingcertain her mother knew the truth, Caroline Diamond remained her gracious and loving self. In the carriage, she didn’t bombard her with questions. Instead, she allowed Purity the dignity of huddling in the corner, staring unseeingly out the window into the gray light of the rain showers that were already beginning to let up.
And while her younger sisters chattered about the day and her father put his head back and closed his eyes, her mother offered her comfort without even knowing precisely what the issue was. She’d taken the seat next to Purity, where normally Bri or Ray would sit, and calmly grasped her daughter’s hand between both of hers, holding it lightly upon her skirt.
When her mother did that, Purity could almost believe everything was going to be fine. She would know in the morning whether the baron would do the honorable thing and make true what he’d told the awful prying couple by the fountain.
It would mean telling her parents something ahead of time, perhaps only that Foxford had asked for her hand and that she’d said yes. They didn’t need to know any of the details, only that the upstanding Lord and Lady Diamond were going to have a licentious libertine as a son-in-law.
That thought nearly made her tears flow. But Purity didn’t allow herself the self-pitying spectacle. Not until she reached the sanctuary of her bedchamber. Upon reaching their home, she excused herself, claiming the headache her mother had suggested.
“I’ll send you up some tea. If you don’t feel well enough to come down for supper, I’ll send you up a tray then, too,” her mother said, still not asking for an explanation. Although she added firmly, “We’ll talk in the morning.”
Purity nodded and disappeared, glad her mother was being understanding, and equally grateful she didn’t have to face her father until she was ready. Not that he was a harsh man or even particularly judgmental, but she loved him beyond anything and didn’t relish the look of disappointment she would inevitably see upon his face.
After accepting a tea tray and sending her maid away for the evening, Purity sat on the end of her bed and considered her culpability in the afternoon’s events and how the past weeks had led her to her current predicament.
If she hadn’t been so affected by Foxford’s magnetism, she wouldn’t have let him kiss her once, never mind all the other times. If he’d been a troll of a man without a sense of humor, no wit, nor an ounce of sense, and no devastating smile, she could have tutored him in the graces and social manners and never been in the smallest whit of danger or trouble.
Instead, she was in a barrel full of suds.
All because she liked him. More than that, her heart swelled when they were together. She was excited each time he was nearand anticipated every meeting with gladness. She didn’t have to be a soothsayer to know she had developed atendrefor the man.
Then she recalled the night of a late-July country party at her family’s Derbyshire estate, two years earlier. To entertain their guests, her mother had invited a fortune-teller. Purity had long since put it out of her mind, but now, she considered what the woman had told her.
“Your heart will be much affected. You will be surprised. But don’t let your rigid notions blind you.”
Was she rigid?Her heart was definitely affected, and shewassurprised by who was affecting it. Those were both true. But as for being blind to something, she didn’t know what.
She ought to be grateful he had done the honorable thing by declaring them engaged. And she was. In fact, she ought to think of him as a man of honor since he hadn’t betrayed her. He could as easily have left her with her shredded reputation on the grounds of Syon Park.
Regardless, it was impossible to put a renowned rake in the same class of honorable gentleman as her father, brother, or even her sister’s husband.
Her eyes welled with tears. If she allowed her affection for Foxford to continue, if she opened her heart to him entirely and acknowledged the sentiment to be love, then she would be vulnerable. It was all too easy to imagine him taking up with a mistress after their marriage, and she would be devastated.
Purity had never thought she would have to worry about her husband’s fidelity because her choice was always going to be a safe one.
Foxford wasn’t safe!He was decidedly dangerous.
Finally, the tears spilled over. She’d been playing with fire, as they said, swimming out of her depth in an ocean with a shark as her companion. This behavior and the consequences were all usual and quite normal for him.
Wiping her face, she let the tea the maid brought in grow cold, despite a twinge of guilt at wasting it.Was she ever going to feel good again?
After undressing down to her shift, she brushed out her hair before plaiting it. Then she performed her evening ritual of washing her face and brushing her teeth before climbing into bed despite the early hour.
Lying on her back, she stared at the canopy above her. It was a pretty room she’d had since childhood. If she became the Baroness Foxford, what would her new room be like?
Turning on her side, she wondered what the man who would become her husband was doing at that moment. Mostly likely, he had gone from Syon Park to his club.And then what?
Having seen the fiery passion in his eyes when they’d been locked in an embrace, Purity could picture him slaking his lust on some woman of pleasure later that night.
She shuddered. Her mind was going down dark paths, and she needed to rein in the despondent thoughts. Tomorrow, hopefully, everything would seem less dire.
Matthew was too workedup to go home. Thus, he did what any right-thinking man would do when needing the company of his supportive peers. He went to his club.
After the doorman gave him entrance, he found a seat in the Boodle’s reading room where soon he was brought a glass of soothingly expensive brandy.
And then he contemplated the events and, more importantly, the results of the day. He could hardly credit that, after all the dalliances he’d enjoyed, he had finally been caught unawaresbecause of how blind his passion for Purity made him. Hearing nothing apart from her breathing and his own heartbeat, he’d allowed the Varleys to sneak upon them.
If only it had been Quinn who had come upon them.
