24
Kit
I’d curledup in the front parlor after Andy told me not to follow him, heartsick, heartbroken, and crying so hard that I’d eventually passed out from the effort, wrapped in a blanket mother would have been furious to see me sleeping under.
I knew all this only because that was how I found myself when a touch to my shoulder woke me.
I must have chosen the front parlor because it was where Andy had hidden on Christmas Eve. The Christmas Eve I’d utterly wasted trying to do my familial duty instead of spending it with him.
“Andy?” I asked, fighting to unstick the glue holding my eyes shut.
“Only me,” Father said. “I thought it was about time I brought you a cup of tea.”
“Andy’s gone,” I said. It wasn’t a question, I knew in my heart that he’d left.
I probably deserved it.
“I thought it better not to interfere on account of not being certain of the substance of your argument and not wanting to make it worse,” Father said. “He’s booked a flight back to New York. Stanley got that much out of him.”
“And drove him?”
“No,” Father said. “He offered, but Andy refused.”
I made an unhappy sound, unsure whether I should be upset with Stanley for volunteering to take Andy away.
But then if Andy wanted to leave, who was I to stop him? I had no right, and even if I had, I wouldn’t have wanted him here against his will.
I watched Father pour me a cup of tea in silence, staring blankly at the now-complete Wedgwood set.
The horrible feeling that he’d handed me Andy’s cup—though I had no way of actually knowing—sat uncomfortably in the pit of my stomach.
There was a manilla folder stacked with papers sitting on the coffee table beside the tea service, but I didn’t have the strength to care what they were for.
The fire was burning low. The tree in the corner was drooping. Even the snow outside seemed listless.
The world had lost all its color, all its appeal. I couldn’t even taste the tea in my cup and the warmth couldn’t penetrate the dread sitting heavy in my stomach.
Dread that Andy would never speak to me again. That I could never be happy again without him, that the world would always be grey and dull.
I’d imagined heartbreak to be rather more dramatic and violent, but I was finding that after the initial crash, it was like a wind-up toy running out of go.
And Andy had walked off with the only key that could wind it back up again.
“He found out about the… about… me,” I said. “My inheritance.”
“Ah,” Father said, settling down in an armchair opposite me. “And took it badly.”
I nodded, staring down into my tea.
Of course he’d taken it badly.I’dtaken it badly.
My whole life had been thrown into disarray and I hated it and I didn’t want any of it.
“I don’t want this,” I said, louder than I meant to. “I don’t want to be a Duke, I don’t want my life to change, I don’t want the estate or the money or the responsibility or any of it. I want to bloody well go home.”
My ears were ringing, my fingers curled so tightly around the teacup that I was in danger of shattering it.
“This isn’t home?” Father asked gently.
