“I’m going to find Thomas, of course, but first I have one stop to make.”
CHAPTER FORTY
Delilah flew up the stairs to the front door of her mother’s town house. As soon as Goodfellow opened door, she dashed inside. “Where is my mother?”
“She’s in the gold salon with Lord Hilton, my lady.”
Of course she was. Good, they both could hear this together.
Delilah didn’t bother to deposit her bonnet and pelisse with Goodfellow. She wouldn’t be staying long. She didn’t bother taking three deep breaths either. Instead, she marched directly to the gold salon and shoved open the door hard enough to send it cracking against the far wall.
Her mother glanced up. “Delilah, there you are. Good. We were just discussing what time we should all awake tomorrow morning. We want to be refreshed, but we mustn’t linger abed. We have much to do. What do you think?”
“Decide for yourself,Mère. You always do. Thoughit’s cunning of you to pretend as if you care about my opinion in front of Lord Hilton.”
Her mother’s eyes briefly flared. She pursed her lips. “I’ll thank you not to speak to me in that tone of voice, young lady.”
Delilah crossed her arms over her chest and strode toward her mother. “I’d like to thank you too. I’d like to thank you for all the times you let me cry without a comforting hand. I’d like to thank you for all the occasions you pointed out my flaws and told me I wasn’t good enough to be your daughter. I’d like to thank you for all the nasty names you’ve called me and all the instances when you made me feel small. Most of all, I’d like to thank you for telling me that it was a good thing Papa died so he wouldn’t have to live to see what a disappointment I’ve been.”
Mother straightened her shoulders and glanced at Lord Hilton uneasily. “Delilah, once again, you’re being dramatic.”
She gave the other woman the same cold, hard stare that Delilah had suffered countless times from her mother. “Am I,Mère? Am I being dramatic? Are any of the things I said untrue?”
“They may be true,” Mother replied, “but you’re making far too much of them, as usual.”
Delilah turned her attention to Lord Hilton, who was watching with a hard look in his eye. “What do you think, Lord Hilton? Do you think I’m making too much of my mother’s words?”
Lord Hilton tugged on his lapels and glanced away. “I’m not about to insert myself in a difference of opinion between a mother and her daughter.”
“Delilah,” Mother snapped. “Stop calling memère.Take off your wrinkled bonnet and your dirty gloves and sit down. We have wedding details to discuss.”
Delilah lingered close to the door, refusing the old habit to escape. “There’s not going to be any wedding,Mère. At least not for me. I wouldn’t marry Clarence if he were the last man in London.”
Her mother’s eyes flared. “He may just be the last man in London who’ll haveyou.”
Delilah clenched her jaw and lifted her chin. “See, that’s exactly what I’m speaking of. I never thought I was worthy of love before. You taught me that from an early age. As long as I wasn’t perfect—and I willneverbe perfect—then I didn’t deserve your love or your attention. Or anyone’s attention, for that matter. But I know better now. I’m perfectly right, exactly as I am. Thomas loves me and I love him.”
Her mother’s sharp bark of laughter followed, shattering the room’s thick atmosphere. “Huntley? Are you mad? He might be amused with you, but he’ll nevermarryyou.”
“He is going to marry me. And I’m going to marry him. But you’ll never see your grandchildren, and you won’t be welcome in our home. I’m leaving this house now, and I won’t be back. You’ll have to take out your vitriol on someone else. Perhaps Lord Hilton will put up with it.”
Lord Hilton gave her mother a sideways stare that clearly indicated he was concerned by that statement.
Mother lifted her chin. Her voice was filled with ice. “Delilah Montebank, if you leave now, you’ll never be welcome under this roof again.”
“I can only hope that’s a promise,” Delilah tossed over her shoulder as she marched into the foyer and said good-bye to Goodfellow.
CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
Delilah pounded on the door to Thomas’s town house. The butler opened it and his jaw fell.
She’d never arrived alone at Thomas’s door before. It was improper. She’d been here for parties before, of course, but always accompanied by a chaperone. Either Lucy or her mother.
“My lady?” the butler said as she moved past him and strode into the foyer.
Voices sounded in the nearest salon, and she rushed inside to see Lavinia and Lord Stanley sitting together on the settee, sipping tea. “My apologies,” she said, blushing and trying to back out of the room as quickly and gracefully as possible.
Lavinia had a smile on her face, a genuine smile. “You might as well be the first to know, Lady Delilah. Lord Stanley has proposed, and I have accepted.”
