Cass swallowed and swallowed again. Tears burned the backs of her eyes. She couldn’t breathe.
It wasn’t her.
He wasn’t talking about her. He couldn’t be. She hadn’t seen him in London, not as Cass, and she obviously wasn’t in love with another man. Julian couldn’t possibly think that about her. She’d never mentioned it in her letters, and her parents weren’t in London. They couldn’t have been the ones to tell him such nonsense. No. No. Julian was talking about someone else entirely, some other woman. Some other woman he cared about and had been writing to, all the time he’d been writing to her solely as a friend. A woman he’d never seen fit to mention to her. Cass was going to vomit. She had to get away.
“I’m… I’m ever so sorry to hear that,” she murmured, biting the inside of her cheek to keep from crying.
“It’s all right. I shouldn’t have expected that she would wait for me all these years.”
“No, I… I don’t suppose—” Her voice cracked. She didn’t care if she seemed rude. She had to leave before she broke down sobbing, wrapped her arms around his ankle, told him she was Cass, and begged him to love her. That would be very, very bad form. No. Better to leave with a shred of dignity. Perhaps she might be able to see him again. Perhaps she might be able to look at him, but right now, while her heart was breaking, she had to get away. Had to.
“I’m sorry, Captain Swift, but I fear that I’m… unable to…” She stood and ran from the room. She could hear Julian’s calls, asking after her health, if he might be of assistance, but she just couldn’t stop. Tears streamed down her face, tears she couldn’t let him see. Better to allow him to think she was mad or sick or both.
She ran out of the library, down the corridor, and up the main staircase. A few of the servants watched as she flew past. If they thought she seemed overwrought running through the halls, she didn’t care. She ran up the marble staircase and down the long corridor to her bedchamber. She didn’t stop until she landed squarely on her bed, where she let the wrenching sobs rack her entire body.
***
Cass cried for exactly ten minutes. She hugged a pillow against her face and bawled like a child whose Christmastide stocking was empty. Then she sat up, dried her eyes with a handkerchief she retrieved from her reticule, and stared. She crossed her arms over her chest and contemplated the wall. It occurred to her then. She was tired of crying. She’d cried the entire time she’d thought Julian was dying. She’d cried for hours, days, weeks. She’d cried and cried, and when she’d known he was coming back to marry Pen and would be forever lost to her, she’d cried more. And now, she realized, staring at the shadowy wallpaper in the darkness, she was quite through with crying. Patience Bunbury wouldn’t cry like this, would she?
She rang for her maid. The young woman appeared in the doorway, minutes later. “Maria, please send a message to the duchess and Miss Lowndes. Tell them I must see them as soon as possible.”
“Yes, my lady,” Maria said, hurrying away to do as she asked.
Yes. Cass was finished with crying. She was going to take action, just what Patience Bunbury would do. She had a plan.
Fifteen minutes later, Lucy and Jane hurried into Cass’s bedchamber. “What is it, dear?” Lucy asked, flying over to her bed and pushing Cass’s curls back from her face to look at her.
“It’s Julian,” Cass replied, wiping away the last remnant of tears.
“Oh, no, what happened?” Lucy asked.
Jane watched her closely, a sympathetic look on her face. “Tell us, Cass.”
Cass straightened her shoulders. “Julian told me tonight he cares for someone else. Someone other than Penelope.”
Jane’s brow furrowed. “Not Penelope?”
“No.” Cass’s voice was calm.
“Who?” Lucy asked, looking equally confused.
“I don’t know. It doesn’t matter,” Cass replied. “I just know it’s not me… Cass, and it’s not Penelope.”
“I don’t understand, dear,” Lucy said. “Is it Patience?”
“No.”
“Who, then?” Jane asked, her hands splayed upward in a question.
“I don’t know,” Cass replied. “But whoever she is, she apparently doesn’t return his affection. He said so.”
“He said that?” Lucy asked.
“Yes,” Cass replied. “At first it made me cry. Now it’s making me angry.”
Jane’s eyebrows shot up. “Angry?”
“Yes. Angry. Angry enough to do something about it.”
