Gold Thread’s face turned an unhealthy shade of red but, surprisingly, he didn’t respond. She guessed there was only so far you’d push the boundaries with a duke.
Unable to help herself, she grasped at the hope that her earlier assumption was false. That Edward hadn’t been betraying all they’d talked of. “Are ye working with Liverpool, then?” She hoped no one else could hear how the lump in her throat strangled her voice.
His sober gaze gripped her. “Iamworking with Liverpool.” Her heart sank, but before she could turn away to hide her disappointment, he grasped the back of her chair. “I believe the only way to enact meaningful change is through working together, even when each other’s perspectives seem so…faulty. Protests and pitchforks cause a lot of harm for limited gain.”
There was a haunted look to his eyes, and she realized that she’d never stopped to consider how that night—fronting an angry mob with nothing but his size and his title to protect him—had impacted him. She’d been so lost in her own grief at Jeremy’s death and Edward’s sudden departurethat she’d never thought of his pain.
That felt incredibly selfish and unkind now.
“And once again the Wildeforde manages to suck the fun out of a conversation,” Gold Thread said. He turned to Fiona. “I look forward to seeing you at Macklebury’s tomorrow night, Finley. We’ll extricate you from this dullard’s grip and show you a proper good time.”
Edward’s fingers flinched almost imperceptibly on the back of her chair, but he said nothing to Lord Mallen. “Finley, I need to grab some notes from my study before heading back to Westminster. Do you need a ride back to the house?”
She couldn’t tell if he’d phrased it as a question because it genuinely was one, or if he didn’t want to be seen as dictatorial in front of these men. Either way, she was keen to leave. As much as she found her current company shallow and insensible, they had given her the seed of a new strategy. Shewasgoing to attend the Macklebury ball and she was going to approach these Lords Chester and Livingworth.
She stood. “Gentlemen, you’ve given me much to consider. Thank ye for yer help.” She bowed, gathered her satchel, and turned on her heel, forcing Edward to follow her.
She stopped at the dining room exit.
“To your right,” he said from behind her with a sigh.
Doing her best to appear to the liveried footmen around her that she knew exactly what she was doing, she strode down the corridor with her head high.
“Mallen’s an arse,” she said as they got to the steps outside. “I quite enjoyed watching you skewer him.”
Edward didn’t chuckle or even clear his throat in an amused way. Instead, he leaned in, a furious expression on his face. “That was a blasted foolish thing to do, setting foot in that building.”
It was the truth. She knew it. But the unfairness of it all made her blood boil. In the short time she’d been there, she’d seen business and political dealings all around her along with a gaggle of aimless barnacles who cared not a whit for the privilege of admittance. All the while, she couldn’t even manage to secure a second meeting for her actual hard work.
She was in no mood for Edward’s lecture. “You make it sound as if the walls were about to cave in around us,” she snapped. “That my mere presence could prompt such a disaster.”
“In 120-odd years, no woman has ever set foot in that club.”
“That you ken.” Fiona sniffed, quickening her pace.
He kept up easily. Damn his long legs. “Pardon?”
She stopped abruptly, forcing him to turn around and face her. “Ijust stepped foot in that club. Hell, I had two glasses of whiskey in it, and I’m a woman. What’s to say other women have not also snuck in under the guise of a man?”
His eyes narrowed. “Because all guests must be backed by a member, and every member knows that allowing a woman in will get you blackballed for life. And likely kicked out of every other club in London.”
“Oh, boo-hoo, you need to find somewhere else to drink and play whist.”
Edward leaned closer, his voice quiet but furious. “Lives are built in that club. The country’s most important political decisions are made there. Men create business empires between those walls. It is far more than a place to drink and gamble, and you risked William’s access to all of it.”
“And you don’t see a problem with that? A problem with the foundations for success being built within a building women cannae even enter? That in order to succeed, hard work is nae enough unless there’s a hanging member swinging between yer legs?”
Edward stared at her, mouth agape.
“Think on that, Your Grace.”
***
The force of Fiona’s words almost felled him. Rarely was he so sure he had the moral high ground and then been proven so obviously wrong.
His instinct had been to dismiss her comment. After all, a woman’s success did not rely upon conversations that were had at his club. A woman’s success was judged by her ability to marry well and run a household. A woman’s success was determined in the ballrooms of Almack’s and the houses of Mayfair.
But he also couldn’t deny that, for Fiona, success meant something different than it did for most women of his acquaintance. Objectively speaking, her endeavors were to be admired. She had shown more grit, determination, and intelligence in the development of her matches than many of the men whose entrance to White’s went uncontested.
