“Your disliking toward me precedes either of us meeting His Grace.”
“I do not like you because you were justthere,” Belinda spat. “We were supposed to live a fairytale life here in Morland House, with Mama being freed from that awful man we had to call our father. Now, he was truly cruel, Elinor. You know nothing about any of that, and you never asked. You simply existed, spoiled by your father’s love, taking his attention, when he ought to have given some to us, too. We were not his by blood, but we were by marriage, but he was too busy with you to ever notice.”
Elinor was speechless. She did not know who her stepmother had been married to before her father, and Belinda was right: she had never thought to ask, mostly because she had been worried it was not her place. All her father had ever told her wasthat her stepmother would welcome her like a true mother, that she had come from a harsh place before their marriage.
“I … I understand it must have been upsetting, but none of that is my fault,” Elinor whispered. “I did not do anything to you.”
“We could have been friends,” Belinda hissed. “Not that I ever wanted to be, but we could have been, but all you cared about was your silly studies and books and your father.”
“I do not truly believe you care about any of that,” Elinor dared to say. “All you have ever wanted was to marry and focus on your social status. As you said, you did not want to be my friend, so why hold so much bitterness against me?”
Belinda flinched back as if she had not expected to be caught out. “I—I—” She glared at Elinor, a vicious, mean curl of her lip forming. “I could have been the Duchess of Fairmont! Now, it will be you, and I will hate you forever for it!”
With that, she turned on her heel and stalked off. Elinor watched her leave for a moment, her breath coming hard and fast, her heart pounding in her chest.
What was Belinda’s true problem?
Her words had been empty, reasons that didn’t quite make sense, but she still aimed the blame at Elinor.
I do not have time for this, she thought, turning back towards the door up ahead.Besides, neither of us will be the Duchess of Fairmont.
The thought came with a strange ache—not because she wanted to be, but because the thought came with the reminder that soon, whenever Lucien saw fit, he would call off their engagement, and Elinor was quite sure she would never be in his company again.
Definitely not publicly, for the ton would wonder why they were still seen together, and Elinor was rather enjoying their roleplaying, especially when he was overly dramatic about it.
Pushing those thoughts aside, she hurried onward, only to see Gilbert coming from the other hallway that led to the main entrance of the townhouse.
Her stomach dropped. She had somehow escaped his notice recently, but she was not in the mood to endure two of her step-siblings.
He was tugging off his gloves, his brows knitted together in thought, until he saw her.
As soon as he did, his smile broadened, and she braced herself for more mockery.
Yet, she froze in shock when he walked up to her and draped an arm around her shoulders, heavy and demanding.
“Ah, if it not my favorite bespectacled stepsister,” he said, and Elinor’s nerves frayed, already knowing something was coming.
He was never friendly, and this was falsely so.
“I do not recall you ever having a kind word to say to me, Gilbert,” she sighed.
He chuckled, steering her towards the hallway in the opposite direction to where she needed to go. She made a noise of protest.
“Do walk with me, only for a moment. I am a very busy man tonight.”
“But it is the evening.”
“Yes, and I have a late-night game of cards with—never mind, time is short, and I shall not bore you with my exciting life. It must be hard to hear of all the things we all get to do while you shove your nose in a book, so I will not be unfair.
“However, your life has taken a bit of an incline in excitement as of late, no? I realize I have not properly congratulated you on your engagement.”
Ah. It hit Elinor then what her stepbrother might be thinking.
“Thank you,” she answered shortly. “I am very happy?—”
“Yes, yes, I am sure. Anyway, the Duke of Fairmont is a very sought-after man, one who is starting up some interesting business prospects. The Fairmont duchy has always been notoriously wealthy, and I was—well, I shall not sidestep my intentions. I would like you to set up a meeting with him for me. He is hard to pin down, and he has not returned any of my attempts for contact, so I thought, given that I would do anything for you, as you know?—”
“I do not know that?—”
