By the time she’d finished with the silver, her shoulders burned, and twilight had begun to creep across the floors. She was making her way toward the kitchen for whatever meal the servants received when voices drifted from the kitchen, high and excited, wholly inappropriate for the usually subdued staff.
“Can you imagine? The Marquess of Whitebrook!”
Cressida froze in the corridor.
“Surely not,” another voice whispered. “He’s the most notorious rake in London. I heard he once?—”
“Hush! Mrs. Drewley will have our heads if she catches us with this.” There was a rustling of paper. “But it’s all here inthe scandal sheet. The engagement is announced. Miss Harriet Barnes is to marry Lord Whitebrook next week.”
The world tilted.
Harriet?
HerHarriet, who had sworn she would never marry a rake, who had declared such men beneath contempt? Harriet, who deserved a husband who would cherish her intelligence and kindness, not some debauched scoundrel who would break her heart before the honeymoon ended?
Certainly, they couldn’t mean her, could they?
“Next week?” The first maid’s voice rose with scandalous delight. “How deliciously rushed. Do you suppose he has already?—”
“Mary! Don’t be vulgar.”
Cressida didn’t wait to hear more. She moved through the kitchen on silent feet, her mind racing. The maids were too absorbed in their gossip to notice her, huddled as they were over what must be one of the very scandal sheets Aunt Agatha publicly denounced while privately devouring.
Next week.
In the countryside, the announcement had said. Cressida had caught that much. Which meant Harriet was likely already traveling, if she hadn’t arrived there already.
She had to stop this wedding. Shehadto.
Cressida found her aunt in the study, bent over the household accounts with her characteristic severity.
“Aunt Agatha.”
Her aunt didn’t look up. “I believe I gave you tasks to complete.”
“I’ve finished the silver.” Cressida stepped forward, her heart hammering. “I must ask… I need to request permission to travel to London. My friend, Miss Barnes, is to be married, and?—”
Now her aunt looked up, incredulity written across her narrow features. “Permission? To travel to London?” She set down her pen slowly. “Have you taken leave of your senses entirely?”
“Harriet is my dearest friend. I merely wish to attend her wedding?—”
“You areunwelcomein London, Cressida. You would embarrass your parents, embarrass me. Embarrass yourself, if that makes any difference to you.” Aunt Agatha stood, her posture rigid with displeasure. “You seem to labor under the misapprehension that you have any standing left in society. You do not. You are a spinster. A failure. Your parents banished you here to livequietly, to cease causing them trouble, and by God, that is what you shall do.”
“But Harriet?—”
“Your friend has made her choice. She is to be a marchioness. What possible use could she have for a penniless, unmarriageable bluestocking?” The words landed with a force that should have been bruising. Cressida had long since learned to treat them as mere glancing blows. “Now, return to your room before I withdraw your supper privileges as well.”
Cressida stood rooted to the floor, rage and helplessness warring in her chest. But she saw the futility of further argument in the set of her aunt’s jaw, the dismissive wave of her hand.
She curtseyed, a mockery of obedience, and left.
In the attic that night, Cressida lay shivering beneath her inadequate blanket and stared at the darkness. Harriet deserved better than Lord Whitebrook. She deserved better than a marriage born of pressure or convenience or whatever had driven her to accept such a man.
And Cressida… she might have failed as a lady, might have disappointed her parents and scandalized the ton with her unladylike interests, but she would not fail as a friend.
“No. Harriet deserves better,” she whispered to herself.
And with that, she rose with her decision already made.
