Daphne was—had been—perhaps still was?—Delilah’s social superior in every way: in wealth and stature and family name.
But Delilah had possessed a different sort of social supremacy: she was beautiful. It hadproved to be Delilah’s impoverished family’s salvation.
Daphne had not ever resented her. After all, they were united by the tension that beset all women: the rest of their lives depended upon making perfect matches. Daphne had money and stature; Delilah had eyes like a doe. These were what they brought to the marriage mart and her doe eyes had helped Delilah captivate the Earl of Derring.
And furthermore, the last time Daphne had seen Delilah, she’d been so certain of her own future, so satisfied with how she envisioned life unfolding with Henry, it was simply impossible to begrudge a poor knight’s daughter the attentions of an earl.
Delilah’s cheeks sported bright pink spots, too. She’d apparently wisely opted for silence instead of attempting a sentence. But she couldn’t stop her famously lovely dark eyes from moving wonderingly between Daphne and the man standing next to her as if she’d been presented with an equation impossible to solve.
“Life has been eventful indeed in the intervening years,” Delilah began with a little laugh. “It’s an honor to be able to welcome you tomyhome.”
Delilah had been to Daphne’s home for teas and picnics and assemblies. They had liked each other. And yet both had been aware that Daphne had been extending graciousness and charity to the poor daughter of a knight.
“I’m not certain whether such news would have reached you, but the Earl of Derring passedaway not long ago. I’ve remarried. I’m known as Mrs. Hardy now.”
“I had not heard. I’m so terribly sorry for your loss.” She grasped hold of this platitude gratefully.
Intriguingly, Delilah hadn’t qualified the earl’s passing with a “sadly.”
“I’m very well and happy,” Delilah added hurriedly, and, Daphne thought, with a frisson of defensiveness. “My husband is—” She pressed her lips together, then gave another little laugh. “Oh, for heaven’s sake! Forgive me. Do let me start over, Daphne! In my delight and astonishment in seeing you again I have quite forgotten my manners. Allow me to introduce my dear friend and fellow proprietress of The Grand Palace on the Thames, Mrs. Angelique Durand.”
So, Delilah, a former countess, now ran a boardinghouse near thedocks.
The golden-haired Mrs. Durand curtsied. “How do you do, Lady Worth?”
Hers was another soothing accent: it spoke of education and refinement.
“A pleasure to meet you, Mrs. Durand.” Daphne’s knees recognized those words as a cue for another curtsy.
Throughout these exchanges, the large, fearsome stranger who had apparently thought he was leading her to a bordello remained so quiet and watchful he might have been one of the gargoyles lining the roof.
There fell the inevitable awkward pause, during which torment ramped in Daphne.
Because the three of them were such well-bredladies, and as such were bound by and observed the social rituals and niceties, Daphne knew what they expected her to do next.
But she couldn’t do it.
More specifically, because she hadn’t the faintest idea what to say.
Delilah prompted gently, tentatively, “Dot tells us you’d like a suite. How lovely! This must be your... husband?”
In truth, there wasn’tquitean ellipsis’ worth of hesitation before she said the word husband.
But the minute pause fair echoed like a chasm.
Because they all knew there was only one acceptable answer.
And it was the glimmer of hope in the words that cut Daphne so savagely: Delilah hoped Daphne had not plummeted so far in life that she was now the unmarried lover of a large pirate. Delilah clearly hoped that her life was as happy as her own apparently was, when it was patently not.
If Dot hadn’t already made it clear to Mrs. Durand and Mrs. Hardy she was amenable to sharing a suite with this man, and if anyone else at all besides Delilah had asked the question, she might have been able to spontaneously invent an alias and a story. An alias had been her plan, after all, when she’d gone out the window.
But she didn’t know Delilah well enough to tell her the truth of her life as it was now. Moreover, her pride wouldn’t let her.
And the truth was scaldingly painful, humiliating, frightening, and messy. To tell it properly she would need to start with what had happened with Henry. She in fact knew no one intimately enough to entrust with her truth, unless it was Henry. He’d once been the beating heart at the center of her everything. Everything else had been a tributary that ran to and through the fact of him.
There was the shorter truth:Oh, this man? I found him in an alley while I was leaping from a window, right into his arms!
And as another second ticked by Daphne realized that chasm of silence had a crumbling edge. The man standing next to her was a terrifyingly unknown quantity. In less than an hour, she had come to believe he was capable of anything.
