Loudly.
“I am terribly sorry,” she sniffled, dashing at her cheeks. “I never cry, or lose my composure in such an embarrassing manner. It’s just that I’ve handled this all wrong from the very beginning, and I hoped that if I could halt the separation then I might begin to make amends. But I’m too late.”
“Yes,” the solicitor said gravely. “You are. When I appealed to the courts to begin this filing, I was given a strict deadline of noon today. Lord Campbell met that deadline. You, Lady Brynne, did not.”
She gazed at Mr. Jacobson in bewilderment. “I…I don’t understand.”
“I sent a letter informing you of the impending due date to Hawkridge Manor, but you and it must have crossed on your way here to London. Simply put, Lady Brynne, your husband submitted the necessary paperwork to file for your judicial separation. But you did not.”
“I didn’t?”
“No.”
“But that’s…that’s wonderful news!” she cried as she sprang from her chair. “Mr. Jacobson, I could kiss you.”
His moustache quivered. “I don’t believe I have ever been the recipient of such joy fornotcompleting the task assigned to me, Lady Brynne. Can I assume that you do not wish to pursue extending a filing for a deadline extension with the court?”
Brynne swung her head adamantly from side to side. “Please do not take this the wrong way, Mr. Jacobson, but I hope to never see you again.”
“In that case, my lady, I bid you farewell…and good luck.”
“Thank you,” she said with feeling. “I am going to need it.”
Chapter Twenty-Four
Every Season, theViscount and Viscountess of Denbigh held a dinner party on the third day of the third week. The tradition had begun when they found themselves in need of husbands for their three daughters. The first party had been so successful–with the girls snatching up a marquess, an earl, and a baron, respectively–that like-minded parents with daughters of their own to marry off had begged Lord and Lady Denbigh to host another dinner party, and another after that, and another after that, until it became a staple of the London Season.
Brynne had never put much stock in the claim that a young woman wanting a husband need only attend the Marriage Miracle Dinner (as it was now called) and they’d magically become engaged before the month was out.
But tonight, she was hoping for some of that magic for herself.
The last time she and Lachlan had been together, he’d told her that he loved her. Then the next day, he’d signed papers to complete their separation. That juxtaposition had her sitting on pins and needles all through the five-course dinner and into dessert, a sponge cake topped with powdered sugar and strawberries with a thick middle layer of cream.
Evie and Joanna ate their pieces in a matter of seconds, but Brynne only poked at hers with the silver tines of her fork, her attention focused on the glass French doors at the end of the dining room.
She knew Lachlan had been invited because she’d implored Lady Denbigh to invite him. And while the viscountess had been visibly confused by such a request, she had honored it without question, proving that sometimes itdidpay to be the granddaughter of a duke.
But Lachlan wasn’t here.
At least, he wasn’t hereyet.
Which was fine, she told herself. After the sponge cake was cleared, the party didn’t end, but rather spread out to include the parlor, the drawing room, and the rear gardens. As long as her husband arrived within the next two hours, she’d have the opportunity to pull him aside and have a much-needed private discussion, something which she had attempted to do numerous times over the past few days…except she hadn’t been able to find him.
He was not, as she’d naturally assumed, renting the same townhouse as he had every other visit to London. Nor was he staying with his brother, Robert, who had been very surprised–and intrigued–to discover a distraught blonde on his doorstep at half-past seven in the morning.
It was, once more, the very height of irony.
Ten days ago, she’d never wanted to see Lachlan again.
And now, she was terrified that she never would.
Her biggest fear was no longer failure, or being ostracized by High Society, or disappointing her family. It was that she’d done enough damage to her relationship with Lachlan to chase him away indefinitely. And while she sat in her seat shredding apart her sponge cake, he was on a train bound for Scotland.
“Are you going to eat that?” Joanna asked. “Or murder it?”
“You can have it if you’d like,” she muttered distractedly, sliding her plate towards her half-sister who happily scooped up a large plop of cream.
Evie followed Brynne’s gaze to the door. “You’re waiting for him, aren’t you?”
