Chapter Seventeen
The unwrapping was over. The ribbon had been tidied away.
Gwen had already broken one of her Christmas presents, and she and Teddy had squabbled over who was able to play the new pianoforte music first. The servants had been sent home for their day with their boxes.
Michael had wandered off, much to their mother’s chagrin, and Irene…
Irene stared out of the window at the frost-covered lawn. The garden had received no sunshine today, Boxing Day, and its tendrils of icy art traced over every leaf.
If she had been her artist cousin Evelyn, perhaps she would have been able to find some beauty in the sight. As it was…
“I think you should leave this house, Your Grace. You are not welcome here.”
Irene clenched her fists, sitting all alone curled up in the armchair near the fire by the library, but unclenched them just as quickly.
What was the point in getting angry? What was the point in attempting to rationalize the fool’s actions?
He had done it. She believed him when he’d said he hadn’t officially announced any such thing, but he had evidently acted so indecorously with this woman—whatever her origins, if the gossiper knew her father’s name, perhaps she was not too low to be a duchess, after all—at some point that the whole world considered him engaged to another, and now…
now Irene and Wilfred were forever separated.
Irene brushed an errant tear away. With every moment that she promised herself she would not cry over Wilfred Matthew Kirk Chesterham Zouch, Duke of Aynor, another tear seemed to come. Apparently, she was just as unable to control her idiotic eyes as she was her idiotic best friend.
Her former best friend.
Footfalls in the hall, and chattering, laughing voices. A ghost of a smile brushed across Irene’s lips. It appeared her two sisters had made it up, from the sound of it. She had always thought she and Wilfred would never fall out, not properly. Not for long. And yet…
How could she ever forgive him for this?
Her head fell listlessly back against the wing-backed armchair.
There appeared to be no energy in her limbs, no drive within her to sample the baking, the smell of which had wafted up from the kitchens since daybreak.
Her parents had gone out for a Boxing Day stroll, as had presumably many of their acquaintance, but Irene had pleaded a headache and no one had been brave enough to argue with her.
And so here she was. Alone. As I always will be.
Irene almost laughed, her own thoughts were so ridiculous. But they were true. How was she supposed to love, and be loved by, another man after what she and Wilfred had shared? That intimacy, that complete abandon…no. No, she would never feel that again.
Shifting her slippers off so she could slip her feet under her knees, Irene sighed. The garden remained unchanging. Just like she had thought her friendship with Wilfred would be.
Another tear slipped down her cheek.
“Your headache still giving you trouble?”
Irene started but did not look around. She knew that voice. “No, Mama.”
The door closed—in truth, she had not noticed it open—and gentle footfalls meant her mother’s face soon appeared before her. The Viscountess Pernrith slowly lowered herself onto the sofa opposite her daughter and examined her.
Irene looked away. She did not want to be looked at, even by her own mother. She did not want to be beheld by anyone ever again. What had that gained her? There was nothing, nothing to be gained by such connection.
Her truest friend, her better half—and now that Wilfred had made his confession, she could not but see him as the man she loved, even as she hated him—had gone from her forever.
She would be alone. Forever.
“You know,” her mother said quietly, “I do not think I have ever seen you look so miserable.”
Irene let out a pitiful laugh as she brushed aside the treacherous tears. “Thank you, Mama.”
“Still very pretty, as always,” her mother continued with a lilting smile. “But still. Not happy.”
‘Not happy.’ Well, it was not an inaccurate description.
“No,” she said quietly, not quite able to face her mother’s gaze. “I am not happy.”
Happy, that the best man she had ever known had lied to her?
Happy, that the man she had always thought would be by her side was gone—and not just gone, but gone to stand by the side of another?
Happy, that the best and the brightest of Society would soon be attending the wedding of the Season: the wedding of the Duke of Aynor?
“You know,” her mother said delicately, “you might want to talk about it. It might help.”
Irene tried not to laugh as she shifted her feet, pulling the blanket she’d tucked around herself over as she moved. “Thank you, Mama, but I don’t think talking about it with you will help.”
There was just a hint of a pause. “Oh. Talking about it with me won’t help?”
Bother. She caught that, did she?
Irene forced herself to look up. Her mother was still incredibly beautiful—that was, she could not recall a time when her mother was not one of the most beautiful women she had ever known.
Oh, age had added a line or two here and there, and her hair could not be described as dark auburn any longer, but these marks of age had merely accentuated her beauty, not marred it.
She was so beautiful. And Father is so besotted with her, Irene could not help but think wistfully. Theirs was a love that was so pure, so easy, she half-wondered whether her mother would understand anything about courting in today’s modern world.
After all, theirs was a love match. All the way back in 1812!
“I mean no disrespect,” Irene said quietly. “It’s just… Well. You cannot possibly understand. You and Papa, you were made for each other. Everything has always been so easy for you.”
Laughter was not the response Irene had expected, but it was the one she received. In fact, there was a great deal of laughter. So much, it started to aggrieve her.
“Well, I don’t see what’s so funny,” she snapped, against her better judgment.
Her mother did not appear offended, despite Irene’s rudeness. “Oh, Reeny—”
“Don’t call me that.”
How could anyone ever call her that again, after what she had shared with Wilfred, whose soft lips had called her that name during the act again and again?
The Viscountess Pernrith still did not appear offended, another mark of her good nature.
“I am sorry, Irene. I am not laughing at you, more… Well, what you said. I am sure I have told you part of the story of your father and me before, but I wonder… Yes, I wonder whether hearing the full tale might aid you in this moment.”
It was all Irene could do not to roll her eyes. How would hearing her parents’ perfect love story help her get over the worst heartbreak anyone had ever known?
“I am always happy to hear the story, Mama,” she said politely, “but I am certain I could tell it to you. You met, Father was besotted with you—”
“He was rather,” said the Viscountess Pernrith with a charming smile.
“You fell in love, you got engaged, and Grandpapa—”
“Threatened your father with a duel, you know,” her mother said lightly, adjusting her skirt as though grandparents frequently menaced their sons-in-law.
Irene knew it was not precisely ladylike, but she could not help it.
Her jaw dropped.
“Yes, you know part of the story,” her mother said, her voice low and unburdened with shame. “The story we told everyone, the story the ton heard and my father, your grandfather, was determined to keep to. But I wonder… I wonder whether hearing the full tale might assist you.”
Irene was still attempting to lift her jaw from the floor. “Grandpapa threatened Papa with a duel?”
“Well, he had found him compromising me heartily only the second or third time we met,” her mother said, small pink dots appearing in her cheeks even as she spoke.
It was a good thing Irene was seated, for those words would have surely made her fall to the ground if she had been standing. To hear such things about anyone was scandalous enough, but one’s own parents!
Then she shot out a pointed finger. “I always knew Michael was born only seven months after—”
“Yes, well, timings cannot always be completely accurate,” interrupted her mother hastily, a glance at the door. “That is not something I have ever shared. But the story of how your father and I fell in love, well…That may be a story you could enjoy.”
Irene could hardly believe what she was hearing. Her father, threatened by her grandfather? A fake engagement?
Her mother, compromised!
“I am not sure I want to hear the details of such a tale,” she said warily, attempting not to think the unthinkable.
To be sure, she had always known her parents had—that was, that her mother and father, in order to have five children, had—but… Well!
“Your father was, and is, a very handsome man,” her mother said dreamily, lifting a hand to her hair and adjusting a pin with a faraway look. “And when I saw him—and then we were alone, and the opportunity to know just how he tasted was too good to—”
“Mama!”
To Irene’s great relief, her mother cleared her throat and sat up straighter.
“What I mean to say,” the Viscountess Pernrith said, her voice stronger, “is that love can start in all sorts of ways. Your father and I… I liked him—”
“Mama!”
“I was going to keep the details to myself this time!” her mother said with a laugh, though there was just a tinge of shyness in it.
Irene did not know whether to bury herself underneath her blanket and put her fingers in her ears or launch herself from the armchair and make a break for the door. No daughter in the world should have to suffer through this!
“We were discovered. By my father.” Her mother sighed with a wistful smile. “I do miss him, and it’s memories like this that I think about most often. He insisted your father marry me, but… Well, he was considered beneath me. You know why.”