Chapter 30
It took Cecilia’s mother and brother another two days to visit her, and she assumed by then they must have read about Cassian’s departure. She was not ready to host either of them, but when her mother swept into the blue drawing room like a storm unleashed, Cecilia felt her chest tighten.
“Mother…” she said, her eyes flickering to her brother, “Marcus, what may I help you with?”
Margaret’s gaze sharpened as she studied her daughter’s face. “Your eyes are dreadfully swollen, dear. Have you been sleeping well?”
Cecilia’s jaw tightened, but she said nothing.
“In any case, it’s time for you to return to London. It’s about time you returned home to your family,” her mother said frankly, omitting all niceties and social proprieties. “I, for one, am glad the mocker of a husband you once had is gone.”
Her fists clenched, “And why do I need to return to London, pray tell?”
“To find your new husband, of course!” Margaret sang loftily. “I have it on good faith that you have had an annulment agreement, and it is signed. You are a free woman, Cecilia, and we can find a proper husband for you.”
“And where, precisely, did you get this information?” Cecilia asked her mother.
“I told her,” Marcus answered swiftly. “A few of my friends are posted in the Archbishop’s office and disclosed to me in confidence that the agreement was sent off.”
“Yes, yes,” Margaret waved a handkerchief. “Now, do as you’re told and pack a few things. We can send for the rest of your belongings later this week. Are you familiar with Lord Salisbury, perchance?”
“The handsome, blond man whom they equate to the reincarnation of Adonis, yes, I do,” Cecilia answered flatly.
“Oh, delightful! He has proposed his interest in meeting you,” her mother chimed. “And he already has mine and your father’s approval.”
“To marry me, I presume,” Cecilia filled in the blanks hollowly.
“Of course!” her mother clapped. “Now, when are you going to get ready?”
Cecilia sighed, knowing that any refusal she might give her mother would be ignored. Being alone was certainly doing no good for her well-being; shooting down this second marriage buffoonery head-on was possibly the wisest decision in the short term.
“Give me a few moments, please.”
As she went to her rooms, she called for Abigail, and soon enough, they had a couple of trunks and bags set. With that done, she left for Cassian’s room, where she had been sleeping for the last couple of days, and found the folio he’d spoken of under her copy of Cecilia.
A wry laugh left her, “If you wanted to make a point, Cassian, you made it.”
Taking both with her, she rejoined her mother to see that Andrews had brought up refreshments. From the overly stoic look on Andrews’ visage, she knew the man was not entirely thrilled. Joan, the housekeeper and his wife, was standing beside him, equally distraught.
She went up to them, ignoring the look her mother was searing into the middle of her back. In her mother’s house, staff were not privy to peers’ affairs, but Cecilia did not much care.
“I’ll be leaving,” she said quietly. “I will be sending for the rest of my things later this week. Will you be alright?”
Andrews bowed, “His Grace has paid our allowances for several years on, or as long as it will take to dissolve the Dukedom if the decision is made. Yes, Your Grace, I—we will be all right.”
“Good,” she smiled. “Please look out for my note this week. I’ll be sure to visit soon.”
Turning to her mother, she said, “We can leave.”
“You have everything for now?” Margaret asked.
“Yes.” She nodded as two footmen came and collected her trunks. “We can go… home.”
The carriage rocked gently as it made its way back to London, but Cecilia felt no such ease.
It was with a dismal ear that she listened as her mother and Marcus discussed the lords of London who were potential suitors, while she wondered when to tell them that she had not seen, let alone signed the annulment agreement Cassian had left behind.
“Salisbury is still a good choice, but what about Duke Valhaven?” Margaret pondered aloud.
“He is a perpetual bachelor, Mama,” Marcus’ forehead creased. “He could not be tied down with a Gordian Knot. Now, his brother, on the other hand—”
Cecilia narrowed her eyes. “Will you two care to address me as I am present and also as not as if I am some fattened calf ready to be led to the slaughterhouse?”
“Yes, yes,” her mother waved absently. “I would love to include you, Cecilia, but seeing how disastrous your past choices were, we think it wise that we vet the lords for you first.”
“Might I remind you that you also thought Whitmore was good for me, and how did that spin out again?” Cecilia muttered pointedly while reaching for her trusty novel, Cecilia, ignoring the glare shot her way from the opposite seat by her brother for talking back.
Anger and injustice tangled inside her. If anything was for certain, she would not allow anyone, much less her family, to make a decision on her behalf again.
She pulled the book open and jolted when she found it empty of her annotations. She spun back to the cover to notice this was not her copy of Cecilia at all, but a new, recent purchase.
Before she could ponder the meaning of this—where on earth was her own copy?—a slip of paper fell out.
Curious, she plucked it up quickly before Margaret or Marcus could notice, and read.
My dearest Cecilia,
There are words I should have said. Words I was too much a coward to speak aloud.
I told myself it was enough to show you through touch, through presence, through the way I looked at you when you weren't watching. But it wasn't enough, was it?
I should have told you that these weeks with you have been the most honest of my life. That waking beside you felt like finally coming home after years of wandering. That when you smiled at me, really smiled, I forgot every reason I'd ever had for running.
You asked me whether going away was something I wanted or I needed last night.
I am sorry, but I lied. Truthfully, it was neither.
I choose to leave as I’m afraid. Afraid that you might someday see me for the broken man I am, and you would want me no more.
So I would sooner let you go. A return to yourself.
I could never bear to trap you in something you didn't choose freely.
But if I'm wrong... if there was ever a moment where you felt what I felt…
I need you to know that it was real for me, too.
All of it.
You were real. And you changed everything. I don't know how to be the man who stays, Cece. I never learned that. But God help me, I wanted to learn it with you.
If you did as I asked and went to find the folio, and you happen to read this before I board my ship, perhaps you could say what I have lacked the courage to. I will be waiting.
Perhaps forever.
C.
Cecilia reread the note again. Then again. For a third time.
The words blurred as tears filled her eyes, each line breaking her heart and mending it simultaneously.
He had loved her. He did love her. And he had left because he thought he was setting her free, because he believed staying would have been imposing, would have been trapping her in a life with a man who was undeserving.
He didn’t know that every morning she woke beside him felt like a gift. That his presence had become as necessary to her as breathing. That she had fallen so completely, so irrevocably in love with him too…
“Turn the carriage around…” she whispered, her voice on the verge of breaking.
For a moment, she didn’t think she was heard, but then Marcus asked, “Pardon?”
Looking up from the letter, she ordered, “I said, turn the carriage around. I am going back to Hertfordshire, to my home.”
Her mother’s lips tightened. “That place is not your home anymore.”
“Yes. Yes, it is!” Cecilia snapped in a tidal wave of emotion. Pulling the folio out of her satchel near her side, she spun it open for them to see that the agreement was not signed. “Do you see this annulment?”
“Cecilia, you cannot go back on—” Margaret looked down and promptly went apoplectic. “Why haven’t you signed it? It could have been sent off weeks ago!”
“That’s simple,” Cecilia answered as she held the paper out. “Because I don’t want to.”
“You cannot mean… never say you have fooled yourself into believing that you are in love with Tressingham…” her mother said sharply.
She gave a small yet firm nod.
“You foolish, foolish girl,” her mother bemoaned.
“How can you do something so madcap? Was it not just a few weeks ago that his old lover had come to Wiltshire, and he ran after her? Is that not an account that he is still back to his philandering ways? Do you not feel shame anymore, Cecilia? Why can you possibly think this is rational behavior?”
“Because I know Cassian and you do not,” Cecilia bit back. “He is a good man beneath the facade you think you see.”
“He has ruined innumerable ladies—”
“And so has Gabriel,” Cecilia said. “And he has a child out of wedlock. Are you going to crucify Cassian for a lesser sin than Gabriel has committed but let him go free?”
Her mother’s face went flinty, “I never said that.”
“No, but I know you still slap horns on Cassian while you give Gabriel his wings,” she waved the paper. “I am not signing this.”
“Think carefully, Cecilia,” Marcus warned. “This is your future.”
“Cassian has already given me every provision to be comfortable in my future,” Cecilia said. “I will wait for him. Whether it be a week, a month, or years. Whether I die of old age in Fitzroy Manor as some lonely, pitiful lady. I rather make my own decisions from now on.”
“You need to marry, Cecilia—” Her mother fisted her wrist and pulled her back into the carriage seat. “It is the acceptable thing in our society!”
“I am married,” she reminded and holding her mother’s eyes, tore the annulment agreement in two and then in fours. “I am the Duchess of Tressingham. Now, is there anything else you need?”
“You’ll regret that, sister,” Marcus muttered darkly.
“No, I won’t,” she said. “Turn the carriage around. I wish to return home. And I will walk back if I must.”
Margaret spun to the driver, pausing only to regard Cecilia solemnly. “I sincerely hope this does not come back to haunt you, daughter of mine.”
She swallowed, stared at the fragments of paper, reassured herself, and squared her shoulders. “I spent nearly two years betrothed to a man who did not care a jot for me. I can spend two lifetimes waiting for Cassian.”