Chapter Nineteen
Lisbeth sat in the drawing room, exhausted.
She hadn’t slept well after Thomas left her in the guest chamber the previous evening.
Now, night was approaching, and she hadn’t heard from him at all.
A sigh escaped her. The day had been awful.
She’d planned to spend most of it at Seely House, meeting with the other board members of the Historical Society of Female Curators, but couldn’t.
Her marriage was all over the papers, as well as the fact that Thomas was out celebrating his celebrity status and their union. She felt foolish. Alice wouldn’t speak to her, and Jeremy wouldn’t stop asking when he would return. Lisbeth had no idea. She felt so alone.
A knock on the door jerked her from her melancholy thoughts. Her butler, Morrison, opened the door. Perhaps it was Thomas, still not comfortable just walking in, but it wasn’t. Rose, now the Duchess of Sinclair, asked Morrison, “Where is she?”
Lisbeth tilted her head back against her wingback chair. Tears burst from her. Rose barged into the room, frowning. “I’m going to murder Thomas Easton.”
She stared at her once frenemy, who always liked Thomas more. Her eyes continued to water, and her chin trembled. “I’ve made my own mess of things.”
Rose sat down. “Tell me. He loves you, but somehow, I suspect this marriage isn’t what you anticipated or wanted.”
Lisbeth rose and shut the drawing room door. Rose pulled a flask from her reticule and uncapped it, handing it to her. The absurdity of Rose carrying it around caused her to giggle even though she was so upset. Her friend grinned. “I wanted to come prepared.”
“I have wine, brandy, and champagne.”
Rose grinned at her cheekily. “This is more fun.”
Lisbeth took a sip and handed it back to her. Her friend took a large gulp. Another giggle escaped Lisbeth. Rose smiled. “I’m glad to hear that sound from you.”
It felt good, but the drama of the last day hit her with full force again. “There are so many things I wish I had done differently, but I truly never felt I had a choice.”
“Start at the beginning.”
Lisbeth stood and paced back and forth. She’d never shared this with anyone but Nicholas, Justin, and Thomas’s mother.
Still, the need to let it out flowed through her.
“When Thomas proposed to me in Tuscany, my brother Justin showed up a few days later. My father was destitute. He’d just been beaten badly by a creditor and was close to debtor’s prison.
There was no money. It was all gone. Justin had used the last bit of it to find me. ”
“Why?”
Bitterness filled her. She smiled sadly. “My father and my husband’s family arranged a marriage between us. Nicholas, at the time, hadn’t wanted to marry and refused to put in any effort, so his father offered an exorbitant sum to mine.”
Understanding flashed across Rose’s face. “You left to save your family.”
Lisbeth grabbed Rose’s flask again, drinking it. “I left because I had no other options. While you and your father were successful, Thomas and I were still barely surviving. None of us were wealthy at the time.”
“Thomas would understand that,” Rose insisted.
“He did,” Lisbeth said with a sigh and sat down. “But he saw Alice and instantly realized she was his.”
Rose’s eyes widened. “I suspected, but then I saw portraits of your husband. They all have similar traits.”
Lisbeth wiped at another tear. “I didn’t know until shortly after I wed Nicholas that I was with child.
I told him the truth right away. Shocking me, he dealt with it more compassionately than I believe most husbands would.
Likely because he also loved another, but she’d passed away, which is why he’d agreed to the marriage.
I spent years wondering if I should write and tell Thomas the truth.
His mother has always known. I just didn’t want to cause more pain. It is awful.”
“It is,” Rose said, never one to mince words. “But I don’t know what other option you had. What did his mother think?”
“She worried about what he would do if he knew, especially since I was married, and Nicholas had claimed Alice.”
“What a bloody mess,” Rose muttered.
It was. There was no fixing it. “I should have told him in Syria, but selfishly, I enjoyed having a few moments with him where the past wasn’t so heavily hanging over us.”
“Still, as a young lady, had you returned to London and told everyone, you would have been ruined. I can’t believe your husband stood by you,” Rose pointed out.
Lisbeth smiled sadly. “Nicholas was a good man. I didn’t hold his heart, but we grew to be dear friends.”
Rose sighed. “How did you and Thomas end up married?”
She shook her head. “He is so angry. He acquired a special license. I don’t think he cares about me. He detests me but wants to be in Alice’s life.”
A snort escaped Rose. “I can’t imagine Alice wants anything to do with him. She is protective of you.”
Lisbeth sniffled. “It makes it even more awful. Alice is so angry, and he enthralls Jeremy.”
“He should have wooed you properly.”
She shook her head at her friend. “Did you hear what I said? He hates me.”
“Thomas Easton loves you. Everything he has ever accomplished is to prove he is worthy of you.”
He had always been worthy of her. It was she who wasn’t worthy of him. “The wedding was a disaster. There is no love left, trust me.”
“Can you annul it?”
Lisbeth flushed and fidgeted uncomfortably. “It has been consummated.”
Rose shot her a pointed look. “But the love is gone?”
Lisbeth had no words to convey how much anger existed in Thomas’s eyes every time they spoke. Rose squeezed her hand. “Give it time.”
“You don’t understand. Too much hurt and lies have occurred. Some things can’t be fixed, and this can’t. We will live separate lives. I plan to take Alice and Jeremy to the country for the time being at the end of the week. I need to get out of the city.”
Rose sighed and took a drink from her flask before handing it back to Lisbeth.
*
Thomas sat at the Den; it was his third night there.
Devons reluctantly offered to let him stay at one of the cottages on the grounds that bachelors frequented when they were visiting London.
Of course, he first explained to him why he should go back to his wife.
The woman would not stop tormenting his thoughts.
He’d played cards and drank, and a few of the lords had tried to entice him into visiting some ladies with them, but the thought left him disgusted.
Lisbeth was his wife, and as much as he despised her, now that he’d made the vow, Thomas couldn’t break it.
She was his. When he was completely in his cups, sometimes he wondered if he’d forced the marriage so he could have her or because of his daughter.
The daughter, who hated him. Thomas suspected only time would fix that. Guilt coursed through him that he hadn’t been back since the night he’d made love to Lisbeth and she’d thrown a glass at him. In truth, he deserved it. He took a sip of his drink.
The whole situation was a sordid mess. Thomas shouldn’t have forced Lisbeth to wed him, no matter how angry he was.
He cringed, remembering the horror he’d seen on Alice’s face when Lisbeth explained they were wed.
What the fuck was he doing? Thomas considered leaving England altogether, but something held him back.
“Easton, you’ve been a bore tonight,” Lord Braxton moaned.
Matthison, his friend from his voyage to England, nodded in agreement.
Before he could respond, both men’s eyes widened, and gasps echoed through the great hall.
He wasn’t facing the entrance, so he turned in his chair to see.
A furious Rose was stalking towards him, with her husband following behind her as if a duchess charging into a gentlemen’s club was perfectly normal.
“Bloody hell,” he muttered, standing.
She reached him and glared. “I would like to speak with you, Mr. Easton.”
“What are you doing here? You are in the middle of a gentlemen’s club,” he whispered to her, and then glanced at her husband, who shrugged. He sighed. Rose was lucky she married a duke; gossip could only affect the hoyden so much.
Devons approached and nodded to a room. “That is a private space if you need to use it.”
Sinclair nodded before following Rose to the room. Thomas sighed and joined them. Once inside, the duke shut the door. Rose hissed, “Did you force Lisbeth to marry you?”
“You have no idea what she’s done.”
“Alice is yours.”
It was like another stab to his heart. Rose and her father were like family to him. “You knew?”
Rose rolled her eyes. “No, I went to see Lisbeth, and she told me.”
“I had to make sure I could see my child,” he bit out, somewhat relieved that she hadn’t known all along. “How can you side with her?”
“I don’t, and I told her she should have revealed the truth when she went to Syria, but honestly, what choice did she have?”
Thomas glared at the woman who was like a sister to him. “She could have annulled her marriage.”
Rose glanced at her husband. “Augustus, would you give us a moment?”
He nodded. “I will join Devons for a drink.”
She smiled at him, and a look of adoration passed between them. Thomas was so envious, but he kept it tamped down because it had nothing to do with Rose. The woman he loved had lied to him for over a decade.
“Rose, I don’t want to talk about this.”
“What do you think would happen to an unmarried pregnant woman whose family is destitute? What would happen if that woman married a duke and then revealed to society that she needed an annulment?”
He would not feel bad for Lisbeth. “I would have supported her.”
Rose snorted. “With what? While we’ve become wildly successful in the last ten years, we had nowhere close to the money Lisbeth would have needed.”
He didn’t want Rose to make him understand. “She and my mother kept my daughter from me.”
“And that is wrong. But I’m asking you, as the man who loved her, to try to understand that she had no other option as a woman.”
“My mother knew.”
“Thomas, you were a mess after Lisbeth left. Your mother was probably terrified of what you would do. You would have returned to England and destroyed your life. The famous explorer Thomas Easton wouldn’t exist.”
“I don’t give a damn.”
Rose squeezed his hand. “That is a lie. Would you have picked a life with Lisbeth and your child ten years ago? Of course. Still, life doesn’t always give us what we want.
You’ve enjoyed traveling the world, sometimes too much.
Now, you have a chance to love Lisbeth openly and to raise your daughter.
I’ve spent time with both Alice and Jeremy.
If you let yourself, you’d love them both. ”
Thomas found himself unable to speak.
His friend added, “There are so many wrongs between you and Lisbeth that can’t be changed.
But I remember the love the two of you had.
I used to think how lucky you both were.
What are you doing in this club? If you want to be her husband, you both have a great deal of work to do to mend the hurt and trust between you. ”
Hoarsely, he confessed, “I do still love her.”
She smacked him on the arm. “I know. Go figure it out. Right now, you look like the pompous, famous explorer from the serials. That isn’t you, no matter how hard you are trying to behave that way. You will regret all of this.”
Thomas sighed. “I’m so angry.”
“You deserve to be angry, but you have Lisbeth now. It is up to you how real your marriage and your relationship with your daughter are,” Rose said, and then she glanced around. “At least leave this club. The gossip you are creating by staying here after your sudden marriage is atrocious.”
The back of his neck went hot. Thomas nodded. “Thank you for coming to see me and being honest. Do you think you and your duke could drop me off at my mother’s?”
She beamed at him. “Of course.”
Thomas was still angry, but Rose had pierced through some of it, and now the desire to stay and celebrate left him empty. What was he going to do about his marriage?