Chapter 44
ELIZA
Two days after I’d landed, I was still in London.
The wedding prep was in full swing at Roderick House.
Instead of being at a safe distance in Chicago while this was all happening in England, I’d wound up smack bang in the middle of it, a bit like I’d pressed pause on a disaster only so I could watch it get planned in slow motion.
I found myself adhering to the schedules and timelines of planners I’d never even met before. People with clipboards swarmed around the house, showcasing truly impressive levels of enthusiasm for things like seating arrangements and fabric swatches.
I nodded a lot and smiled when required but contributed absolutely nothing of value. Honestly, I could’ve set down a flowerpot where I was standing and no one would notice.
“God, the floral mockups are disgusting,” Eugenie said. “I’d never do it this way.”
Well, neither would I, but I wasn’t asked for my opinion.
Meanwhile, she swept into the room like a storm cloud in designer heels even though she hadn’t said a single word to me since she’d arrived yesterday. I hadn’t even had the courtesy of a polite nod in my direction, but her opinions were loud and frequent.
“The roses are all wrong.” She waved dramatically at the poor florist. “This arrangement is completely unbalanced. It’s amateur at best.”
The man looked like he might actually cry, but it was Winnie who’d just had her entire vision verbally dismantled. A florist stood no chance against her, so when she’d told him what she wanted, he’d gone along without question.
I’d tried to suggest something much simpler, like wildflowers, but Winnie had looked at me like I’d just spat on the Queen Mother before she’d turned away, continuing to explain to the florist exactly what he was going to do.
She faced off with Eugenie now, not even flinching at the criticism. “Noted, but I disagree. Roses are classic. They provide a touch of class no other flower can parallel.”
I stood slightly to the side, watching them bicker and increasingly feeling like this had nothing to do with me. One of the planners stepped between them, an earpiece in her ear and her trusty clipboard held tight in her hands.
“They’re supposed to go to the castle in a few days,” she said. “We’ll need a final decision before the end of business today.”
I still didn’t understand why we couldn’t have just used local suppliers from the village for everything else and asked the footmen to bring us fresh flowers the morning of. Instead, we were soon transporting this entire production to the countryside like a glamorous traveling circus.
“Honestly, I don’t know why we’re even bothering with half of this stuff,” Eugenie said. “It’s all so overdone.”
Winnie spun on her, gaping and certainly not turning to find out where I stood on all of this. “Stop being a brat. This will photograph beautifully. That’s why we’re doing it.”
The next few hours passed just like that, with the two of them politely tearing each other apart over every detail. Their relentless bickering only paused when they started giggling together over whatever suggestion I’d made.
At the final dress fitting later in the afternoon, I stood on the small platform in a guest bedroom while the seamstress made tiny adjustments to a gown I still wasn’t convinced I was going to wear.
Eugenie had had it shipped from Chicago, but now, suddenly, she wasn’t so satisfied with it anymore. “It’s too soft. We need more.”
“More of what, Lady Roderick?” the seamstress asked, eyeing the layered taffeta cake I was wearing like she wasn’t sure anything more could be added to it.
As it happened, I agreed. It was already way too much. “It’s fine. Let’s just—”
“I like the softness,” Winnie countered, speaking over me as if she wasn’t even aware I was in the room. “It’s whimsical.”
“It’s lazy craftsmanship, is what it is,” Eugenie said. “I honestly think that shop assistant sent us a poor imitation of the dress we chose.”
“Duly noted,” Winnie said. I was beginning to suspect it was her new version of ignoring people politely. “It’s still gorgeous, though.”
“I strongly disagree.”
While they went another round, I stared at my reflection in the mirror and finally just tuned them out. The girl staring back at me looked like she was about to get married, the dress perhaps a bit dramatic, but it certainly was a wedding dress.
I tilted my head, trying to muster some sort of emotion as I imagined walking down the aisle wearing this. Excitement. Nerves. God, even fear would’ve been acceptable, but instead, I had nothing.
Everything in me felt hollow, like there was an empty pit where my feelings used to be.
Whenever I tried focusing on the wedding, my mind simply drifted back to Will and the tiny, small moments we’d shared that had led to me falling in love with him.
Like the day I’d been showing him around the castle grounds, walking him through the history while he asked questions like he actually cared about the answers.
I thought about the way he’d looked at me when I’d told him why I was doing this. I remembered how he’d cared for me when I’d had my first ever hangover, drawing those curtains shut and taking over the rest of my day to make sure I could rest.
Suddenly, a shrill laugh from Eugenie snapped me out of those quiet memories. The room felt too small, the dress too heavy, and the voices around me too loud.
“I don’t like the neckline,” she was saying. “How could you possibly think it works? That’s ridiculous.”
“You don’t need to cackle about it like a witch,” Winnie said. “The neckline is fine. It’s romantic.”
Eugenie scoffed. “It’s not fine.”
“I’ve had enough.”
The words slipped out before I’d even thought them through. Nothing changed, though. They hadn’t even heard me.
Winnie and Eugenie kept bickering. The seamstress was still crouched at my feet with a mouth full of pins. Frustration rose from deep within, hot, insistent, and so painfully intense that I suddenly couldn’t breathe.
“I said, I’ve had enough!” I started tugging at the fabric as tears pressed at the backs of my eyes. “Get this off of me. Now.”
God, for all the luck I was having trying to get the damn dress off me, it felt like it had been engineered by NASA. “Could someone please help me out of this thing?”
The seamstress scrambled to her feet. “Yes, of course. Just hold still.”
Her hands moved around me, unfastening, unhooking, and untying things I hadn’t even known existed. The fabric loosened inch by inch, the pressure easing, but not fast enough.
“Excellent,” Eugenie said. “I’m glad you agree that the dress wasn’t working after all.”
Winnie sighed. “Honestly, Eliza. Why did you buy it if—”
“Can you not?” I snapped as I spun to face them, my voice rising along with the pressure at the backs of my eyes. “I didn’t buy this fucking thing!”
Winnie blinked at me. “Excuse me?”
“Can you just not? For five seconds, just stop,” I repeated, half hysterical at this point. “Don’t ask me why I bought it because I didn’t. I’ve been nothing but a spectator on the sidelines of my own wedding planning, and I’m sick of it. Everything, all of it, just stop.”
Winnie let out a soft laugh, like this was mildly entertaining to her. “Look at you, turning into bridezilla on us.”
“No,” I said, shaking my head as the dress finally loosened enough for me to step out of it. I grabbed the robe someone handed me, pulling it around myself like armor. “You cannot just laugh me off this time, Winifred.”
“Oh, come on,” Eugenie said, rolling her eyes. “You’re being so dramatic.”
I stared at her, feeling hysteria rise along with my disbelief. “Just piss off. Both of you. I mean it. I’m done letting you stand there, criticizing everything you chose and then acting like I’m the problem when I finally speak up.”
Eugenie scoffed. “We’re just trying to help.”
“Help?” I let out a short, incredulous laugh. “You’re not helping. The only thing you’ve been doing is alternating between ignoring me and tearing me down for fun.”
“Oh, for heaven’s sake,” Eugenie said.
“You do the same thing to Dad,” I said, my voice shaking now but not enough to stop me.
“You’re constantly dismissing his opinions and disrespecting him at every turn.
According to you two, nothing is ever good enough, yet neither of you are willing to lift a finger to help remedy whatever the problem might be.
All you do is complain, judge, belittle, and patronize. ”
Winnie’s features tightened. “That’s not fair.”
“No, it’s not,” I agreed. “The way you treat me and Dad never has been fair, but where do you think you’d be without us?
Fucking nowhere. You complain about the castle, but you’re forever boasting about having one.
Hard work is beneath you, but someone has to do it, and yet, you make fun of me for stepping up and getting it done. ”
My throat tightened. “You are both awful bloody people. Honestly. There is no world in which I would ever have invited either of you to my wedding if it was within my control not to. You’ve both been absolutely terrible to me for most of our lives when in reality you’re nothing more than lazy, entitled brats who would be penniless if not for Dad and me. ”
There was so much more I wanted to say, so much more that I’d been bottling up for so long, but my pulse was pounding in my ears and my hands were shaking. Right now, I just needed to get out of here.
“Lady Roderick—”
I ignored whoever called after me, just keeping my head down and trying my best to hold back tears as I raced down the hall and past the staff. When I reached the corridor that led to my father’s office, he was stepping out, his eyebrows drawn together in confusion.
“Eliza?” he said when he spotted me hurrying toward him. “What’s going on? I heard an awful racket a moment ago.”
I didn’t stop to explain that the awful racket had been me, finally telling my wicked sisters off for pretending I was the laughingstock of the family. Dad called my name again when I rushed right past him, but then I was pushing open the doors at the end of the hall and finally I was outside.
Cool air hit my overheated skin and I dragged in a deep breath, willing my heart rate to calm down. I looked around wildly. There had to be a car here I could use to get away, but the courtyard and driveway were chaos.
Trucks lined the drive, workers moving back and forth carrying crates filled with the family china and decorations, pieces of a wedding they thought was still happening. Voices overlapped as I rushed past them all, barely paying attention to where I was going.
“Careful with the vases—”
“That’s being delivered to the castle on the next truck.”
The words blurred together, but suddenly, my father was calling my name again. “Eliza! Where are you going?”
Damn good question.
I blinked rapidly when I realized that no one here would help me escape while he was right behind me. When I spun around to tell him to leave me alone, he was only a few steps away, his eyebrows still drawn in confusion, but irritation also now shimmered in his eyes.
“What was that about?” he demanded. “I heard shouting and now you’re ignoring me and causing a scene. What’s going on?”
“What’s going on?” I echoed, disbelief lacing every word. “Are you serious?”
He sighed, glancing this way and that as if the answer would come speeding toward him from the street. “Of course, I’m serious. What on earth is this all about?”
“It’s about me finally standing up for myself,” I snapped.
“Everyone else might be too polite or too self-absorbed to acknowledge how awful Winifred and Eugenie are, but I’ve had enough.
I’m tired of being overlooked, dismissed, and laughed at, when in the meantime, we’d have lost everything by now if not for me. ”
His features hardened slightly. “Watch your tone, young lady.”
“No, I don’t think I will,” I said, hugging the robe tighter around me as my head shook over and over again. “You’ve always overlooked me. Everything I do for this family never even gets me so much as a thank you. It only invites ridicule and criticism.”
“That’s not true.”
“It is,” I insisted. “The work I do at the castle, keeping it running, making it profitable, and turning it into something that actually matters in our community? You barely acknowledge it.”
His jaw started ticking. “That’s not—”
“I did this for all of you,” I said over him, my voice breaking.
“I agreed to this arrangement because it was what you wanted and what the family needed, and not one person has even said thank you. Bloody hell, I didn’t even need a thank you.
Just a simple how are you feeling about this would’ve been sufficient.
” My chest was heaving in the aftermath, tears stinging my eyes. “I’m done, Father.”
His eyebrows furrowed. “Done with what?”
“With all of it,” I said. “The wedding is off.”
His face fell, the color draining out of it completely. “You’re not serious.”
“I am,” I replied without hesitation. “I won’t be honoring my agreement to marry Jesse Westwood. You can tell the family that they’re free to set him up with another match.”
My father stared at me like he didn’t recognize the person standing in front of him, but I couldn’t blame him. I’d never, ever spoken to him in this tone of voice, nor had I ever stood up to him before.
“We need to talk about this, Eliza,” he murmured after a few long seconds. “It’s not as easy as—”
“I don’t care if it’s easy or not. Frankly, I don’t even care if it’s the hardest thing you’ve ever had to do. I’m not committing the rest of my life to a man I don’t know for a family who will not—and has never—appreciated me.”
Dad’s mouth opened, but before he could say anything, I was already turning away. I didn’t need him to try to convince me I was making a mistake. Maybe I was, but for once in my life, it was my mistake to make.
“Eliza,” Miriam called just a second before I reached the gates. I paused at the sound of her voice. She caught up to me, her fingers closing gently around my wrist as she slipped a set of keys into my hand. “Go.”
“Thank you, Miriam.”
“Just go,” she repeated, her voice firm but quiet. “Go now, Eliza. While you still can.”