Chapter Twenty-Six
Andrew had told her everything. Big or small, he spilled every detail he’d come to know since he’d returned to London.
He hadn’t been sure how she’d react. It was so much information, and it must be an overwhelming rush of emotion.
He thought there might be tears, whether they were an expression of hurt or sadness or rage.
He’d stood close by the entire time in case she’d swooned.
He told himself that was why, at least. Whether she raised her voice or tore at her hair or collapsed to the floor, he thought he’d been prepared for everything.
He hadn’t expected the silence.
Even now, as they stood in the grand hall of Morley House, she was eerily quiet.
She’d said hardly a word as they left his home for what used to be hers.
The carriage ride had been uncomfortable, and he hadn’t thought it possible to feel so tense around her.
She was such a calming presence, a balm to his soul, and he hardly knew what to do in the absence of that comfort, especially as she’d been sitting right in front of him.
It was as if her entire spirit had disappeared and left nothing but her physical form behind.
“Everything will be all right,” he whispered. They were pitiful words, nothing but verbal fluff in comparison to the seriousness of the moment, but they were all he had.
Della looked up at him, and there was a hint of sparkle in her eyes. A twinkle. Just a flash, but enough to make him think the rest of her was still in there somewhere. Perhaps trapped beneath a landslide of emotions, but still there nonetheless.
There was a commotion, something that sounded like a gasp and an angry hiss of unintelligible words. Andrew didn’t despair, he could tell by the tone that those sentiments likely weren’t for repeating in polite company, anyway.
As he felt the tension in the grand manor home rise to a crescendo, Andrew once again questioned whether he should have brought Della with him.
The last thing he wanted was for her to feel more of her family’s ire, but she’d been cast aside and looked over far too much in her life.
If there was one thing Andrew could do, it was give her a choice.
She’d chosen to come with him. To stand at his side as he either secured her future or tore both of their worlds apart.
Andrew realized that this could very well be the last time he stood here at Morley House.
The thought made him oddly sad, as the place held such nostalgia for him.
Memories of his childhood and his father and the woman standing next to him—the girl he’d grown up with here.
Beyond that nostalgia, there was a sense of peace.
If he walked out of here today with her by his side, he’d be more than happy to never see this house again.
“Adelaide!” a voice hissed. Andrew knew who it was. No one else would attempt such dramatics. It wasn’t traditionally how a viscountess greeted guests in her home, but they weren’t guests, and she wasn’t a traditional viscountess.
“Hello, Mother,” Della uttered. Her voice was soft. Almost kind, even though quite possibly no one in the world had ever hurt her the way the woman standing in front of her had.
Andrew had always found it strange how much Della and her mother looked alike. When he’d learned she was actually Della’s stepmother, he’d struggled to believe it. They possessed the same features. Thick, dark hair. Strong brows. Long lashes.
He’d never truly seen Esther in Della, though.
Della’s beauty was so much more than her features.
It was the light in her eyes and the innate kindness that seemed to radiate from her smile.
Esther’s face held nothing but misery. Even now, standing in front of a daughter she rarely had the opportunity to see, there was nothing but hostility in her gaze.
“I cannot believe you,” the viscountess hissed again.
Andrew had come across a rattlesnake once in his travels through America.
He’d never forget the danger he’d heard in the noise it made.
That sound seemed to echo in the vitriol Lady Morley was so casually spitting.
“Showing up here uninvited with this boy. Unchaperoned in a carriage like a common doxy.”
“That’s enough.” Andrew stood up straighter as he spoke. Lady Morley could call him whatever she wanted—he’d been called worse by better people—but he took issue with the way she spoke to her own daughter.
The viscountess stepped forward, poised to spear Andrew with a scathing retort, but she was quickly silenced. By Della.
“We’ve come to speak with you,” she told her mother. Now that she’d resumed speaking, her tone felt almost eerily calm. Though he’d been deeply unsettled by her silence, he almost preferred it to this artificial serenity. “You and Father. David as well.”
“And what could you possibly have to speak to us about?” Lady Morley crossed her arms over her chest. This wasn’t happening as Andrew thought it might.
How he’d hoped, anyway. He wanted a private, proper conversation where they could speak reasonably.
In hindsight, that was far too much to ask of them.
Still, shouting at each other in the hall seemed so uncivil.
They were the aristocrats, though. Not him.
He supposed he should defer to their sense of etiquette.
He felt Della’s eyes on him. Perhaps she was looking to him for strength or to recommend he answer the burning question in the air.
Andrew couldn’t take his eyes off of her mother.
He’d never truly loathed someone before, and he was having trouble with the feeling.
His eyes began to squint, trying to find something redeemable in her vicious gaze.
There was no part of him that could imagine behaving this way.
Della had just come home for the first time in eight years, and to what? An anger she’d done nothing to deserve.
Silence continued to reign, and Lady Morley’s arrogant indignation floated about the room like a child’s toy boat on water. Andrew wanted nothing more than to watch it sink. So, he started throwing stones.
“We’re here to discuss your daughter’s inheritance,” he said simply. He could play the role of her solicitor if that’s what it took. He could pretend this was a matter of business for him, not something that had the potential to be the most devastating kind of personal.
Lady Morley gasped, of course. The fanfare of her extravagant, overplayed emotions was beginning to get old. Through Della, Andrew had seen what real emotion looked like on a face like that. This wasn’t it. This was manufactured. A display that served a manipulative purpose.
“I’m sure I’ve no idea what you’re talking about!” Lady Morley raised a hand to her chest, the other patting her forehead. She should’ve been an actress. “You must be mistaken. You have no inheritance. You’ve a dowry, of course, but it was useless.”
Andrew heard the breath heave out of his lungs.
He sucked in air between his clenched teeth.
It seemed an unnecessarily cruel reminder to them both, that there were foolish men who wouldn’t even be paid to marry Della.
It was a reminder that all those years ago, he’d have married her in a heartbeat even if neither of them had a pound to their name.
He’d consider it the honor of his life even now.
“We are talking about Kinloss,” Della said. Her face had gone blank, taking the lack of emotion she was exhibiting one step further.
Her mother gasped again. This one was stunningly real. He couldn’t tell exactly what those feelings were flashing across her face. Shock, or disbelief, maybe, but he knew they were true.
“Perhaps we should wait for the viscount,” Andrew suggested.
He still didn’t like the thought of airing out their grievances in the middle of the hall for all of Mayfair to walk by and observe.
Not to mention the exhaustive household roaming about.
Besides, Della needed a chair. It wasn’t good for her to stand for so long, and he couldn’t stand looking at her rigid posture any longer.
He couldn’t make this hurt her heart any less, but he could at least make the process easier on her body.
“Very well,” Lady Morley said. She gestured to the drawing room they used for guests and led them there.
Andrew watched as she walked past him, looking for any slight break in her confidence.
She was like bone china, he thought. It would only take a crack in the veneer to shatter the entire piece.
She whispered harshly toned words to the footman at the door, and he swiftly disappeared.
Andrew felt Della tense up as she watched them interact.
He knew she couldn’t stand the way her mother treated others, but it was as if seeing it in the flesh caused her physical pain.
He hoped not. Of that, she had plenty already.
Lady Morley delicately arranged herself on a low settee near the corner of the room.
It was upholstered in an ugly striped fabric, as if it were almost intentionally made to look overdone.
Andrew sat on one end of the sofa. His body wouldn’t relax, and he stayed perched on the edge, his back still far from resting against the equally ugly upholstery.
Della sat next to him. Closer than she needed to, given the size of the sofa.
Her hand hovered near his on the cushion, and seeing her pinky so close to his own made the damask pattern beneath it so much more palatable.
This wasn’t a competition, but already, he felt like he’d won.
“The viscount is on a ride.” Lady Morley looked at each of them.
She looked between them. Andrew had always thought that odd, how those with titles referred to each other so formally.
He knew it was the way things were done, but it had always felt so cold.
“David is with him. They should be back soon, but I’ve sent a servant to fetch him. ”
There was disdain in her voice as she addressed them, but Andrew caught the way she fidgeted.
She was wringing her hands, running her fingers over each other.
He saw it for what it was. A crack. He could almost hear it, the sound of her splintering, then shattering entirely.
That imaginary sound filled him with strength.
It straightened his spine and his resolve.
“You know,” Lady Morley looked down at the hands she now had clasped in her lap, “it is good to see you, my dear.” Her gaze had recovered that manipulative veneer, and Andrew hated to see it.
“It is good to see you too, Mother,” Della parroted the appropriate words back to her, but her gaze was a startlingly blank canvas.
He’d always seen her as so emotive, her face so full of life that it spilled over, but it seemed his Della had a veneer of her own.