Chapter Twenty #2
He hadn’t just tried to beat her to market. He’d tried to wipe her out. Entirely. Burn her down before she could even open her doors. Destroy the name she’d resurrected. Her father’s name.
Her fingers dug into the folds of her gown.
“He did this,” she said aloud. “He came for me.”
“He came for us,” he said quietly.
She turned to look at him, her face tight, unreadable.
“Because I dared to build something,” she said. “Because I dared to do it with my name. Not just yours.”
“Because you’re a threat,” he said.
She looked down at her gloved hands. The fingertips were black with soot. She peeled one off slowly, revealing skin streaked with ash and sweat.
“I feel like I’ve buried something,” she murmured.
“What do you mean?”
She looked at the wreckage, her jaw taut.
“The girl I was—when I first walked into your study and asked you to marry me. I was scared. Desperate. That girl needed this building.”
Nicholas watched her in silence.
“But now,” she said, her voice like iron wrapped in velvet, “I think I needed it to burn.”
He raised a brow.
She met his eyes, her own glittering not with tears—but something sharper.
“Because now I’m not desperate. I’m angry. And I’ll rebuild it. Better. Bigger. I will not be ruined.”
Nicholas reached for her hand, not like a comfort, but a vow.
“You’re not alone, Lydia.”
Her fingers laced with his.
They sat in the ruins as the last of the smoke drifted into the evening air. People would say the duchess had lost everything. But they’d be wrong.
Lydia hadn’t lost her future. She’d just forged it in fire.
***
The soot still clung to her cuffs and the roots of her hair.
Lydia hadn’t changed since they returned from the ruined shop. There hadn’t been time. Not when so much had to be rebuilt, reimagined, resurrected.
But how? That was the question.
Lydia stood near the north-facing windows searching for inspiration when Emma burst into the room, cheeks flushed and curls askew beneath her bonnet.
“I spoke with my cousin,” Emma said, breathless.
Lydia turned quickly. “What?”
Emma barely paused to catch her breath. “My cousin—the one with the fashion rooms in Mayfair—she heard. Everyone has. She suggests we can host the launch here, at Hawthorne House instead. We turn the ball into a showcase. A presentation.”
Lydia blinked at her. “Emma, the showroom is gone. The mannequins, the fittings, the signage—”
“Not all of it. The design sketches were in your satchel, weren’t they?”
Lydia nodded slowly. She hadn’t even thought of that.
“And the seamstresses we hired? Most of the bolts of fabric were still in off-site storage. The delivery warehouse. They’ve offered to work through the night. Every one of them.”
“Why?” Lydia asked softly. “Why would they do that?”
Emma stepped closer, gripping her arm. “Because your father treated his people with respect. Because your designs are good. Because you haven’t stopped fighting, and it’s contagious.”
Lydia swallowed hard. Her chest felt too tight for breath.
“I need to find Nicholas,” she whispered.
“I’ve already spoken to him,” Emma said, with a crooked smile. “He’s already giving orders to the staff. Charlotte’s writing invitations. Sebastian is charming the printers into rushing a new batch of programs. It’s madness. Glorious, glorious madness.”
Lydia could hardly move. She felt the weight of the soot, the ash, the grief, and beneath it, like a heartbeat under rubble, something fierce and bright.
***
The rest of the night blurred.
Seamstresses arrived in droves. Someone wheeled in dress forms and unpacked untouched fabric.
The scent of fresh starch and pressed linen overtook the smoke that had clung to Lydia’s hair.
Charlotte found her in the drawing room and pressed a warm hand to hers before hurrying away again, arms full of ribbon samples.
Lydia paced. Directed. She didn’t sit, didn’t eat. Her body moved on memory and adrenaline.
Hawthorne House had never seen such chaos. Or such purpose.
Seamstresses darted between tables and dress forms, ribbons trailing behind them like streamers in a storm. A young boy hauled in extra candles. Someone had spilled a box of pearl buttons near the west wall, and they scattered like stardust across the floor.
Lydia barely noticed. Her hands were deep in a half-finished gown, pale silk and midnight tulle. One of the women, Mara, had dropped her needle and muttered something about her fingers going numb.
“Here,” Lydia said, kneeling without hesitation. “Let me finish this seam. Take a minute. Drink something.”
Mara blinked at her. “Your Grace, you shouldn’t—”
“I can and I will.” Lydia threaded the needle with practiced ease and bent over the hem, stitching swiftly and cleanly, her knuckles dusted with chalk and starch. “This is what I was trained for. And if I don’t help, this gown won’t be ready for the display tomorrow.”
Mara stared at her a moment longer, then wordlessly reached for the tea Emma had brought in.
Across the ballroom, Charlotte stood beside a dress form, holding up two sashes for a footman and looking near tears.
“Gold or silver?” she asked, turning to Lydia.