Chapter 18
“It would seem the Auteberrys are throwing another party,” Lottie said one morning over breakfast, looking down at a piece of paper she was holding in her hand.
“I will not be attending,” Mya said. It had been a week since the incident and the pain was still ripe like a fresh wound.
“Nor, I think, will I.” Eleanora set an egg into the egg cup beside her plate and cracked the shell with a flick of her spoon. “Tell them that we have a previous engagement. Surely they cannot imagine that we would actually wish to be there, after what was done to Mya?”
“I am sure that Blanche has some sort of hand in this.” Lottie’s lips pressed flat together, her expression a study in disapproval. “It is likely she has orchestrated the whole thing in an attempt to upset Mya.”
“I don’t know why she’d need to,” Mya said, picking at her toast without actually eating any of it. “She already has Kayden.”
“I am not so certain about that,” Lottie said.
Mya turned to look at her, not sure what the comment was supposed to mean. Lottie lifted her gaze from the bowl of yogurt in front of her to meet Mya's.
“I have not heard anything of them being seen together. In fact, Kayden has hardly been seen at all since the day you saw them together.”
He had tried to come by the house, but this time there had been no letting him in, and if there were flowers Mya hadn't been told. She didn't care if he brought an entire greenhouse worth; she wasn't going to forgive him. He didn't deserve it.
“So Kayden is moping,” Mya said, stabbing a sausage with her fork. “I don't see what that changes.”
“There is no word that Kayden and Miss Auteberry are any sort of item,” Lottie said.
“I find that rather interesting, considering that she was supposed to be the more socially acceptable choice. Why would he not flaunt her? It is not as though he took you out. He would not have to explain why he had one girl on his arm one day and the next appeared with another.”
That was true. The only time she had gone anywhere with Kayden that was not one of the back fields was when they had gone to the theater, and that hadn't been a social outing of the sort that he would take a woman he actually wished to be seen with.
It had been one of the smaller playhouses, dark, and not the sort of place that attracted those accustomed to the social circles Mya had been traveling in since she came to live with Lottie and Ella.
“So he didn't take me out, and he doesn't take her out. Maybe he's just a terrible suitor,” Mya suggested. “Although if that’s the case, I don’t know what he sees in Blanche. She will not be providing anything that he was getting from me, I'm quite sure.”
Eleanora laughed.
“So if that is the case,” Lottie said, “why has he not made his move with her?
Because the only advantage he receives from a marriage with Miss Auteberry is her family's social clout to improve his own standing. Even that is somewhat dubious. He has a title of his own, and enough land and wealth that he will never need to worry about money. So what is the allure?”
“Maybe he just likes her,” Mya said glumly. “That is something that happens sometimes between people, I've been told.”
“If he was with her just because he chose to be, would he not be taking her out in public to show her off?” Eleanora asked. “That is what I would expect, unless there was some secret they were keeping.”
“Maybe he did receive something from her.” Lottie took a sip of tea. “Or gave something to her, if you take my meaning.”
“You think she's pregnant and that's why they're not going out in public?” Mya didn't even want to think about that.
She stabbed the sausage again, ripping off a piece and taking a bite that didn't taste like anything except frustrated disappointment.
“I don't think she is. And I don't understand it. He wanted me. I know he did. And we—”
She cut herself off. They had been over and over his interactions with her and how they meant he felt. Mya wasn't in the mood to rehash them.
“Anyway. I do not honestly see why we're having this discussion. None of it matters. We're not going to a party hosted by the Auteberrys, and Kayden can do whatever he pleases so long as it doesn't involve me.”
“I suppose I just have a difficult time letting things go,” Lottie said, lifting one shoulder and letting it fall again in a shrug. “I like to know what is going on, and why people do what they do.”
“So go ask Kayden why he's an arse. I don't care, though.
And I don't want to hear about what he has to say.” Mya stood, leaving her hardly touched plate behind, and went back to her room.
Behind her, as she left, she could hear a discussion starting that undoubtedly had something to do with her and Kayden.
Let them talk about it. None of it mattered to her. She had other things to do.
***
It was raining the day after they received the invitation to the Auteberrys’ ball.
Mya looked out at the gray drizzle and sighed.
It perfectly matched her mood, but the rain wouldn't be much of a boon for waking.
She had hoped to get out of the house, and away from the looks that Lottie and Ella were still occasionally exchanging over her head, like they were worried about her but weren't quite sure how to approach the issue.
In the end, Mya decided a little rain had never done much harm, and dressed up in some of her warmer things to go walk in it anyway. At least it would give her something to do
The coat she wore kept the worst of the water off her, and Mya found she actually enjoyed wandering through the field all full of fog and water falling from the sky.
There was a deeper scent to the heather, and the cool breeze was refreshing.
Somewhere, there were frogs croaking softly, and Mya thought of the pond where she and Kayden had gone that day they rode up into the hills.
He had been so attentive to her there. Had looked at her as though she was the most beautiful thing he had ever seen, touched her as though she were something precious.
How could he go from that to what he had done when she had walked in on him and Miss Auteberry?
Had it all been an act, or had something somehow changed between them that she wasn't aware of?
Mya sighed, and dipped her head a little lower as the rain fell heavier, watching the toes of her boots move through the wet grass.
She was glad she had worn the high ones, though the hem of her skirt was going to be soaked.
She gathered up a little of it in each hand and tried to keep it from the worst of the mud.
“Mya?”
She stopped in her tracks. Kayden was not supposed to be there. It was not his land, and Lottie and Ella had told him in no uncertain terms that he was to keep off theirs. Mya had seen with her own eyes the message that they sent.
“Go away,” she said, keeping her eyes on the ground. She started walking again.
“Mya, please. I just want to talk to you.”
“And yet, I have no wish to speak to you. Go home, Kayden.”
“I didn't kiss her!”
Slowly, Mya turned around to face him. “What was that?”
Kayden, who was standing in front of her not wearing any sort of protection from the rain at all, leaned closer, his eyes pleading. “I didn't kiss Miss Auteberry, Mya. I know what you think you saw, but she kissed me, not the other way around. And I pushed her off.”
Mya laughed bitterly. “Do you really think I am going to fall for that lie? It is as old as time. And I was standing right there. You didn't push her off. And you didn't even speak to me. If you didn't kiss her, why didn't you come after me when I walked away?”
“My hand was on her arm to shove her away. She was clinging to me like a limpet!”
“Why don't you tell this story to someone who cares?” Mya asked, turning away to continue on her walk.
Kayden's hand on her arm stopped her. It was gentle, not the clutching desperation visible in Blanche's touch when she had grabbed Kayden after the kiss.
“I swear, Mya. I didn't kiss her. I didn't want to. You are the only woman that I want. Ever. Always.”
She wrenched her arm out of his hold. “Then why didn't you come after me when I left? You just let her follow and berate me, tell me how poor and worthless I was and how I was no good for you? If you really cared, you would’ve stopped her.
If you truly cared, Kayden, you would have tried to stop me. But you didn't.”
“I did try to come after you,” Kayden said. “Her maid came up out of nowhere and grabbed me, babbling about some kind of emergency with the stable and one of my servants. By the time I had been dragged out to see that nothing was actually wrong, you were back home, and Lottie wouldn't let me in.”
“Lottie wouldn't let you in because I asked her not to. Because you're an ass, and I didn't want to see you.”
But the words didn't hold the venom of her earlier accusations.
Had Kayden truly tried to come after her?
If he had, if he was telling the truth, that meant Blanche and her maid must have somehow planned the whole thing.
Had one of them seen her coming up the walk?
She supposed there were enough rumors about her and Kayden by now that someone must have figured out what was going on, and it had gone back to Blanche.
“How can I be sure you're telling the truth?”
Kayden took a step forward, obviously encouraged by the fact that she was even willing to consider listening to him.
As she watched, he went to one knee in the wet grass, likely completely ruining his suit.
His hair was plastered to his head, dripping down into his eyes.
He reached out, slowly enough that she could have pulled away if she had wanted to.
“Mya,” he said when her hands were held in his. “You are everything that I desire.”
Her mouth twisted. “Truly? This sort of flowery garbage, Kayden? I thought you were better than this.”
“Would you just listen to me? I am trying to say something to you here, Mya.”
Despite herself, Mya felt one corner of her mouth trying to twitch upward into a smile at the look on his face. She waved a silent “go on” in his direction.
“I am going to say something,” he repeated.
“And I don’t care how ridiculous or flowery it is.
Nothing in this world has ever made me as happy as you do, Mya.
And I do not care if I have to wait a year.
Or ten years. Or twenty. I do not care if it takes a hundred.
I will wait until you are ready to have me again, because I would rather have you laughing at me than another woman fawning for my approval.
You have won me utterly, and there is no time or place in which I am not ardently and desperately yours.
” His eyes locked with her own. “I would give you the universe entire were it mine to give, but if you will settle for just myself, I will be the most blessed man in all of history.”
Mya stared down at him. He was still kneeling there, looking utterly pathetic in the rain. She thought of the nights they had spent together, and the way that his hands felt on her skin. The way that he had always treated her as though she mattered. The laughter they had shared.
“You swear to me that you do not want Blanche?” Her voice trembled a little on the words.
“I swear it,” Kayden said. “On everything that has ever been dear to me.”
Giddy laughter bubbled up in Mya's chest and overflowed. Laughing, she lifted Kayden to his feet, and then he was there, crowding into her space and claiming her mouth with his own. Kissing her until neither of them were breathing anything but the other.