Page 24 of Dropping the Ball

Alden rose a moment behind Bernadette. “You do not need to go,” he said, guessing at the real reason she wished to flee.

Bernadette met his eyes with a troubling combination of sadness and anger. “I believe I must,” she said. “These things cannot wait.”

As far as Alden was concerned, everything that did not make Bernadette happy could wait. It would have been rude of him to demand she stay only to continue to be tortured with Lady Gladys’s meanness, however. “I shall see you at supper, then,” he said, trying to smile.

Blessedly, Bernadette managed a small smile in return. “Good day to you,” she said with a perfect curtsy. She then turned to Lady Gladys and curtsied to her as well. “Good day, Lady Gladys. It was a pleasure to meet you again.”

Lady Gladys pretended that she could not return the kind words because she had just taken a bite of her meal. Bernadette did not wait for her to swallow. She sent Alden one final look, then marched off. Alden could have sworn that Egbert pokedhis head out of the top of Bernadette’s fichu and flickered his tongue, like a child blowing a raspberry.

“She is so horribly tiresome, Alden,” Lady Gladys said as Alden watched her go.

At the twin offenses of insulting Bernadette and using his given name without his leave had Alden snapping his glance to her. “I beg your pardon?” he asked as he resumed his seat.

Lady Gladys sent him a wry grin. “Come now, Alden. We have known each other for too long. I can see you are fond of Lady Bernadette, but you should put the woman out of your mind immediately.”

“I do not see how it is any business of yours,” Alden said with a frown, picking up his cutlery as if he would eat, but finding that he, too, did not have an appetite.

“It is every business of mine,” Lady Gladys said, looking surprised that he would suggest otherwise.

Alden could see the path she was taking and hurried to divert her from it.

“Our connection is in the past, my lady,” he said, overly formally. “You chose Edward, therefore you have no say over what I choose to do with my life now.”

“Perhaps I chose poorly,” Lady Gladys said, lowering her eyes and dropping her shoulders. “I should have been your wife, not Edward’s.”

Her confession would have meant more if everything about her stance and expression had not felt as hollow as a rotted log.

“Yes, well, as I have said, the past is entirely behind us. I’ve no wish to revisit it, only to move on,” Alden said.

To his surprise, Lady Gladys saw something different in his words than he’d intended. “Yes,” she said, reaching across the table for him once more. “I feel the same. We should put the past behind us, where it belongs, and continue on together as friends, as more than friends.”

A paradoxical sense of relief rushed through Alden. Lady Gladys had shown her cards, and now he could face the enemy directly.

“I have no wish to marry you, Lady Gladys,” he said, standing. He had no appetite anymore and no desire to continue pretending civility. “Your ulterior motives are too clear. It is my fortune you desire, not me, and I have no intention of marrying a fortune hunter.”

Lady Gladys’s expression turned steely, and she abandoned her luncheon and rose as well. “I do wish to marry you, I will admit it,” she said. “But to suggest I wish to do so for your fortune and not because of the intimacy we once shared is an insult, sir.”

Alden huffed out a breath, frustrated with the guilt he felt, whether he should or not. He was still convinced Lady Gladys was playacting in order to get what she wanted, and the drana was not finished yet.

“I loved you then,” she said, stepping away from the table, perhaps so that she might come closer to him. “I have never stopped loving you. Edward … Edward was not who I thought he was, and our marriage was a disappointment.”

Her false expression wavered, hinting at genuine grief. Alden narrowed his eyes for a moment when he saw it, wondering what Lady Gladys’s true emotions were.

A moment later, the act continued. “How can you begrudge me the chance to right the greatest wrong of my past by pursuing the man I love and should have chosen from the start?” Lady Gladys demanded.

Again, her words and appearance were perfect for the sentiments she expressed. Alden just didn’t think they were real.

“If you will excuse me, Lady Gladys,” he said, stepping away from the table and from her, “I, too, need to have a word with theforeman of the workers I’ve hired. You are more than welcome to remain and finish your luncheon, if you wish.”

“But, Alden–”

“Good day.”

Alden bowed then walked past Lady Gladys to the house. He was surprised that she did not reach out for him to anchor him to the spot where she wanted him, or that she didn’t call out to him as he walked away. He should have taken that as a good sign, but it felt more as if she was letting him go for the time being so that she could decide upon a more definitive way to nab him later.

Alden returned to the house with the intention of finding Bernadette and apologizing for Lady Gladys’s behavior. To his distress, she was not in the terrarium, where he expected her to be. She was not anywhere along the hallway where the workmen were busy tearing out the broken and faded parts of his house to replace them with new bits either.

He was prevented from searching the house further for her as the workmen actually did need his advice on a great many things. The entirety of his afternoon was taken up in consulting with one workman or another about everything from acquiring new carts to take away the rubbish that the improvements were creating to approving the fabric for new drapes in several of the guestrooms.

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