Page 66 of Married to a Scandalous Spinster
Wyatt stepped close to Miss Henford, looming over her threateningly. “Here is what you are going to do,” he said to her, his voice low and dark. “You are going to go straight to Lord Tarver and return every penny you had that poor boy steal from him. And the brooch too. And you had best pray he chooses not to pursue the matter with the constable.”
Miss Henford swallowed visibly.
“And you will not come anywhere near me or my wife—or her family—again. Do I make myself clear?”
Miss Henford nodded, cowering under the bulk of the Duke. “Yes, Your Grace.”
“Good.” Wyatt stared her down. “Now I am not going to ask you again. Get. Out. Of. My. House.”
Miss Henford turned without another word and raced down the staircase. Her footsteps echoed as they tapped rhythmically against the marble.
“I am so sorry, Your Graces,” Miss Henford's mother squeaked behind them. She looked like a sorry figure with her disheveled hair and smudged makeup, her gown laced too loosely and hanging crooked on her shoulders.
Wyatt gave her little more than a passing glance. “You can get out of my house too.” He turned to Lord Anderson. “Both of you.”
The Baron, who was entangling himself in his cravat, put a hand to Wyatt's shoulder. “Come on, Larsen,” he said, chuckling humorlessly, “don't be like that. You know?—”
“I told you to leave,” Wyatt said tautly. “Now.”
The forced grin disappeared from the Baron's face and he swallowed visibly. “As you wish,” he said. Then he hurried down the staircase after his lover.
For a moment, Gemma stood silently beside her husband, listening to their footsteps disappear. What would he do now, she wondered? What was he thinking? He reached for her hand, but she pulled away almost on instinct.
“Gemma,” he began. “I?—”
“I do not wish to hear it,” she snapped. She turned on her heel and began to march back towards her bedchamber.
“Where are you going?” Wyatt called after her. “The guests…”
“I do not care a scrap about the guests,” Gemma hissed. “My father is very ill. And I have no intention of not going to him.”
“You cannot just leave in the middle of our own ball,” said Wyatt, but his words sounded weary, as though his heart was no longer in it.
Gemma whirled around and gave him an icy smile. “Do not think anything of it, Your Grace. I'm sure thetonwould expect nothing less from such a scandalous lady as the Duchess of Larsen.”
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Gemma sat in the carriage beside her sister and grandmother, her forehead pressed to the cool glass of the window. Condensation was beading on the glass, and it felt damp against her skin. Her hands were clasped tightly in her lap. Squeezing her fingers together almost painfully helped keep her thoughts from careening off into dark places.
“Gemma, dear, this is highly inappropriate,” said the Dowager Marchioness, for at least the fifth time. “When I told you about your father, I did not expect you to come flying out of the house in the middle of your own festivities.”
“Grandmother.” Gemma's voice came out sharper than she intended. “That is enough. I told you, I have made my decision.”
The Dowager Marchioness pressed her lips into a thin line. “I see,” she said. Her expression conveyed the knowledge that she would acquiesce to her granddaughter on account of her lofty title—but that she did not have to like it. Gemma gave her apologetic eyes. She had never intended to pull rank on her own grandmother. But if it put an end to this infuriatingly circular conversation, then so be it.
Beside her, Veronica reached over and pressed a hand to Gemma's wrist. “Father has the best physicians,” she assured her. “The money His Grace sent us made sure of that.”
At the mention of her husband, something clenched in Gemma's chest like a fist. The tears she had been wrestling with all evening welled up behind her eyes again.
Tonight, she and Wyatt were supposed to spend the night in each other's arms. Tonight, she had planned to confess her love for him. Tonight was supposed to be the night they put an end to the childish games they had been playing with their emotions; put an end to hiding their true feelings from one another. And now? Now she had discovered that her husband did not trust her an inch. And that he would willingly wash his hands of her shameful family. She had learned far more about his true feelings than she had ever wished to know.
“That's right,” the Dowager Marchioness said, a forced brightness in her voice. “Your father does have the best physicians. And I am sure His Grace is doing all he can to put this right.”
At her grandmother's words, Gemma's tears spilled. She swiped at them hurriedly, but not before the Dowager Marchioness caught sight of them. “Gemma?” she said tentatively. “The Duke is doing all he can to fix this, is he not?”
Gemma sniffed. Telling her family about Wyatt's refusal to help them hurt almost as much as hearing the news from him in the first place. She shook her head, unable to meet her grandmother's eye. “He says he will not help us, Grandmother,” she sniffed. “He says he will not taint his family's name any further by trying to protect Father.” The words were difficult to get out.
“What?” The Dowager Marchioness's voice wavered slightly—whether with fear or anger, Gemma could not quite determine. “But you told me it was that dreadful Miss Henford behind all this. Surely His Grace will not let your father take the blame for the theft when he knows he is innocent!”
