Page 89 of The Lady's Last Mistake
They’d heard of the courtship’s end, of course. All ofLondon had. She’d avoided reading the gossip columns but when asked, Ruth confirmed it had been reported upon.
“They’re speculating you cried off when you caught him with his mistress,” Ruth had told her. Cassie’s insides had felt as if they were imploding, crushing her from within. He would go to that club on Bond Street now. To Miss Devereaux, no doubt. He would carry on and forget Cassie, and she would have to find a way to live with it.
She would simply do what she had before. She’d throw herself into Hope House—thenewHope House, funded almost entirely by Madame Archambeau and Miss Stone. Elyse had come to Grosvenor Square for tea, as planned, and together, they’d drawn up plans to remake the safe house into a free lying-in hospital and school for women. Madame Archambeau had mentioned a building in Stepney that she owned, and with her additional funds, they could hire a team of security. Elyse had taken their plans back to the benefactress and she’d sent a note to Cassie with the good news—they were to visit the Stepney building at the first of the year.
If she moved forward with Elyse and Madame Archambeau, she would need to do so openly. Honestly. Without a doubt, she would be ostracized from society. Perhaps even from her own brother’s home. It was a risk she was willing to accept.
“Toby, get your sister a sherry,” Genie said as she led Cassie to a seat on the divan.
“I’m fine,” Cassie tried to say, but she had to admit, she didn’t sound fine. Her voice shook.
“That bloody blackguard. I knew he was no good,” Michael said. “I’m sorry, Neatham, I know he’s your friend,but even you must admit now that Thornton wasn’t suitable for my sister.”
Hugh didn’t respond to the duke. He wouldn’t denigrate his friend, nor could he argue against Michael’s opinion.
“This isn’t about Lord Thornton,” Cassie said, waving aside the sherry Tobias had brought her. She jumped up from the divan. “I have something to tell you. All of you. And I’m sorry to ruin the night, I planned to wait until after dinner, but honestly, there’s no good time to do it. I can’t put it off any longer.”
She closed her eyes. Looking at them would make it so much more difficult. All the practiced confessions and finessed words fled her mind, and she heard herself blurting: “I’ve been operating a home for unwed pregnant women in the East End for a year and using my pin money to fund it.”
A handful of protracted beats of silence later, she peeked out at the room. Mouths gaped. Eyes blinked owlishly. Michael seemed to have turned into a statue, his loose jaw hanging open in a most unflattering expression.
“You’reHope House.” Audrey’s whisper severed the stunned quiet. “That is why you didn’t need me to look into it for Isabel.”
“Who is Isabel?” Genie asked.
“It doesn’t matter who Isabel is,” Michael said, breaking from his stony mold. “What do you mean you’ve been running a…a home for…My God, Cassie! The East End?”
Genie swiped the glass of sherry from Tobias’s hand and brought it to her husband, who had collapsed backward into a chair. She ordered him to drink. He did, tossing it back in a single gulp.
“I think it does matter who Isabel is,” Hugh said fromwhere he was standing behind Audrey’s chair. “Unless I’m mistaken, she’s the very sort of woman Cassie has been helping at this secret home.”
He implored her with a wrinkled brow to speak up for herself. She nodded, the motion jerky with her muscles so tight with nerves. “Yes. Isabel found herself compromised and the man responsible was cruel. She had no one, no family to care for her, no one to turn to for help. But then she heard of a safe place.”
“And you took her in?” Michael asked. “Youhidher?”
“Her and many more like her, yes,” she said, exhaling shakily. “The home is for any woman wishing to have their child in private.”
“But you’re no midwife,” Tobias exclaimed, appearing even more boggled than Michael. “How did you even come to have this…this radical idea?”
Audrey cleared her throat. “Sir, would you please take Catherine to the kitchens? I’m sure Mrs. Comstock wouldn’t mind.”
The young man scowled at the dismissal. “Things were just getting interesting,” he grumbled, but took Catherine’s hand and did as he was asked. Genie dismissed the footman and maid from the room, too. As soon as they had gone, Cassie turned to her younger brother.
“Toby, there are things you don’t know?—”
She was cut off by the butler knocking on the closed drawing room door.
“What is it, Barton?” Michael snapped. The butler entered and bowed at the neck.
“Your Grace, a visitor. Lord Thornton. Are you in?”
Numbness stole over Cassie from crown to foot as Michael bellowed, “No, we are not in!”
But as Barton turned to deliver the response, Grant shoved past him, into the room.
“You’re rather loud for not being in, Fournier.” Grant’s eyes immediately found and hinged onto Cassie. Her lungs drained of oxygen as she stared at him, her eyes drinking him in. What was he doing here?
“What the devil, Thornton?” Michael lunged to his feet. “How dare you intrude into our home uninvited, and after what you’ve done?”
