Page 99 of Rules for a Bastard Lord
“Mr. Hallowsby, I hadn’t realized you were still here. Goodness, but it’s well past teatime now, and we have so much to do before the Season starts.”
He stepped back, his heart wrenching as he did. “I was just taking my leave.”
Eleanor wasn’t a fool. “Forgive me for being blunt, but you know—”
“I cannot be associated with Miss Ballenger. I know.”
She sighed. “I’m truly sorry Bram. You would have made an excellent duke.”
The knife in his gut twisted sharply. If only he’d been legitimate instead of a bastard, perpetually dancing at the edge of society. Then she would allow him in. And he could court Bluebell.
Rather than soothe him, her words churned his resentment.
If only.
He turned away, though bitterness clung to his words. “I bid you both good day.”
Then he headed for the door. Seelye was there with Bram’s hat and coat in hand. A moment later, he was outside the residence, the door shutting with a ponderous thud.
Outside.
Unworthy.
Bastard.
He’d never hated his father more.
Chapter Nineteen
Everyone thinks a bastard is devious. It is nothing compared to what a legitimate heir will do when cornered. But that is what makes society sofascinating.
Maybelle was fuming.In a day filled with every feeling she’d ever thought to experience, everything now settled into one strong emotion: seething fury.
“I do not understand why you insist on treating me as an ignorant girl!” She planted her hands on her hips and glared at her grandmother and Eleanor.
It was early evening on the day they’d forced her grandparents to recognize her. She was in the parlor with Eleanor and her grandmother to plan her coming Season. Or so they’d claimed. Instead, the two women had “instructed her”—for four hours—on appropriate behavior. She’d tolerated it at first, but when they began to discuss gentlemen, they stressed over and over that Mr. Hallowsby was definitelynot suitable. And that was when she lost her temper.
But far from being upset by her outburst, the women tut tutted at her as if she were an overwhelmed toddler.
“I know this is difficult to understand,” said one.
“It is all happening so fast, I can scarce credit it,” said the other.
“But you must trust us to know what’s best.”
“Indeed, I cannot think of two women more able to steer you through the social waters than us.”
“I quite agree.”
“Yes, definitely.”
Maybelle huffed out a breath and wished she could loosen her damned corset. “You forget,” she said coldly, “that I was reared under the daily shadow of illegitimacy.” Her grandmother flinched, and Eleanor compressed her lips, but Maybelle did not soften her tone. “I knew from the earliest age that I must act more correct, more proper, and more stifled than anyone else just to maintain our dubious place in the village.”
“But a village in Hull is not London.”
“No,” Maybelle snapped. “I suspect it is harder to change people’s minds up there.”
Her grandmother reached out a comforting hand. Maybelle could see the lady’s age spots and slight tremor. She knew the thin skin and the frail bones of age. So she did not throw off the condescending pat.
