Page 85 of A Duchess Bound
Elias searched her face for a moment longer, but when she did not offer anything further, he sighed and nodded reluctantly. “As you wish, my dear sister.”
“Thank you.”
“Well. Enjoy the evening.”
He left her and joined his friends. Gerard was not among them.
With a sigh, Dorothy drifted to the side of the ballroom, content to be a wallflower for the evening. As much as she might have welcomed some respite from being alone with her thoughts,Dorothy could not muster the enthusiasm to converse with anyone, much less to try to appear as though she desired a dance.
And Gerard had probably spent the handful of days since their amorous congress without a shred of guilt. In all likelihood, the man had not even thought of her.
Bridget had elected to dance with that same dark-haired man, whom Dorothy had once warned her away from, and as if basking in Dorothy’s potential displeasure, Bridget cast her sister a sly, brazen look.
Are you truly going to let me have my freedom?Bridget seemed to ask.
Dorothy offered nothing.
Seeming satisfied, Bridget turned her head and said something to the young man, which made him laugh. Dorothy wanted that?—
The intimacy. The closeness.
Dorothy closed her eyes, too aware of the warmth threatening to gather in her core. She must remember that she did not care for him any longer, and it was for the best that she not care! If they had continued with their dalliance, he would have inevitably ruined her.
“I see that you have elected to become a wallflower for the evening,” Lady Hargrave said, joining her.
Dorothy forced a smile. “Is that startling for a spinster?”
“I suppose not.”
An uneasy silence fell between them, during which Dorothy’s fingers itched to fidget with her skirts. She could not readily discern if Lady Hargrave had some ulterior motivation for choosing to speak to her or if the lady was merely being a dutiful hostess.
“I imagine it must be difficult,” Lady Hargrave said gingerly, “looking after your sisters as you have. It is quite noble of you. Selfless.”
Dorothy blinked, a fissure of discomfort stirring within her. “That is kind of you, but any other woman would have done the same.”
“No, I do not believe any woman would have,” Lady Hargrave said. “You are something special.”
Dorothy let out a little, disbelieving laugh. It seemed as though everyone wanted to have intimate conversations with her, and it was terribly awkward for it to happen at such a time when she wanted, more than anything else, to be left alone!
“Maybe my behavior seems as though it is something to be admired by others,” Dorothy said at last. “But I have never imagined that I would be anything other than a spinster?—”
That was untrue, though. Gerard had ruined her satisfaction with that dream. He had shown her pleasure that she had never before known or imagined.
“—and a nurturing woman, who might raise them in our mother’s stead.”
But Bridget’s fury loomed large in Dorothy’s mind. She wasnotthe mother to either of her sisters, and at least one of them had found her affection unwelcome.
Dorothy inhaled with a sense of immense, heavy dread. It was as if she did not know who or what she was anymore. No longer was she the nurturing spinster who would never know pleasure or love, for she had tasted both of those. And now?—
Now, they were gone. She was ruined, even if no one knew it.
She could still be a spinster, but that path no longer held the allure it once had.
She was not the maternal figure that she had always hoped she would be, the one who was beyond reproach. Dorothy had failed to secure a match for Catherine, and Bridget had chastised her for interfering so much. A lump rose in Dorothy’s throat as allthose thoughts came mercilessly careening to the forefront of her mind.
“I believe I shall have some lemonade.” Dorothy’s own voice sounded as though it was coming from a continent away. “I am quite parched, my lady.”
She left before Lady Hargrave could say anything further. When Dorothy reached the table laden with refreshments, her hand trembled around the glass.
