Page 49 of A Lady's Beloved Novelist
James
Chapter 21
Andrea sighed and stared up at the ceiling. She knew she was making a mistake in being with Cecil, that much had become apparent much quicker than she had been anticipating. He was drinking more and more. Not only that, but he was being rude to her parents.
She felt embarrassed that they were looking to her for an explanation as to why this man was being so rude to them. Cecil was relentless and appeared to come from an entirely different upbringing to what Andrea had been through.
She grimaced at the thought of marrying him and was suddenly incredibly glad that she had pushed the date of the wedding off into the distance. Andrea wanted nothing more than to curl up in a ball and forget about the entire thing.
A knock at her door caused her to sit up quickly. The morning was beginning to mature, and she should already be up and dressed.
“Sorry to disturb you, my lady. Your aunt is here and insisted on coming up,” one of the maids spoke from her doorway.
“That is all right, she can come in.” Andrea nodded.
Bella entered shortly afterwards, her face unreadable and her hands folded in the material of her gown.
“Good morning, Aunt Bella,” Andrea said with a smile on her face as the maid left them alone.
“Good morning,” Bella said, deciding to take a seat at her vanity. “I come with a delivery.”
Andrea’s eyes instantly lit up as she sat forward.
“He has written back to me already?”
“Yes.” Bella nodded. “And my life has been reduced to that of a postman.”
She knew her aunt was being dramatic. Her mother had told her many stories of Bella’s strong will when she was younger; if she did not want to do something, she would not be convinced of it.
“Thank you, I know that we both appreciate that you are doing this,” Andrea added to show her thanks.
Bella reached one hand into her sleeve before retrieving the small letter. “Has it all been positive thus far?”
“It has. I understand him much better now, and it is nice to know that he did not simply lose interest in me.”
“Good men like him rarely do. They would at least have the decency to tell you in person if they did anyway,” Bella explained.
Andrea thought about the man she was supposed to marry. She imagined Cecil being the kind of coward who would not stick around if he grew bored. She also could not imagine him waiting to give her a decent explanation.
“How is your engagement going?” her aunt asked.
“Not very well,” Andrea admitted, turning up her nose. “I think I might be making a big mistake. Especially now that James is writing to me once more.”
“He is really so bad?”
“Even my parents have had to tell him that his behaviour at times is not acceptable,” Andrea explained. “It is embarrassing, but the man does not seem to care. He acts like a petulant child when someone chides him, but there are no other consequences for him.”
“And he has blackmailed the man that you would really rather be with,” Bella said whilst shaking her head.
“He tries to talk inappropriately to the maids too,” Andrea muttered. That was something that she was rather embarrassed about. She could not talk to Lily about these things without her coming out with something along the lines of ‘I told you so.’ But it felt good to voice her anxieties to her aunt.
“What do your parents think about all of this?”
“It is difficult to say. I think they can see that he is not the man we thought him to be, but he is also a fine match and they do not want me to become a spinster.”
“I imagine that they will not want you to start a scandal either if you were to leave the engagement,” her aunt said before pursing her lips for a moment. “That is something I happen to have a very vivid experience with. Though, I cannot say that I would recommend going down the route of starting a scandal.”
Andrea had heard patches of the story from her mother; her aunt had broken off an engagement to marry her uncle. At the time, it had been a large scandal, one that was only brought up more after her uncle’s sudden passing.
