Page 10 of The Taming of the Duke
A footman stood beside the doors and raised an eyebrow as she approached.
“It’s very cold outside tonight, Miss,” he said. “It’s been snowing.”
“And?” Catherine cringed at the sharpness in her voice, but after an evening in the company of men, she’d had her fill of being contradicted and countermanded.
He pulled open the doors, bowed as she stepped through, then closed them behind her.
The cold air hit her like a wall, but she took comfort in its freshness and walked across the terrace, her footsteps crunching in the snow. No doubt Papa would remark on her soaked slippers, but he’d be admonishing her anyway tonight. One more transgression wouldn’t make a difference to the tirade of admonishments she was expecting in the carriage home.
She drew her shawl around herself and looked out over the garden. The moon hung low in the cloudless sky, casting a soft blue glaze over the landscape. Despite the strains of music and laughter filtering through the terrace doors, the snow had cast a blanket of silence across the world—a silence she sought solace in.
Why was it that people always saw a need to fill silence with incessant chatter and inane remarks? There was something to be said for a companion who was comfortable enough in one’s presence to just let the silencebe.
A screech echoed in the distance. An owl, most likely, hunting for prey. Yet another predator—but the owl sought its quarry in order to survive. The predators inside the ballroom tonight relished the sport of it.
She shivered—not from the cold, but from the memory of another night, almost ten years ago. Then, she’d been a wide-eyed rabbit, unwittingly following the wolf toward his lair. And though she hadn’t been devoured, in every other sense, her innocence had been lost—replaced by an understanding of the world ruled by men who used women for their own ends.
At all costs, Blanche must be protected from such a fate. Only a man worthy of trust would be good enough for her—if such a man existed.
The doors creaked open again, and music and laughter filtered through the air.
Dear Lord—could she not be given a moment’s peace? Lord Francis had been ogling her all evening—not due to her looks or her dowry which, as most men pointed out, were both non-existent, but because she was the only woman in the room without a single dance partner, and therefore, in the eyes of most men, the most desperate.
But when she turned to face the newcomer, it wasn’t Lord Francis.
It was Papa.
He approached her, the moonlight throwing shadows across the angular planes of his face. Cold blue eyes glittered with disapproval—so unlike the sapphire gaze of another that had captivated her only moments before.
“I see you’re not dancing, Catherine, but I trust youhavedanced tonight and not spent the entire evening sitting in a chair?”
“Didn’t you spend the entire evening in the gaming room?” she retorted.
He moved toward her with a speed that belied his thin frame, and she winced as a bony hand caught her arm, and his cadaverous fingers tightened their grip.
“Shrewish creature!” he hissed, and her stomach churned at the odor of stale brandy and cigar smoke. “Always such a disappointment.”
“Because I was born a girl?”
“Yes—and because you killed my son!”
The arrow hit home, and she curled her hands into fists to stem the memory—Mama’s screams from behind her bedchamber door, pleading for her unborn child, while Catherine kneeled on the floor outside her chamber, praying that her beloved parent would be spared.
But her prayers had gone unanswered.
Early pregnancy brought about by a fall, the doctor had said. A fall which had occurred when Mama returned from a ride, and Catherine, rushing out to greet her, had spooked her horse.
“And what of Mama?” she asked.
He let out a snort of derision, and muttered something under his breath, which sounded very much like the words she’d heard eighteen years ago when the doctor had tried to express his condolences.
Wives can easily be replaced.
She had no wish to be a replaceable commodity.
“If you’re not dancing, then I see no need to remain here tonight,” he said. “Go and send for the carriage.”
She glanced up and met his gaze—the sour expression of a man, old before his time, made bitter through loss. But the loss of two wives meant nothing to him. Papa’s bitterness arose from the loss of his baby son, and, most likely, the losses sustained tonight at the card tables. An early exit from a party was his strategy for avoiding creditors.
