Page 51 of Tempting the Reclusive Duke
The poet had been writing about a different kind of love, a different kind of torment, but the sentiment felt painfully apt. She couldn't live with the memory of what she'd had with Adrian, but she couldn't seem to live without it either. And poor Theodore, offering her escape from this limbo, deserved better than to be someone's safe harbor from storms of the heart.
She folded the unfinished letter and put it away. Tomorrow she would decide. Tonight, she would allow herself one more evening of uncertainty, balanced between the comfortable future Theodore offered and the impossible past her heart couldn't quite release.
The fire died to embers as she sat in the gathering darkness, a woman caught between two worlds, one of safety and scholarship, the other of passion and pain, knowing that whichever she chose would define not just her future but the person she would become.
In the end, perhaps that was the real question: not which man to choose, but which version of herself she wanted to be. The scholar who found contentmentin books and intellectual partnership? Or the woman who'd tasted passion and couldn't settle for less, even if it meant spending her life alone?
The night offered no answers, only the distant sound of carriage wheels on cobblestones and the whisper of wind against windows. Somewhere, a clock chimed midnight, marking the end of one day and the beginning of another.
Tomorrow, she would choose.
Tonight, she simply sat with the weight of possibility, heavy as any ancient tome, and tried to read her own heart as carefully as she'd ever parsed any classical text.
But hearts, she was learning, were written in a language far more complex than Greek or Latin, and sometimes even the most dedicated scholar had to admit when translation failed.
Chapter 15
"'It is a truth universally acknowledged that a ruined woman in possession of a scandal must be in want of social exile."
Eveline muttered these words as she stood at the entrance to Lady Carlisle's ballroom, her stomach performing acrobatics that would have impressed the performers at Astley's Amphitheatre. The golden light spilling from the doorway seemed less like welcome and more like the flames of social purgatory.
"Cease your dramatics," Harriet commanded, though her grip on Eveline's arm suggested she too felt the weight of what they were about to face. "You've confronted Latin texts that would make grown men weep. Surely you can manage a ballroom full of gossips."
"Latin texts don't whisper behind their fans about one's moral failings," Eveline replied, smoothing the rose silk of her gown with trembling fingers. The dress had been her mother's choice for her last Season, before she'd given up on making a match, before the position at Everleigh Manor, before everything had gone so spectacularly wrong. "Nor do they cut one dead in public view."
"No, but they do contain far more substance than anything you'll encounter in that ballroom." Harriet's tone brooked no argument. "One evening, Eveline. Show them you haven't been broken by their whispers."
The footman at the door announced them with perfect diction that seemed to echo through the sudden hush that fell over the nearest conversations. "Miss Fairweather. Miss Whitcombe."
The effect was immediate and devastating. Like ripples in a pond, silence spread outward from their position, conversations dying mid-sentence as heads turned with the precision of a well-drilled regiment. Fans lifted to hide mouths that whispered words just loud enough to be overheard.
"...the audacity..."
"...that creature who entrapped poor Everleigh..."
"...heard she practically threw herself..."
"...spent the entire night doing heaven knows what..."
Each word was a barb, carefully aimed to wound while maintaining the pretense of private discourse. Eveline kept her chin high and her expression serenethrough sheer force of will, though she felt each whisper like a physical blow.
They progressed through the ballroom with agonizing slowness, the crowd parting before them not out of respect but from a desire to avoid contamination by association. Ladies who had once smiled at her in passing now turned their backs with theatrical precision. Gentlemen who had partnered her in country dances suddenly found urgent business elsewhere.
"The plants are particularly fine this evening," Eveline observed with false brightness as they took refuge near a cluster of potted plants at the edge of the room. "I've always admired Lady Carlisle's dedication to horticulture."
"Eveline..."
"Did you know that the fashion for palm trees in ballrooms originated with the Prince Regent? Apparently, he wished to recreate the atmosphere of his Pavilion at Brighton. Though I suspect these particular specimens have witnessed less scandalous behaviour than their royal counterparts."
"You're babbling."
"I'm deflecting. There's a distinct difference." Eveline accepted a glass of champagne from a passing footman who managed to serve her while somehow conveying disapproval through the angle of his silver tray. "If I focus on botanical history, I'm less likely to notice that I've become a social pariah."
The orchestra struck up a cotillion, and couples moved onto the dance floor with the easy grace of those secure in their social standing. Eveline watched them with the detachment of an anthropologist observing a foreign tribe—interesting in theory, but ultimately incomprehensible in their rituals and customs.
"Miss Fairweather." A young gentleman materialized before them, his cravat so elaborate it threatened to strangle him with its own ambition. "Might I have the honour of this dance?"
Harriet's smile could have frozen the Thames. "I thank you for the compliment, Mr. Ashworth, but I am not dancing this evening."
