Chapter 26

CHAPTER 26

T he Duchess thought she might faint but knew that she needed to get ahold of herself before someone observed the scene, and her embarrassment was printed in her papers. Her hand pressed against her diaphragm as if she could put enough pressure to will herself to breathe normally again.

There, before her, was her husband. He had not noticed her, being some ways away from her, but he was smiling. He seldom smiled, and perhaps that was the worst part of all as he was speaking to a young lady—one Marina had never met and was unfamiliar with. She watched them for as long as she could bear—but a few seconds—then whirled around to face the other direction. There was very little time for her to decide on what to do.

She could not go over to him. If she did, she was sure to cause a scene. But if she did not, later, when they spoke of this at home, he would give any number of excuses that she knew not what she saw. Olivia was away, dancing, and Marina would not bring herself to ruin her sister's night with the wretched thoughts that now held captive her mind. So, Marina moved, slowly, leisurely, until she found a place to sit on a long ottoman, and she stared down at her hands while her mind worked.

It was not uncommon, she supposed, for a married man to be seen so publicly speaking to a young lady. Perhaps she was, somehow, his family. Perhaps she was the younger sister of a dear friend. But Marina dismissed this—the girl had not one chaperone in sight. Still, she pushed herself to think, there must be an explanation. Surely, surely , Phillip had more sense than to entertain an affair right in front of her face in front of the ton.

She could check if they were still chatting—perhaps she had asked for directions or mistaken him for someone else, and it was a brief encounter that Marina did not need to dwell on as she was. But she could not bring herself to look. The image of Phillip, who never smiled or laughed publicly, gazing at another woman the way she had just seen him doing had her stomach in knots. It disturbed her so much that she did not hear Emmanuel Hayward until the third time he addressed her.

"Your Grace? Are you quite well? You look horribly pale."

At last, her eyes flickered up and the Duke came into focus before her. She gasped lightly and pressed the back of her hand to her forehead, giving him a sheepish smile as she recovered. "I am, yes. My apologies."

"Might I get you anything? A glass of water?"

Marina studied him for a couple of seconds, intrigued again by the way he seemed to display genuine concern for her yet somehow seemed to be up to no good. "I am quite all right," she promised. "I believe that I have merely neglected to eat in my excitement."

"Excitement?"

Marina nodded. "I have not been to a ball in quite some time. I have busied myself watching the young couples dance and have not thought to find time for food or drink."

"Allow me. I will find you something and return in a moment."

Marina could not protest, for Emmanuel spoke to her one moment and was gone the next. She huffed, upset further at having been found by him. The night had begun so smoothly, but it now seemed as though the guests at this ball were determined to rip her and Phillip apart from one another with remarkable cruelty.

Nothing was going as she would have liked it to.

"Here you are, Your Grace. Please. Eat." Marina took the food and drink that Emmanuel handed her and thanked him, and then he sat beside her while she ate. After a few moments, he smiled and peered again into her face.

"Your color has returned. You are looking much better."

It was the first time that Marina caught the man in a lie outright. She did not need a mirror to know that she had not recovered, for a lack of food and drink were not her real problems. She wondered, bitterly, if a propensity for lies and deception was not a family trait.

"Thank you. It was incredibly kind of you to help."

"We are family, after all."

Marina hated the way he spoke this sentence, thick with sweetness like a tea that has entirely too much honey. She was able to keep her face composed only because she also told herself that her emotions were already heightened—she would not react well to interaction with anyone in this moment, least of all someone who looked so much like her husband. She very much wanted to glance in his direction and find out whether or not he was still engaged in conversation with the young girl, but she did not dare call Emmanuel's attention to them.

He seemed content to sit with her in amicable silence, something she knew to be out of his character, for a few minutes, but eventually, he broke the quietude, a move which very much reminded her, to her great chagrin, of Phillip.

"I hope that my nephew has been treating you well. Does he accompany you to the ball tonight?"

Marina smiled, sweetly. "I am here as my sister's chaperone," she answered, ignoring his question. She was desperate, sure, to know more about Phillip, but she did not wish to speak of him in that moment. Doing so would surely only upset her.

"Ah, yes. I have heard that Lady Olivia is the talk of the ton this season. Do you expect that she will return next season as a married woman or a young lady?"

Marina could not contain her expression as she looked upon Emmanuel, who looked not at her but out to the dance floor. It was wildly inappropriate for him to ask such a thing, and she could not fathom his reason for doing so.

"Only time will tell," she answered drily and stood from her place. "If you'll excuse me." She nodded her head in a curt display of respect, but before she could take her leave, she heard a familiar voice that sent a chill down her spine.

"Uncle."

Marina looked up to see Phillip approaching them. His eyes were aflame with fury, but it was not directed at her. She could see what was about to happen, and she was not the only one who had noticed. Marina's green eyes observed at least one or two onlookers unabashedly glancing in their direction, called to attention by Phillip's swift, deliberate movements. She had two choices: she could sit and watch and allow her husband to cause a scene, or she could be a good wife and intercept him.

There was a part of her that whispered how he had not thought to be a good husband tonight.

Marina quietly pushed the nasty thoughts away, sucked in a deep breath, and stepped into her husband's path with a smile and her hand held out to him. It gave him pause which was all she needed to sweep in, gently wrap her hand around his arm, and sweep him off in the opposite direction.

"Let us go and find Olivia," she said loudly, so everyone looking might hear. "She complained earlier that her feet were sore. We should get her home." She did not need to look back to know that Emmanuel Hayward was glaring daggers in her direction. A confrontation, she realized, was precisely what he wanted though why on Earth he wished to provoke his nephew, she could not fathom.

"What are you doing?" Phillip hissed to Marina, his lips all but pressed to her ear as they walked.

"You have asked me on many occasions to trust your judgment where mine is lacking due to experience, Phillip," she answered, her voice low but her face still smiling and bright. "In this instance, I beg of you to do the same. There." She pointed toward Olivia, who had just finished a third dance with the Viscount and was being led by him to find some refreshments. Marina quickened their pace until she reached them and tapped her sister on the arm.

It was not long after that she found herself, once again, alone and enraged in a carriage with her husband.