Chapter Seventeen

December 10, 1812

Though her stomach rumbled, Edie pushed the carefully fried trout about on her plate. The eye of the fish, lifeless and now unseeing, looked up at her.

She sighed heavily.

Luncheon was supposed to be one of the calmest parts of the day. Visiting hours were approaching, and there was usually an evening engagement to be enjoyed. Luncheon, however, was the pleasant genteel meal she shared with her father, and her father alone.

Mrs. Teagan had been most insistent, when she had accompanied them to London. “A girl needs her father, Miss Stewart. Far be it from me to come between you!”

Now she came to think, Edie had absolutely no idea where Mrs. Teagan took her lunch. Surely not with the servants downstairs. But then where?

“You are very quiet.”

Edie jumped and looked up guiltily—though what she felt guilty for, she was not sure. At least, not in this conversation.

“Most of us are forced to live within the bounds of Society. There are certain expectations—”

Oh, she had plenty to feel guilty about when it came to that discussion—but her father did not know about that, did he?

A further strain of guilt tightened around her, squeezing her tightly. She ought to tell him—she knew she must… but for each passing minute she did not tell her father that she and Frederick had broken with each other, she could almost believe it had never happened.

“Am I? Quiet, I mean?” Edie tried to speak with the same cheer she always had, but it was clear her father was not convinced. She rallied. “I am just eating my food, that is all.”

“Indeed,” said Lord Stewart wryly. “The food you have barely touched.”

Forcing herself to stick a morsel of fried trout onto her fork, Edie brought it to her lips. It was delicious—she knew it was. Cook never failed, and the trout had been freshly caught only a few days ago, apparently.

It tasted of nothing.

The dining room was elegantly laid out, as it always was when they were taking luncheon. The fresh flowers in the vase by the window were starting to wilt. The cake that stood on a stand to her left looked a tad stale—or was that just her imagination?

The image of another cake, a different cake, flashed before her eyes. A cake she had never gotten the chance to taste.

The scandal sheets had made no mention of it. That had been a surprise, for Edie was sure the viscount’s servants would have heard the loud voices and spread the news by now. Yet Whispers of the Ton did not even contain their names.

It would all come out eventually…

“You should tell me about it,” said her father softly. “You know you can always talk to me. You always have.”

Edie’s lungs tightened.

Yes, she always had. There had been no mother for her to turn to, only a gruff father who had never expected a daughter and had found himself left without a wife to mediate between them. It had been a strange time for them, but now… now Edie could not imagine her life without him.

For the first time in over a decade, however, there was a topic about which she could not speak to him.

“I don’t want to talk about it,” she said quietly.

Edie dropped her attention to the waiting fish on her plate. It prevented her from seeing any hint of disappointment or concern on her father’s face—expressions that would make it all the harder for her to stay silent.

She could not tell him. Revealing that the whole engagement had been a farce was more, she was sure, than her father would bear.

Bad enough that she and Frederick—that she and Lord Pernrith had been caught kissing, and rather more, in a library. Bad enough that of all the gentlemen in the ton she could have been compromised with, it was a man whose reputation was low in the eyes of Society. Bad enough that they had been forced to marry.

But if her father discovered it had all been a sham… that she had lied to him, moreover, to him and Mrs. Teagan and everyone in Society…

No. Edie was not going to lower herself in his eyes to that extent.

She would wait until dinner, then tell him the engagement was at an end, Edie decided, fiddling with her fork and pushing a roast potato back and forward across her plate.

And that would be it.

“I’m not brave, Edie. Bravery suggests a choice. I haven’t had a choice, this has been my life—it’s been handed to me and I’ve had to learn to live with it. But you… you have a choice.”

Her grip tightened painfully on the fork, just for a moment, as the memory of the argument rippled across her mind.

Words had been spoken that could never be unsaid. She had seen the pain in Frederick eyes, felt it viscerally scatter across her body.

He had decided her character to be less than it was, less than she had thought she’d proven it to be. And he would never forgive her. Never.

“My dear Edie,” said her father softly. “Do you mean to tell me—or not tell me, as the case may be—that your pretend engagement with Viscount Pernrith is at an end?”

Edie dropped her fork with a clatter as she stared, astonished, at her father.

Lord Stewart’s face was a picture of soft concern, and it only made her heart ache all the more. How had she managed to disappoint and hurt the two men in her life who mattered the most?

“I—you don’t—we never told… How on earth did you know that?”

Edie supposed she should have attempted to keep her face straight, prevent him from knowing the truth—but as her father appeared to know, what was the point in hiding from him?

Her father placed his own knife and fork onto his almost empty plate and leaned back in his seat. When his gaze met hers, it was a kind one. “My darling girl, haven’t you noticed?”

“Noticed… Noticed what?” Edie said, her voice hoarse.

Dear Lord, if her father was about to tell her he suspected that she and Frederick… if he had worked out they had… if Mrs. Teagan had any inkling that they…

Heat blossomed across Edie’s chest.

But not shame. No, she could not feel ashamed of having shared the most intimate of things with Frederick Chance. He was the only man in the world with whom she wished to share such things, and it was a joy to look back and know that, even though it had ended terribly, she had still managed to have that experience with him.

Even if he despised her now.

“Oh, Edie,” said her father kindly, shaking his head. “I presumed you had noticed. These walls, they aren’t that thick. You can hear most of a conversation from the next room.”

Edie’s mouth fell open.

“It is remarkable how clear those voices are. The walls must be made of paper.”

She had known that—but she had never considered that someone might have overheard her and Frederick…

Lord Stewart’s eyes twinkled. “I heard every word of your little plan before you and Lord Pernrith came into my study. ‘My father will force you to marry me, so we must pretend we are engaged,’ I think it was?”

Edie had never been so astonished in her life. It was like discovering that one’s father had secretly been working for the Prince Regent in France, or one’s grandmother had been an actress on the stage.

Attempting to fit into her mind that her father had known, from the very beginning, that the engagement between herself and Frederick had only been for show…

“You—You knew!” Edie spluttered, food quite forgotten. “From the moment we went into your study?”

“I have to say, I was impressed,” said her father lightly. “I knew you would consider your fate, keep your options open. Having a false engagement, one that could be broken at a later date with no feelings harmed… It was a clever idea.”

Yes, it had been a clever idea. She had done it for Frederick as much as for herself. She could not force a man into marriage. No feelings harmed… that had been the plan.

When had it started to go so awry? When she had hesitated most awkwardly yesterday, too stunned to accept he really did want to marry her? When they had danced at the Duke of Sharnwick’s ball? When they had lain together, joined together, fast and hot, slow and luxurious, at Wickacre Hall?

Or had it started before even that? Had Edie started to lose her head well before visiting Frederick’s home in the country? Did it go as far back as when she had read their names entwined in the gossip sheets—when Whispers of the Ton had considered their engagement to be a scandal?

“But… “ It was difficult to wrap her head around the fact that her father had been so well-informed the last several weeks. “But you went along with it! I mean, you organized the announcement in The Times . You hosted his family!”

Edie could not understand it. What had possessed him?

“And you knew about his reputation, you knew that… well. He was not well regarded.” She swallowed. It felt treacherous even thinking such a thing, let alone saying it. “You were eager to ensure I never spoke to him after Lady Romeril’s ball.”

Lord Stewart shrugged. “So I was. Yet I could not deny that being engaged to a viscount, a clear step above me in title and rank… I could not see how it would hurt. Additional eyes would be on you, even more than those that had been attracted after being declared the flourishing rose of the Season. Who knew what earl, or marquess, or duke would covet you?”

And Edie’s hopes sank.

Her father had not bothered to put a stop to the sham engagement not because he’d been concerned about her, or because he’d thought Frederick a good match… but because he’d hoped it would spark the interest of another.

Another with greater wealth, and more of a chance for her to become “Your Grace.”

“I see,” she said listlessly.

“I don’t think you do,” countered her father gently. “You see, amongst all those reasons was another.”

Edie leaned forward. “Yes?”

“I was curious,” said Baron Stewart gravely.

She slumped back in her seat. Curious . Had not Frederick mentioned how people in the ton gawped when they discovered his history? That he had been forced to put up with the most unpleasant of interviews by those who were trying to identify if he could truly be called a gentleman?

No wonder Frederick hated Society so much. No wonder he had been so pained when she had hesitated, the shock and surprise of his sudden proposal mingling with the parts of her which she despised.

The parts of her that wanted to be adored, and admired, and the center of attention in Society. She could not deny those feelings were, in small part, true, even if she’d been offended by the viscount’s insistence that she was led by those desires.

“You wanted to see what half a Chance was like,” Edie stated dully.

Lord Stewart raised an eyebrow. “Dear Lord, no. I suppose that would have been interesting, but I had quite another motive.”

She frowned. “You did?”

Her father nodded, and there was a sad sort of look in his eyes that Edie rarely saw. In fact, it was typically the expression he wore when he was discussing… her mother.

“I wanted to see if he could make you happy.”

Edie started, heat curling around her lungs.

Happy .

Her father had never said anything like that. It was always “Make sure you dance with every gentleman in the room” or “I’ll just find out what his fortune is per year.” Often “Go on, play one more piece on the pianoforte, just to make sure they remember you” and “Matrimony is a serious business.”

Never before had Lord Stewart mentioned anything about her happiness.

“And he did for a time, did he not?” Her father looked wistful. “Make you happy, I mean.”

Edie had never felt more wretched in her life. Was this what she would have to endure now, the months and years ahead? Regret and anguish, always wondering what could have been and why she had managed to talk herself out of an engagement with the man she loved?

“Please consider this pretend engagement, which meant nothing to you—”

“Edie—”

“—which meant nothing to you, to be at an end.”

“It’s just…” she said aloud, hardly knowing what she was going to say. “The more I tried to—and the plan was to break it off eventually, I knew it wasn’t going to last for… And I thought… “

Edie swallowed.

If only she had not spoken so hastily. Frederick’s clear anguish at what he’d perceived as a rejection—which she hadn’t actually done—had forced her to speak without thinking, and the unthinkable had been spoken, and she could not take it back.

No matter how much she may wish to.

“And it’s not as though—I mean, this engagement isn’t real! It’s all been pretend, hasn’t it? None of it has meant anything!”

“Hasn’t it?”

The unsettled pain in her stomach lurched most uncomfortably and Edie pushed her plate away.

They had stood there, her hands in his. He had looked into her eyes and there had been such love there.

True, he had not said the actual word. But then neither had she, and she had felt it for many weeks now.

And what had she done? Not thanked him for his kind words, not flushed and giggled at the intensity of it all. No, Edie had envisioned the headlines of Whispers of the Ton . The focus that would be on her for the rest of her life if she accepted Frederick’s hand. The way she would never be able to walk into Don Saltero’s Chelsea Coffee House, or Almack’s, or anywhere without people staring.

People who would always presume the worst. People who would gossip about her behind her back and simper when she approached.

Never again would she know whether someone was a true friend, or just curious about discovering more about the scandalous Viscount Pernrith. Never again could she slip into a room and be ignored.

He was right. She had thought those things. They’d been fleeting thoughts, washing through her head, but then he’d gone and accused her of thinking those things—and worse. Accused her of thinking him beneath her.

She had been wrong to worry about such things, but she could not deny them—nor the pain her hesitation had clearly afforded.

“You hypocrite—you said you didn’t want to be treated just as someone beautiful!”

The pain on Frederick’s face was still so clear, she could see it in her mind’s eye. And in that moment, she had known it was over. Whatever had been between them, it had been gone.

There was no possibility Frederick would ever forgive her, would ever be able to see her as someone who could respect him.

“You have to try—”

“The engagement between us is at an end,” Edie said stiffly, speaking over her father. She would not permit him to continue in this conversation under a misapprehension.

His stare examined her steadily. “But if you love him—”

“Love is not always enough,” she said, her chest tightening. “You know that as well as I do. Better than I do. Love cannot always keep those we care about with us.”

It was perhaps a cruel thing to say, and Edie saw the pain flicker across her father’s face. But it was true. Her parents had adored each other, from the little she could remember. And they had been separated.

“Your mother was taken from me.” Lord Stewart spoke quietly, grief dripping from every word. “That is not the same.”

“It ends up the same way.”

“True love, a love I myself have known, is always worth risking for, fighting for, trying to have,” said her father quietly.

Edie raised an eyebrow, unable to help herself. If he was going to speak about true love, then it was only fair she pushed back with both barrels. “So you are going to profess your intentions to Mrs. Teagan any day now, are you, Father?”

It was Lord Stewart’s turn to look aghast. “I haven’t—not until I—but how did you… “

She could not help but laugh as her father’s jaw worked furiously, but no sound came out. “It was hardly difficult, once I started noticing the signs.”

“‘Signs’?”

Edie lifted a hand and started counting off her fingers. “You take her hand onto your arm at every opportunity, I keep catching you looking at her, you’ve spent far more on her Christmas present than mine—do not fear, I am not offended—and when she mentioned that book you immediately went out and purchased it for her—”

“I’m a man who encourages reading,” her father said faintly.

She narrowed her eyes. “What book am I reading right now?”

Lord Stewart threw his hands to the heavens. “How am I supposed to know?”

“And what book is Mrs. Teagan—”

“ The Castles of Athlin and Dunbayne , by Ann Radcliffe,” her father said. Then his eyes widened. “How the devil do I know that?”

“Because you love her,” said Edie simply. “It’s… It’s obvious, when you know the signs of what to look for.”

And she had managed to get herself so entangled in the falsification of an engagement that she hadn’t noticed the strength of her feelings. Frederick had become a part of her life quickly—far more quickly than she could have imagined. And now he was gone from it.

Gone, merely because she had hesitated. Because for a fleeting moment, she had cared more what Whispers of the Ton had thought about her than the man she loved.

“You should say something to her,” Edie said softly.

Lord Stewart gave a laugh. “I don’t want to be seen as… She’s under my protection, you understand. And she’s a good fifteen years younger than I am!”

“And you think the opinion of others should stop you from reaching out for love?”

Only then did she realize she had walked into her own trap. She would have noticed on her own, naturally, but her father’s snort placed more emphasis on it.

“We’re not too dissimilar, are we?”

Edie sighed. “No, I suppose not. You do love her.”

“Almost as much as you,” her father said solemnly. “In truth, it’s been hard to keep my hands off—”

“Father!”

Her exclamation was joined by a sudden screech and a thump that appeared to occur close to them.

Very close to them. Both Edie and her father turned to the wall that adjoined the dining room with that of the parlor—the parlor, now she came to think about it, Mrs. Teagan had claimed as her own.

“Oh, dear,” came Mrs. Teagan’s voice weakly through the wall. “I… ah. I appear to have dropped my book.”

Edie stifled a giggle.

“Ah, there it is. I’ll just… Ahem. Go upstairs.”

There was the sound of a door opening, then hurried footfalls up the staircase.

“What did I tell you?” Lord Stewart’s face was pink, but he held his daughter’s gaze steadily. “Walls as thin as paper.”

She could not help but grin. “I suppose you have no choice to propose now.”

“I shall just have to hope I have not been convincing myself of her returned regard,” her father said quietly. “That’s what has held me back for so long, you see. I suppose that is what held young Pernrith back from speaking to you. I suppose you broke it off before either of you could admit your feelings.”

Edie’s smile faded. “Not… Not quite.”

For a moment, she thought her father was going to inquire into precisely what had happened, but he appeared to think better of it.

“Well, there we are,” he said cheerfully. “I haven’t had the bravery yet to speak to the person I love, but that does not mean that you shouldn’t. Are you brave enough, Edie?”

Swallowing hard, Edie whispered, “I don’t know.”

“You have to ask for what you want,” Lord Stewart said seriously. “If there is even half a chance—”

His words were interrupted by a snort from Edie that was half laughter, half pain.

“Damn,” said her father with a shake of his head. “But you know what I mean. If there’s the slightest chance of happiness, won’t you ask for it? Fight for it?”

Edie took a long, deep breath.

Her father was right. In every other situation, his advice would have been perfect.

But he didn’t know—no one could know how deeply she had hurt Frederick. By hesitating at his proposal, by making it clear without a word just what she would be sacrificing to become his wife, she had treated him just as the whole of the ton had.

With barely concealed scorn.

And she’d had the gall to be hurt he’d think so little of her.

She thought little of herself now.

Yes, she could ask for forgiveness. She could ask for his hand, for his love. But Edie could not help but feel that the half chance her father spoke of was unlikely to turn out in her favor.

“I will try,” she said shakily. “But will he want to hear it?”