Chapter 4

The carriage ride home from the ball was conducted in utter silence, a thick miasma of shock and dread enveloping the Lourne family like a suffocating shroud. Harriet sat frozen, her hands clenched in her lap as she replayed the mortifying scene from the veranda over and over in her mind"s eye. Strangely, she could not recall how she had gotten out of there - but she could relive the disastrous moment over and over in her mind.

How could things have spiraled so catastrophically? One moment she was trading barbed quips with the infuriatingly imperturbable Duke, the next she found herself quite literally in his arms, staring agog as the worst possible witnesses bore witness. The scandalized expressions of those harpies would be seared into her memory forever.

A fine tremor coursed through Harriet as the full gravity of her compromised position settled over her like a leaden weight. She could scarcely fathom the breadth of ruination that awaited if word of this tawdry incident spread unchecked.

By the time their carriage rumbled to a halt outside their Mayfair residence, Harriet felt ill, her stomach roiling with a noxious blend of shame and disbelief. She allowed her mother and brother to usher her inside in a daze, her limbs leaden and uncooperative.

It wasn"t until she was ensconced in the familiarity of their drawing-room that the numbness receded enough for her to fully grasp the precariousness of her situation. William was pacing in front of the fireplace like a caged lion, his expression positively thunderous. When he finally halted to face her, Harriet instinctively shrank back.

"Do you have any idea what you"ve done?" he hissed through clenched teeth. "Any inkling of the calamity you"ve brought upon this family with your idiocy?"

Jennifer shot her son a reproachful look. "Now William, there"s no need for such strong language..."

"No need?" William rounded on her, his voice rising in strangled outrage. "Mother, her actions tonight could very well lead to our utter ruination! Her insipid flirtations with scandal have finally caught up with disastrous consequences!"

Harriet bristled at his scathing assessment, the first flickers of defensive anger rekindling in her breast. "I did no such thing!" she retorted hotly. "I was simply... caught in an innocent situation that was misconstrued by those spiteful, bored women!"

William"s derisive scoff sliced through the air like a whip-crack. "Innocent? You were discovered in a very public embrace with a man, alone and unchaperoned! Do you take me for a fool, Harriet? I saw the way he had his hands upon you, the way you allowed it!"

"That"s not how it was at all!" Harriet"s face flushed a furious crimson at the implied depravity. "The Duke and I were merely speaking when his...his blasted cheroot caused me to choke! He was only attempting to assist me..."

"Oh, I"m quite certain he was attempting to assist you with something," William cut her off with biting sarcasm.

"Enough, the both of you!" Jennifer"s voice cracked like a whip, startling both siblings into momentary silence. "This bickering solves nothing. We are faced with a very serious situation that requires delicate handling."

Harriet felt a fleeting surge of gratitude towards her mother, but William shook his head - though when he spoke, his voice was calmer.

"Perhaps," he conceded, "this was not what you intended, but the reality is stark - your reputation lies in tatters. There will be no containing the gossip, the rumors that are sure to spread like wildfire through the ton. Your actions tonight have irrevocably compromised your virtue in the eyes of society."

Harriet"s breath caught in her throat as her brother's words washed over her in a frigid deluge of dismay.

"Which means you have two options before you." William pressed on, almost gently. "You can choose to accept your ruination, to live your life as a pariah firmly excluded from the embrace of the ton... or you must take immediate steps to repair the damage by securing a husband. Immediately."

A ringing silence met his proclamation, thick and oppressive in the cavernous drawing-room. Harriet"s mind spun, utterly unmoored by the stark gravity of her circumstances. To surrender her future to the cold, clawing clutches of societies" scorn and derision...or to escape that bleak existence by shackling herself to a man for forever and always.

The choice, it seemed, was desolation or debasement.

When she finally found her voice, it was little more than a strangled rasp. "H-how am I to... There"s no one who would..." Her gaze slid to her mother, pleading for an alternative that wasn"t forthcoming. Jennifer, however, looked oddly quiet, her eyes cast down, and Harriet turned back to her brother.

"You"re not alone in this catastrophe, Harriet," he murmured, gaze dropping to the plush rug beneath his feet. "If word of this...incident spreads, it will reflect most poorly on me as well."

She stared at him in disbelief, confusion swirling through her already addled thoughts. "You? But how..."

"As the head of this family, I am the one responsible for upholding our reputation and paving the way for advantageous matches," William explained, misery and self-reproach tinging his words. "If you are ruined, then my standing is equally imperiled by association. And the ability to make judicious decisions for you and Mother someday...that future will be closed to me."

Harriet gaped at him for a long moment before her ire found its breath anew. "Well then I suppose it"s settled," she declared, her voice sharpening with fresh belligerence. "Since it matters so much what the ton thinks, we ought to change our lives merely to please them. A jolly prospect for us all, indeed!"

William barely registered her bitter sarcasm, instead fixing her with a sober, searching look that made her shift uncomfortably.

"We must do certain things to satisfy the ton, Harriet. And there is one path that could restore our stature. One that could salvage our standing and extricate us from the clutches of disgrace," he murmured, holding her gaze in an entreaty so solemn it bordered on ominous.

Harriet"s mouth went dry as the implication settled over her like a death knell. Surely he didn"t mean...

"You"ll have to marry him, Harriet," William confirmed, his voice low but unwavering. "It"s the only way to preserve what little remains of our family"s reputation."

Him. Even before William uttered the name, Harriet knew to whom he referred. The tall, implacable figure that had loomed in her orbit like a force of nature, mercilessly needling and nettling her at every turn.

The Duke of Frighton.

Her mind reeled as William pressed on, outlining her one remaining path forward.

"The Duke is a respected, influential peer. Should he agree to take your hand despite...despite what occurred tonight, it would go a long way towards mitigating the fallout and repairing the damage to our family name. He has the power and status to render you acceptable in the eyes of the ton once more."

Harriet was scarcely aware of the protest bubbling up her throat until the words spilled forth in a breathless torrent. "William, you cannot be serious! The man is...is a boor! An arrogant, sarcastic rake without an ounce of propriety! We did nothing but quarrel like petulant children from the moment we met!"

Yet even as the objections poured from her lips, she could feel their utter futility. William"s expression was set in grim, immovable lines, and his jaw was etched with steely resolve.

"Those are grievances you will simply have to overcome, Harriet. The Duke of Frighton represents your only acceptable path forward now. It"s him...or total social ruination for us all."

The words hung between them like an oppressive miasma, an inescapable truth that stole the breath from Harriet"s lungs.

Harriet watched her brother"s rigid backside disappear through the drawing-room door, an oppressive silence lingering in his wake. She was numb, unmoored, her equilibrium utterly shattered by the stark reality he"d laid before her.

Him or total ruination for them all.

A weary sigh sounded beside her, drawing Harriet"s haunted gaze to where her mother perched on the divan. Jennifer"s expression was etched with sorrow and resignation as she regarded her with deep sympathy.

"My darling girl," she murmured, holding out her hands in a wordless entreaty.

Like a marionette severed from its strings, Harriet drifted forward until her trembling fingers were enveloped by her mother"s soft, familiar grip. She sank to the cushion beside her, eyes downcast as she struggled to gather her tattered composure.

For a long moment, neither woman spoke, the crackling hiss of the fire the only sound pervading the hushed stillness. Then, Jennifer heaved another sigh, this one tinged with reluctant amusement as she gave Harriet"s hands a gentle squeeze.

"Well, it seems my unruly daughter has finally met her match," she mused, the hint of a smile playing at the corners of her lips. "And from the formidable Duke of Frighton himself, no less."

Harriet"s head snapped up, her expression a mask of scandalized disbelief as she goggled at her mother. "I beg your pardon?"

But Jennifer merely laughed, her eyes sparkling with impish delight despite the somber circumstances. "Oh come now, you can"t expect me to believe nothing untoward transpired between you two on that veranda. His hands were all over you from the sounds of it!"

"Mother!" Harriet gasped, appalled by her sauciness even as her cheeks blazed with humiliation. Extracting her hands, she buried her flaming face in her palms, wishing she could simply melt into the plush cushions.

Jennifer laughed outright at her daughter"s mortification, the rich, tinkling sound like a balm against the pervading tension. "What"s this? The girl who delighted in shocking the very studs off every bachelor in attendance is now a shrinking violet at the mere suggestion of impropriety?"

Peeking through her fingers, Harriet leveled her mother with a withering glower. "There was no impropriety!" she insisted with as much dignity as she could muster in her addled state. "That...that infuriating Scot was simply assisting me after I began choking on the smoke from his disgusting cheroot!"

Dropping her hands fully, she crossed her arms over her chest in a defensive posture. "And even if there were the slightest hint of indecency - which there most certainly was not - it was a misunderstanding blown wildly out of proportion by those meddlesome women and their overactive imaginations!"

Her agitated clarification only served to deepen the dimples framing Jennifer"s smile. "I see. So there"s nothing whatsoever between my daughter and the dashing Duke? No spark of interest or intrigue to stoke that legendarily roguish temper of yours?"

Harriet scoffed indelicately at that, tossing her head in a gesture of dismissive derision. "Hardly. The Duke of Frighton is...is..." What was he exactly? Arrogant, callous, utterly exasperating? All of those descriptors rang true, and yet they seemed sorely lacking, pale echoes of the complex, incomprehensible force of nature the man embodied.

"He"s impossible," she settled on at last, deflating with a helpless sigh. "We did nothing but snipe at each other in a constant spiral of hostility. The mere thought of being bound to such a combative, infuriating person for all eternity is...unfathomable."

Jennifer regarded her with a look equal parts sympathy and fond exasperation. "Harriet, my dear, has it not occurred to you that this...antagonism you claim to feel towards the Duke may simply be a force of nature unto itself?" At her daughter"s bewildered look, she pressed on gently.

"You"re both exceptionally strong-willed individuals who clearly don"t shy away from conflict or voicing your stances. Why, you"re practically peas in a pod in that respect! Perhaps this inexplicable tension between you two stems from the refusal of either party to bend or compromise their truths. It"s like two opposing forces crashing into one another over and over in an endless cycle of resistance."

Harriet opened her mouth to protest, to tear apart her mother"s fanciful theory with cold, hard logic, but the words died on her lips as Jennifer barreled forward.

"Or maybe..." Her tone took on a sly, speculative note as she arched one brow meaningfully. "Just maybe there is something deeper simmering beneath all the antagonism."

The suggestion hung in the air like a taunting fog, utterly impenetrable as Harriet floundered for a response that would not come. A heated flush crept up her neck at the unspoken intimation, goading tendrils of confusion and uncertainty to unfurl within her.

Before she could formulate any kind of rejoinder, however, Jennifer seemed to take pity on her silence. Patting her knee consolingly, she rose from the divan with a soft groan, suddenly looking every bit her age.

"In any case, you have a grave decision before you, my Harriet," she said, her tone sobering as she turned to gaze down at her daughter with profound wisdom glimmering in her eyes. "This path William proposes, the choice to accept the Duke"s hand... it"s one I cannot make for you. No one can."

Slowly, she knelt before Harriet, taking her slack hands once more and holding them with reverent tenderness against her breast. "All I ask, darling, is that you search your heart when contemplating your future. Don"t let fear or propriety or even your brother"s insistence sway you from what you know to be true in your deepest self."

Her grip tightened fractionally as her eyes bored into Harriet"s with piercing intensity. "If this path feels wrong, like an inescapable cage, then you mustn"t choose it. No matter the consequences or the work of unraveling you have before you."

Harriet stared at her mother, feeling unmoored and adrift in a way she never had before. Here was the person who had raised her, nurtured her independent spirit at a time when most parents sought to quell such instincts in their daughters, and who had always been her unwavering champion and source of unconditional support.

And now she was bestowing Harriet with the most difficult choice imaginable and tasking her to make it alone based solely on the dictates of her own heart. Her throat was chokingly tight with a surge of emotions too tangled and profound to articulate.

"But... but what if I choose wrong?" The words escaped in a tremulous whisper Harriet barely recognized as her own. "What if I doom us all with my selfishness?"

Her mother"s smile was tender and reassuring, the crinkles at the corners of her eyes deepening with the force of her conviction. "You won"t, my love. Your heart won"t lead you astray if you simply allow yourself to listen to it with an open mind."

Leaning forward, she pressed her brow to Harriet"s, the time-worn linen of her dress rustling with the motion. "I have faith in you, my darling girl," she murmured, her warm breath fanning Harriet"s cheek. "No matter what you decide, I shall stand by your side through it all without question or regret. You need only follow the path that feels true to your spirit."

With that, she pulled back, bestowing Harriet with one final, tremulous smile before turning on her heel and gliding from the room, leaving her daughter alone with her thoughts, her doubts, and the heaviest decision of her life.