Page 32 of Forever Her Bachelor
A knock at her door interrupted her musings, stilling her in place. Shame and regret coursed through her at the thought that another person would see the evidence of Summerset’s cruelty toward her.
Her aunt entered the room, closing the heavy door behind her. The urge to hide her face was strong. She had not looked in a mirror, but she knew from the constant pain that her cheek was bruising from Summerset’s hit.
“Pippa, is everything all right?” Looking up, she met her aunt’s hesitant gaze.
Her aunt’s brown eyes widened, her mouth dropping open like a silent scream, causing something in Pippa to crumble. Margaret Wayford was the exact image of Pippa’s own mother other than the difference in their hair color. At first, it had been difficult to face the woman who was utterly different from her mother in every other way. Where her aunt was soft-spoken and reserved, her mother had been fierce and opinionated.
Pippa allowed a few tears to fall. She concluded that after the night she’d had, she could allow herself this one act of weakness.
After the death of both her parents, Pippa had rarely cried, even as an orphan girl living in an antagonistic environment with the thinly veiled threats of her uncle and cousins. The twins were a horror to Pippa, constantly hiding her cats and sneaking into the laboratory to put things in disarray.
The last time she cried, she was sixteen and betrayed by the one person she had trusted most. Now, she was going to trust him again.
An ache seized her chest, and she thought of the past, the present, and the future. She couldn’t change the past, but she could control her present and her future.
“I won’t marry Summerset.” Pippa’s voice sounded stronger than she felt, but she knew that life with a man who would abuse her was not the life for her.
“I know.” The silence was deafening, the air thick as if it would be hard to move through it. “I wouldn’t choose this life for you.”
Pippa stared at the woman she had spent more years with than her actual mother. Pride swelled in her chest at the fact that the woman who’d raised her was willing to stand beside her.
Her aunt’s lips curved into a sad smile. “You’re like your mother in that regard. She would’ve never stayed with someone who would abuse her. I won’t allow you to marry Summerset to save me from my husband’s callous mistakes.”
It was a relief to hear those words. For weeks, she’d found herself obligated to save her aunt and even her uncle. Pippa knew that his carelessness would destroy her aunt, and Margaret Wayford did not deserve that.
“I won’t let you suffer. I’ll figure out a way to help you.” Pippa rose, going over to her trunk and removing her valise. “I’m goingto St. Clara tonight.” Her heart sped up at the admission, and she found herself wanting him.
Not just to escape Summerset, but because for the first time in her life, she felt a whisper of something.
“I’ll be fine.” Her aunt stood and gently turned Pippa around, softly placing her hand on Pippa’s stinging cheek. “You be happy, Pippa.”
“This isn’t about happiness.” She spit out the words, the truth of what marrying St. Clara really meant. “He needs a wife, and I need a husband that is not the Duke of Summerset.”
Pippa was not delusional about the reasons they needed each other. The only thing that mattered was that Pippa could trust St. Clara with her life. However, she was not so certain about her heart.
“That does not change the way he looks at you.” Lady Wayford released her niece, sitting back on the edge of the four-poster bed with lace canopies. “The way he has always looked at you, even as a boy.”
Pippa sat beside her, intertwining their arms, her head on her aunt’s shoulder. She inhaled deeply, taking in the familiar scent of rosewater and lavender. Her aunt had always been there for Pippa, no matter what her children and husband’s opinions of her niece had been.
Sniffling, Lady Wayford patted Pippa’s hand. “You’re too strong to be treated like this. I was wrong to ask it of you?—”
“You didn’t ask me. I volunteered because you have done so much for me.” Pippa rose, walking over to the painting of her small family.
A smile teased the corner of her lips at the happy sight. There was a slight pain in her chest that she would never experience such a sight in her own life. Pippa had given up the hopes of a family a long time ago; now, all she wanted was to grow her business and be her own person.
“Be happy,” her aunt said from behind her.
Shaking her head, Pippa turned, not wanting her aunt not to have any girlish fancies about her and St. Clara. “It-it’s not like that. We’re not a love match,” she whispered, feeling a tightness in her chest at her own words.
“You were once,” her aunt said vehemently, fire lighting her face.
They wereneverthat. They’d only been friends who’d loved each other and thought it would be enough to sustain a marriage. In the end, it hadn’t even been enough to sustain a friendship.
“You could be again.” Her aunt squeezed Pippa’s arm affectionately before walking toward the door. “I’ll be back in an hour to say goodbye.”
The door opened, and Newt rushed in, taking a leap on the bed. Pippa picked him up, happy that she did not have to go looking for the cat.
Once alone, Pippa stood looking at the room that had been her sanctuary since her parents’ death. Her cheek stung, a bitter reminder that she must trust the man St. Clara had become and hope there was nothing remaining of the boy who’d broken her heart into a million tiny pieces.