Page 3 of His Illegitimate Duchess

No one said anything for a while. Then Jane came in with the tea.

Elizabeth wondered how much the delicacies on the tray must have cost, how many nights she'd have to work her fingers bloody to pay for them.

Typically, her mother cared about appearances more than about her.

Her face set into a scowl without her realising it, but then she noticed Nicholas studying her intently and forced her features to relax.

“I trust you've been well since the last time I saw you, Your Grace,” her mother said.

“I have, Miss Williams. How is your health?”

Elizabeth was stunned at the address. The staff had always addressed her mother as Madam , most likely at Catherine’s insistence, and since she never went anywhere, her daughter had never had the chance to hear her called Miss.

“I've been well, too.”

Silence enveloped the room again. Elizabeth thought about what Nicholas must have been feeling. Sitting in the room with the woman his father betrayed his mother with. And the daughter who was born from that betrayal.

She started remembering that day in the Park, but quickly diverted her thoughts to the difficult piece of embroidery she had been working on that day at work.

It was intricate and beautiful, and Elizabeth couldn't help but run her hands over it lovingly as she worked, knowing she'd never wear a dress like that.

No, such things were not for the likes of her.

She was lucky to even work on it with her rough hands.

“You must be wondering why I'm here,” Nicholas finally said.

Lizzie tilted her head slightly before taking a sip of her tea to indicate that, yes, she was wondering. She got a secret thrill from not picking up the conversational ball like she knew both her mother and her brother expected her to. Nicholas cleared his throat.

“I was made aware of your existence after our father's death five years ago. I was,” he broke off and took a deep breath before continuing, “dealing with my own feelings on the matter, and I apologise for not reaching out to you sooner.

I've recently come to the realisation that you are absolutely blameless in the matter and I'd love to forge a brotherly relationship with you, if you're so inclined?” he looked at her hopefully and she gave him a little smile.

“I'd very much like that.”

“Excellent,” he smiled at her, and suddenly everything was right with the world. “There is a house I'd like to gift to you in Mayfair, and I'd like to provide you with the same dowry as our sister, Charlotte,” he kept talking, but Elizabeth heard nothing after our sister, Charlotte .

Charlotte had to be the little blonde cherub from the Park. Her chest constricted painfully. Did she remember Elizabeth? What was her memory of that day?

“Elizabeth, dear,” her mother prompted. “What do you think?”

“That all sounds lovely,” Elizabeth stammered before taking a sip of tea. This wasn't their usual blend. This was the expensive kind. She frowned at the unnecessary expense before remembering to add, “Thank you so much, Nicholas.”

“Very well,” Nicholas seemed pleased. “Everything is ready for you to move in. The staff left for Scotland with their mistress, so you can bring your own,” he said cheerfully, and Elizabeth wanted to burst out laughing.

Surely he didn't think they had an entire staff?

Hadn't he noticed the frayed edges of the tablecloth his teacup currently resided on?

“That is preferable to us,” her mother said, her composure regal and utterly artificial.

Elizabeth pressed her lips together to avoid showing her contempt for the act.

“I'll talk to Charlotte and my mother about arranging for you to meet the two of them. And my wife, Sophie, I'm very much looking forward to the two of you meeting,” Nicholas said, and from the way he said it, Elizabeth immediately knew she would like Sophie very much.

That night, in her bed, Elizabeth reviewed the entire visit in her head and decided that she would do her best to be a good and worthy sister to Nicholas. With that thought and a small smile on her face, she fell into the sweet embrace of sleep.

*

A month later, Elizabeth (who was now in possession of an account at The Bank of England) and Catherine had somewhat settled into their new Mayfair life.

There had been a lot to do in that first month – furniture needed to be bought, rooms had to be decorated, and there was staff to be hired.

Catherine had tapped into some (to Elizabeth) hitherto unknown persona as she commandeered the move and the obligations that came with it.

Not for the first time, Elizabeth wondered about her mother's upbringing and the future she had to have forfeited in order to spend it not living between her father's visits.

Elizabeth tried not to view giving up on her own dreams of a new life in America as forfeiting something.

Instead, she viewed it as choosing to be part of her paternal family, the only family she had left.

All she knew about her mother’s side was that her grandfather had been a Shropshire gentleman who, at some point, had gambled away his fortune, after which her mother had to find work as a governess.

Catherine always said that she had no relatives left.

Elizabeth didn't dare think about whether that was true or whether the family in question had been another casualty of her parents' love.

One thing was certain: no move was going to separate Lizzie from her extended family – the Barlows.

Mister Ed would be driving the brougham pulled by the pair of horses her brother had so graciously gifted her to facilitate her moving about town.

His wife would resume her rightful place as queen of the kitchen.

Mary stopped working at the salon and became Elizabeth's lady's maid – a development they both shared a good laugh about- and her husband, Robert, thanks to Lizzie’s investment, opened his own carpenter’s shop in their old Church Street residence.

Their maid Jane took over the housekeeper duties, and Lizzie, who, as much as she hated it, was indeed Catherine Williams’ daughter and thus worked very hard at pretending that nothing had changed, got to move without really moving.

It’s all going to end today anyway , she thought to herself. Why would Nicholas do this to me?

“Are you sure you'll be alright, Lizzie?” her mother asked as she threatened to wear their new, expensive carpet thin with her pacing.

“I just don't understand why he would do this! Why would he arrange for me to meet them while he's out of town?”

“Men don't think about these things, my dear girl,” her mother told her in a tone that indicated she was somehow supposed to know this already. “He’s too focused on what a great thing he’s doing to consider all the details.”

“But they’re not details! I just don't want them to hate me,” Elizabeth admitted, and all the agitation bled from her body. As she slumped in the armchair, she suddenly felt a hundred years old.

“Don't forget to behave properly with them, they are both ladies.”

“Isn't it time you left, Ma?”

Her mother sighed a weary sigh that was meant to convey to an invisible audience how put upon she was by her child, before she got up and made her way to hide out upstairs until their guests left.

They finally had a proper parlour. And a drawing room.

And another one. A morning room. And a formal dining room.

And all kinds of other rooms Elizabeth had no use for.

Despite the unease she felt a lot of the time, she had to admit that it was nice not having to worry any more, not to mention not having to work her fingers bloody while Miss Euphemia yelled at her.

The maid soon announced Lady Madeline and Lady Charlotte Hawkins.

Mother and daughter were both stunningly handsome.

Elizabeth was ashamed of herself, even though no one knew that she had been secretly imagining her father’s wife as an unattractive old crone, and it made her feel even smaller in her presence.

As for seeing Charlotte again... the stab to Lizzie’s heart could not have been prevented. It took all her strength to keep the day at the Park in the past where it belonged. Her ringlets were as lovely as ever.

Blonde and lithe, both women seemed to be gliding rather than walking. But there was a coldness in their eyes, a shield of a sort, that immediately put Elizabeth on alert.

She curtsied as she welcomed them. The glance they exchanged was intentionally obvious. As Lady Madeline was sitting down, her whole body looked coiled tight, and her lips were pursed in distaste. She seemed unwilling to touch any of the furniture. Elizabeth wanted to wake up from this nightmare.

No one said anything for a while, and they most likely didn’t know where to start. Etiquette books said nothing about meeting your half-sister or your late husband's illegitimate daughter.

“Thank you both for coming,” Elizabeth said when tea was served. Given her limited experience with high society, she relied on instinct to lead her. “I am sorry that these are the circumstances that brought us together.”

Something seemed to loosen in the older woman when Elizabeth apologised. It was almost imperceptible, just a slight exhale which helped lower her shoulders a bit. The daughter was much harder to read.

Elizabeth looked at Charlotte’s hands and noticed that she had gripped one of them with the other so tightly that it looked painful.

Elizabeth's heart longed to comfort her sister. It made sense that they should lean on each other, since no one but the two of them had directly witnessed their father’s deception.

But Elizabeth feared that Charlotte mistakenly attributed a role in the betrayal to her.

After all, had Elizabeth not spent years hating the little girl from the Park? The one who’d held their father's hand with such entitlement? Who called him Papa , and had not been ignored? Nicholas had told her that Charlotte had been devastated when she learned of their father's secret life.

“Nothing to be sorry about, Miss Elizabeth,” Lady Madeline said, and she seemed sincere. “None of us in this room has done anything wrong.”

The message was clear: I don't blame you, but I do blame your mother. And your father. That was how Elizabeth heard it, and she felt her face heat with shame that she knew shouldn't be hers.

“The most useful thing we can do now is make a plan on how to move forward. Nicholas wishes for you to be a part of the family,” Lady Madeline said, leaving out the but we don't , “as well as London society.

I'm not sure the Ton is ready to welcome someone like you with open arms, but we'll try our hardest, won't we, Charlotte?”

Was it possible to nod petulantly? If so, Charlotte did it in response to her mother's question.

Although they were both 17 (which, in itself, was disturbing to think about), Elizabeth felt a hundred years older at that moment.

Charlotte could afford to be petulant without losing her place in the family.

“I'm not sure how familiar you are with our circles?”

“Not very much,” Elizabeth had to admit, and the older woman nodded with her lips pressed together, the gesture managing to convey that she hadn’t expected much from Elizabeth but was disappointed nonetheless.

“Well, let me explain a few things to you then,” she started, almost gently, and Elizabeth wanted to cry, not for the first time that day.

“My son will do his best to make you an enticing match to a young man in need of funds, one with a lesser title even, but I will not let him risk my daughter's marital prospects in the process.”

Elizabeth was no fool and had no fantasies about her station in life. Fantasies were her mother's domain. Despite her firm grip on reality, she failed to see how her mere existence would endanger her sister's potential marriage.

“I don't understand.”

“Charlotte is making her debut this Season. We cannot have any whisper of anything scandalous mar her introduction to society. Until she is married, your debut will have to wait.”

Elizabeth didn't particularly care one way or the other, and she told them so. They seemed satisfied.

“As long as I'm still allowed to,” she halted a bit and feigned a little cough to explain it away, “can I still spend time with Nicholas and Charlotte privately while we wait?”

Lady Madeline glanced at her with something between compassion and pity.

“Of course.”

“Then that is all I care about.”

Mother and daughter gracefully rose in unison, and Elizabeth sighed in relief when they walked out of the room and out of her sight.