Page 33 of His Illegitimate Duchess

A s her brother was, for lack of a better word, dragging her out of the Pearsons’ home, Elizabeth imagined she was floating above the two of them and re-examining an old memory from a distance.

She calmly noted that she’d never seen Nicholas so angry before, and that she herself appeared rather frightened and pale.

“What were you thinking?!” her brother asked her in a cold, stern voice.

“I wasn’t, Nicholas, I... didn’t do anything!” Lizzie managed to say, even though her throat was closing up from panic and desperation.

“It may seem like nothing to you , but in our circles, a young woman’s reputation is everything! I thought I had made that abundantly clear to you, and everyone around you did their best to teach you how to behave,” he raged as he flung the carriage door open.

“But I guess one truly cannot escape their breeding,” he concluded, then clamped his mouth shut and looked at Elizabeth apprehensively.

They were both instantly aware of what he had done.

Elizabeth pressed a palm to her stomach to prevent her insides from spilling out through the wound her brother had just made. That was how real it felt to her.

She wordlessly entered the carriage and said nothing during the brief ride home. Her back was damp from sweat, her gloves were somewhere on the floor of the carriage, and she was struggling to breathe. Nicholas just stared at her while chewing on the inside of his cheek.

Lizzie struggled to make sense of everything that had happened tonight. One moment, she had been alone in the cloak room, the next she looked up and there Talbot stood, his eyes more naked than she’d ever seen them.

Elizabeth didn’t know which knot to untangle first: Oliver’s hurt and angry face, Nicholas’s fury and disappointment, the mocking disdain and arrogance on the faces of Lady Helena and her coterie?

Or perhaps the shameful frisson of excitement she’d felt when Talbot had stepped between her legs? Lizzie buried her face in her hands.

The carriage stopped in front of her house, and she ran up the stairs, throwing her shawl at a confused Robert, who’d opened the door for her.

When she reached her bed, she fell to her knees, pulled out the chamberpot from underneath it, and retched into it until there was nothing left inside her but snot and tears. That was how Mary found her.

“Where is she?” Her brother bellowed downstairs.

“Do you want me to tell him you’re asleep?” Mary offered.

“No need,” Elizabeth wiped her face with her palms, but it didn’t really help.

Seeing herself in the looking glass gave her a fright. Her eyes and nose were red and swollen, and her complexion was sallow. She walked downstairs feeling like a lifeless marionette whose strings were being pulled so it moved like a real person.

Her brother’s eyes travelled her face, most likely noting all the signs of distress on it, while Elizabeth looked at him and only saw Charles Hawkins’ heartless features.

Suddenly, Duke Talbot entered her drawing room.

“Lizzie,” Nicholas said in a conciliatory, imploring tone, but Elizabeth’s gaze was now focused on the flowers on the carpet.

He then turned his fury on the newcomer, “What do you want?”

Talbot stood a little straighter, his eyes trained on Elizabeth.

“Let us talk outside, Nicholas.”

Her brother nodded darkly, and they both left. Elizabeth still stood in the same spot, but she felt like she was sinking into the floor.

She wondered whether this was what her brother had thought of her the entire time: that she was a girl of low breeding who could never be truly reformed .

She pressed her stomach harder, but it wouldn’t settle. Then the last person she wanted to see in that moment came into the room.

“What is all the commotion, my dear?” her mother asked sleepily.

Elizabeth decided to share the cold, hard facts.

“I was discovered in Duke Talbot’s embrace at the Pearsons’ ball,” she recited emotionlessly. The details, such as the truth, apparently didn’t matter. “Nicholas was quite upset.”

“Oh, my dear girl,” her mother said compassionately, as she stepped towards her and stroked her hair, “everyone makes mistakes when they’re young, I’m sure your brother will-”

Elizabeth couldn’t let her finish. Through the fog of despair, the familiar flame of her anger made itself known. And it felt good to give herself over to it.

“Mistakes?” she asked, her voice continuing to rise with each word that came after that one, “You really believe it is that simple? You think you understand? You don’t!

” Lizzie screamed, her chest heaving, her jaw clenched, as she glared hatefully at her only living parent, one of the two people responsible for all the misery she’d had to swallow down during her time on this Earth.

“You have no idea how hard I’ve had to work to overcome the burden of my birth, of course you don’t!

I did everything right, I did!” Elizabeth accentuated those last words by hitting her own chest with her closed fist, which her mother grabbed to stop her from further hurting herself, but Lizzie jerked it away roughly.

Her mother nodded soberly, taking a step away from her.

“You are right, darling, I have no idea what it has been like for you,” Catherine whispered, and Elizabeth tried pressing her stomach again, willing all her insides to go numb and to just stop doing whatever they were doing.

The two men came back into the house, both of them looking angry and dishevelled. Duke Talbot’s lip was split open. Elizabeth stepped closer to her mother. No one bothered with manners or making introductions at this point.

“We shall marry,” Talbot announced dispassionately, “I shall obtain the license and then I’ll write to inform you of the date.”

Elizabeth couldn’t tear her eyes away from his bloody lip. Her sophisticated brother, the Duke of Ashbury, had apparently landed a facer on his former friend, and it only exacerbated the guilt Lizzie had already been drowning in.

She had driven her civil, polite, kind brother to violence. Now that she had been so publicly dishonoured, her brother had to resort to inflicting pain on a man in order to force him to marry her.

But something didn’t make sense. She looked between the two of them – not only was Talbot taller, but he was also more muscular than her brother, who spent his free time fencing instead of boxing.

The only explanation she could think of for the bloody lip would be Talbot letting her brother punch him, which was utterly absurd and out of character.

When Elizabeth said nothing, Talbot turned to her brother, “I shall meet you at your lawyer’s office tomorrow at 10 to negotiate the marriage settlement.”

He then bowed and left without waiting for an answer, and Elizabeth left right after he did, not looking at or speaking to her mother or brother.

She got into her bed, where Mary pulled the coverlet over her, wiped her face with a warm, wet cloth, and kissed her forehead after Elizabeth had managed to sob out parts of the story to her.

The whole night, Elizabeth dreamt that she was walking through some dark, old, abandoned house and that her hair and face were covered in cobwebs, which she unsuccessfully tried removing from her face as she wandered around.

She woke up more tired than ever before.

Mary had taken it upon herself to inform the rest of the household of what had happened. As a result, everyone was quiet and subdued today, the mood in the house a stark contrast to the optimistic buzz of the previous weeks’ preparations for Elizabeth's wedding.

Her wedding to Corporal Oliver Harding, who had sent her a letter that morning.

Elizabeth had spent the second half of June immersed in preparations for the new chapter of her life.

She had spent days packing her things for the move to Wexcombe, deciding what to bring with her and what to leave with her mother in the Mayfair house, and trying to absorb as much household management wisdom from Sophie as she possibly could.

She had taken Mary and Elinor with her to the final fittings for her gorgeous wedding dress at Miss Euphemia’s new salon in Hanover Square.

As she ordered a new, more practical and serious wardrobe for her life in the country, Lizzie had invited Elinor to come home with her to select the gowns that she liked from the ones Lizzie would not be taking to Wexcombe with her.

She had felt restless in the best possible way. She was finally standing on the threshold of her future.

Lady Burnham had come to Elizabeth's aid once again and helped her work out the details of the etiquette she’d need once she arrived in the country: who would be expected to call on her and who she’d be required to call on, how to deal with the staff and tenants, and how to fill her days, which was the part she dreaded the most.

Elizabeth was well aware of how busy her future husband would be once they’d arrived at Wexcombe, and was more than prepared to do her best to carve out a life for herself at their estate, even if it meant tending to flowers, which she’d never attempted before (and frankly, had no interest in).

I can always read. She comforted herself. If only Talbot could supply me with more books, she thought and was surprised that he’d crossed her mind.

The passage of time hadn’t eased either of the two emotions she felt in regard to that man. She was still saddened by the loss of his friendship and angry at him for his betrayal of it.

Then that damned ball happened, and now Oliver’s letter was staring at her from the tray it was placed on as she drank her hot chocolate. Lizzie had no doubt about what it contained, and she wanted to delay reading it for as long as possible.

“Do you want me to read it?” Mary asked when she caught her glancing at it for the tenth time as they ate and talked about last night.

“No, thank you. We both know what it says.”

“Why not open it, then?”

“Isn’t it easier not to?”