Page 10 of The Reclusive Earl’s Scandal (Vows and Vanity #1)
Rebecca found herself smiling wryly.
“I used to think he was pleasant,” she told Edward, nodding towards Lord Billy.
Admittedly, he had been a man she had danced with already, hoping to find a connection, for they had been friends as children along with Edward, but the three of them had drifted as they grew up.
“Now I see I may have been wrong. Did he upset you?”
“No,” Edward told her. “Not truly. Although he used to. I hated that appellation.”
“I am certain he hated his own more, and that was why he used yours,” she pointed out, and the two of them laughed.
The sound of Edward’s amusement made her heart flutter a little as she sighed, leaning against the wall.
She’d held so much tension in her shoulders all evening, dancing and wooing, smiling and pleasing every lord she danced with, yet now, as she stood back with Edward, she felt it all loosening.
“You have appeared so tense all night,” she noted. “It is good to see you smile.”
“Ah.” Edward turned to her with a bemused look. “So you have been watching me? Among all your attempts to impress your suitors, you have secretly been watching the Earl of Thornshire?”
His voice shook, as though he wasn’t used to such jesting, but the words were refreshing. She was so used to being the one jesting. To have it turned back onto her now made her stomach dip a little. For a moment, Rebecca forgot about everything.
Her father’s debts, her need to marry, her friends and their own worries of not securing a match, her siblings needing good elevation through her choices…
It all faded away, her world narrowing to this moment: simply laughing with somebody she could relax around.
How peculiar to do so , Rebecca thought. Especially after so long of not seeing one another . But she tucked that thought away. As much as she wanted to relax she had a duty to fulfill of marrying well. Still, a few moments on the outskirts wouldn’t hurt anyone.
“Perhaps I have,” she answered when she realized the silence had stretched for too long. “It certainly would make for a better time than what I have had to do at these infernal balls.”
“You do not like them,” he observed, and Rebecca found herself shaking her head.
“It is not that I dislike them, it is more that…” She struggled to find the words. “Finding a suitable match requires patience and strategy, and I am impatient.”
“You wish to be married so soon?” His smile was easy, but Rebecca frowned—not at him, but the reasoning she had not yet shared with him.
It was too soon; this was only their second meeting since reuniting.
She wanted him to know her for herself first before she ever even mentioned her father’s debts.
Men could be unexpectedly noble, and if she had expressed hardship at securing a match, and he wished to relieve himself of the ballroom’s game of marriage, then…
No . She shut down that line of thinking quickly. What a foolish idea.
“No,” she finally answered. “No, I do not.”
“So why is there any rush?”
Because my father is drowning, weighed down by debts, and we are useless lifelines that he drags down with him.
Rebecca swallowed, finding the next best explanation. “You might recall I have four siblings. I must marry well to ensure they do as well.” Her answer sounded flimsy even to her own ears, and Edward looked at her as though he didn’t quite believe her.
“Your siblings have not yet entered society,” he pointed out. “If I recall correctly.”
“That is true. But still… one can never be too prepared.”
Edward nodded, but still looked unconvinced.
His focus moved back to the ballroom, though, constantly observing.
It seemed that, like her, he couldn’t fully relax.
Rebecca followed his gaze, sifting through the many couples on the dance floor, the endless circle of dancers who made the ballroom feel as though it was spinning, a well-oiled gear that knew exactly how to move in the way it should.
“Sometimes I feel like a bolt out of place,” she confessed to Edward, surprising herself with her vulnerability.
“I… I feel as though one wrong move on my part will grind the whole thing to a halt, or that I do not have a proper place in society. I ought to, for I am a duke’s daughter, and I play my part well enough that I have good prospects, but I do not belong here.
Not really. Sometimes I just wish I could lose myself in an observatory, or an art gallery. ”
At that, Edward looked back at her. “Or a library,” he added.
“Indeed,” she answered softly, holding his gaze.
But movement broke her attention, and out of the corner of her eye, Rebecca noticed Catherine watching them.
She smiled at her friend, only to find Catherine hurriedly turning away from her.
Further behind her, she recognized Edward’s mother and sister in a larger group of ladies, watching them with keen interest.
“They seem to be very invested.” Rebecca nodded to his family.
“Well, you know what people say,” he sighed, looking at them. “The wealthiest man does not look away from his most profitable venture. I have danced with many ladies, so I imagine they have had enough of a display.”
There was such resignation in his voice that Rebecca couldn’t help but wonder if he chose to dance with so many women, or if, like her, there was a strategy to his nights. Except she chose hers, even if it was only out of necessity, and it sounded as though he had very little free will.
“And what of us speaking?” she asked. “Will they have any thoughts?”
“My sister remembers you,” he told her, his voice growing more and more formal.
“She has expressed happiness at our reconnection, and… and…” He trailed off, and she followed the source of his distraction.
Catherine had gone over to Lady Thornshire and had struck up conversation.
The two of them looked pleased, and Lady Elena’s face was loose with overjoy.
But Edward’s face didn’t share such sentiments.
“You look troubled,” Rebecca noted delicately.
A surge of jealousy went through her, peculiar and disliked, at the thought of him being matched with her friend.
She would be happy for Catherine, for they all sought happy endings, and Rebecca certainly wasn’t making any sort of claim on Edward, but something about the arrangement looked too… put together . Orchestrated.
Edward shook off her question. “Your mother,” he began, “she must be happy that you have so many suitors coming to ask your hand for a dance.”
Rebecca scoffed, and nodded to where her mother and father kept watch over the whole ballroom as if they owned the place. Her mother’s hand rested on her father’s elbow, a silent claim as well as a visual display of the love she had followed into a strong marriage.
“My mother…” She trailed off, not knowing how to continue the sentence without revealing too much.
Is blinded by love into being a passive character in life when she should have pushed my father into being a proper patron of our household.
She would forgive my father a thousand debts if it meant she could remain in love with him, even at the expense of my family’s well being.
“My mother will look to my father, and he will be happy.”
Rebecca still hadn’t confronted her father about the letter, for it meant admitting she had read his personal correspondence, and the fallout she would face from that would be worse than anything.
It would overshadow his wrongs, turn the blame towards Rebecca, and he would successfully deflect the whole thing.
“Your mother is not involved with your courtships?” Edward asked.
Rebecca lifted her shoulders in a display of helplessness. “She looks towards my father as the master of the household, I am sure. He will give the final say, after all.”
Edward’s brow pinched together before he nodded as if such a thing made sense.
It would indeed suffice, yet Rebecca was eager to divulge all, to ensure he comprehended precisely why her father was the one to oversee her matrimonial prospects, rather than her mother steering her father's judgments in the manner she had preferred.
“Regardless,” she said, hastily redirecting their main subject, “I am certain whoever is chosen will be so because my own decision has been taken into consideration.”
It will never be taken into consideration , she thought bitterly, for she didn’t want the ballrooms and the courtships and the suitor visits.
She wanted simplicity with Harry Maudley.
But that was a dream she had to make peace.
He had not offered her a proposal, and even if he now did, she could hardly accept.
He could not help her pull her family out of poverty, which is where they were plummeting towards beneath her father’s foolish habits.
“What is Lady Catherine like?” Edward asked her, and Rebecca blanched at the change in topic, only to find him watching her friend intently. “Do you know her well?”
“She is one of my friends, indeed,” Rebecca told him.
“She is a good person. Occasionally self-focused, but who is not in this society? To be truthful, she has been one of the people I have relied on most in recent weeks. Despite her moments of only thinking of herself and her prospects, she always has a listening ear for me. Why do you ask? Is she a potential bride of yours? I am certain she will be thrilled to know; with the way she is speaking with your mother.”
Rebecca shot him a knowing smirk that she hoped reached her eyes as she wanted it to, but that curl of jealousy began its path once more, and she hurried to tamper it down. It was no business of hers what either Catherine or Edward did.
“It is only that I could not quite read her,” he admitted. “She… she was trying very hard when I danced with her.”
Rebecca nodded. “She will do. She wishes to be the most notable, of course. I try very hard with my suitors as well.”