Sophia swallowed over the sickening lump in her throat. “Why didn’t you tell me any of this?”
“I did try to. I told you about his reputation.”
“But you made it all seem like idle drawing room gossip.”
Florence clenched her jaw. “Most of it was. Even so, you and your mother wanted him so badly, nothing I said would have made any difference. And then—every time I thought about the time when fashionable New York wouldn’t touch us—I couldn’t help but cheer you on. I wanted to be part of that.”
Sophia tried to keep the shock and anger from her voice. “You kept those things from me because you wanted revenge on the Knickerbockers?”
Florence sat forward on the seat. “It wasn’t just that. It was the thrill of the hunt! He was the best, Sophia, and I knew you and your mother wanted him. I wanted you both to succeed and be happy.”
For a long moment, Sophia sat and listened to the blood rushing hotly through her brain. Wishing she had been wiser. Wishing she had not been blinded by a fairy tale. “Please tell me that you are happy now in your own marriage, Florence.”
Florence shrugged. “I’m not sure anyone really knows what happiness truly is. The point is, I married
very
well.”
Tears began to fill Sophia’s eyes. “But you and your husband have grown to love each other, haven’t you?”
Florence kept her eyes downcast as she smoothed a gloved hand over her skirt. “Of course. Just as you and James will, too.”
With all her might, Sophia smothered the urge to cry.
There was an uncomfortable silence in the coach. It was as if the air had suddenly become too thick to breathe.
Florence covered Sophia’s hand with her own. “You should be proud, Sophia. The Duke of Wentworth married you, after he vowed never to marry anyone. You accomplished a great feat. And you, an American. No one ever thought you would actually pull it off. You cannot possibly be anything less than ecstatic over your victory.”
Staring bewildered at Florence in the dim, dusky light, Sophia realized that the woman had no words of wisdom to offer. Sophia had hoped Florence would be a kindred spirit in this matter, but she was far from it. She did not understand, nor did she care to. She had come to England in search of a title, she had found it, and nothing else mattered.
Or perhaps she did not wish to be reminded of what she had
not
found.
Sophia gazed out the window, feeling more displaced and alone than ever, wondering if in a few years, she would become like Florence, and not want to face the idea that she had made a mistake. Would she ever be able to do that? To paste a pretty smile on her face, pretend that she was happy, and eventually forget that she’d ever known what real happiness was in the first place?
The carriage bumped, and her head began to throb. Florence’s attempt to appease her meant nothing, for she now knew that both James and her mother’s dearest friend had kept a secret from her. They had both ushered Sophia into a world that they must have known would suffocate her.
Sophia suddenly felt as if her soul was being annihilated. She had been stuffed and sealed in a gilded tomb with nothing but a coronet on her head to keep her happy, and no one wanted to hear her complain about it.
A few days after Florence left, the dowager announced over breakfast that it was tradition in late October for the Duke and Duchess of Wentworth to host a shooting party. Sophia would therefore be required to send out invitations to the usual people.
Who the “usual people” were was left for Sophia to guess at, until the time came to actually prepare the invitations. Sophia had to go to the dowager and request a guest list.
She raised her hand to knock on Marion’s door, but heard a loud, gut-wrenching sob from inside. Startled, she hesitated and listened for a few seconds, then gathered her resolve and knocked.
Something dropped on the floor inside the room, and it was a few more seconds before Marion said, “Come in.”
Sophia entered.
If Marion had been crying, it was over now. Her face was as cold and unfeeling as ever. “What do you want? I’m busy.”
Sophia gazed down at the scarf Marion was knitting. “I need a guest list for the party.”
Should she ask Marion if she was all right?
Marion huffed as she rose from her chair. “I don’t have the time or the energy to do your duties for you, Sophia. You must learn to do them on your own.”
Sophia decided not to pry into Marion’s business. She just wasn’t up to being shouted at today. “Believe me, Marion, I want that more than you do.”
The dowager gave her a sidelong glance, then went to her desk and retrieved a book. She handed it over. “This is my record of last year’s party. It includes the menus and the guest list as well as my notes about each guest’s tastes and preferences regarding food and rooms. Viscount Irvine, who is quite elderly, found the bed in the green guest chamber too hard, if I recall. You’ll have to put him elsewhere this year.”
“Thank you, Marion, this is exactly what I need.” Sophia accepted the book, then turned to leave.
She had just stepped over the threshold when the door slammed behind her and almost caught the hem of her dress in the doorjamb.
Forcing herself to ignore her mother-in-law’s contempt—for if she lost her temper, there would be no turning back—Sophia returned to her own boudoir and sat down at her desk, dipped her pen in the ink, and began her letters. Three hours later, she leaned back in her chair, and with a sigh of fatigue, marveled at the huge stack of invitations on her crested writing paper, sealed with red wax, impressed with the ducal coat of arms.
A knock rapped at her door. “Come in.”
The door slowly opened, creaking all the way. Her mother-in-law walked in.
Sophia sat up straight again. “Hello, Marion.”
“You’ve been working on the invitations?”
A sudden and surprising desire to please this woman—whose approval should not matter to her— inched up Sophia’s spine. She gestured with her hand toward the huge pile in front of her. “Yes, I finished all of them. I invited everyone who came last year.”
“Not Lady Colchester, I hope.”
“Yes… I believe I did invite her, with her husband.”
Marion shook her head in that slow, eyes-toward-the-ceiling manner. “No, no, no! Lady Colchester passed away last winter. You must redo that one. It will be Lord Colchester only.”
“I see.” With hands stiff from all the writing, Sophia began to sort through the pile of invitations on the desk, searching for the one she’d written to the Colchesters. They slid off each other and a few fell to the floor. Marion approached and began searching, too, squinting to read the names on the outsides of the invitations, and scrutinize the quality of Sophia’s penmanship, no doubt.
“I can find it,” Sophia said, bending down to pick up the ones she’d dropped. Oh, how she disliked the feel of her mother-in-law leaning over her shoulder, breathing down her neck, as if Sophia were incapable of finding one simple invitation.
“Here it is,” Marion said, her blue-veined hand scooping it up from near the bottom. She broke the seal and opened it. “Oh, good gracious!” she bellowed, as if Sophia’s letters were lists of profanities.
“What’s wrong?” Sophia asked, not quite sure she wanted to know.
“You do not sign your name as Sophia Langdon! Your signature must read Sophia Wentworth! Wentworth!” Marion threw the letter down onto the desk and picked up another and ripped it open. “This one is the same.” She ripped open another. “And this! They’re all wrong! You must redo them all! All that paper wasted. You will have to burn it.”
She walked out, slammed the door behind her, and Sophia swallowed hard over the rage rising up in her chest. She felt like a child, back in the one-room school-house with Mrs. Trilling as her teacher. Sophia could still hear that ruler smacking the desks.
Well, she would not let the dowager break her. She would not let a hateful woman crush what was left of Sophia’s old self nor the dream of what she had wanted to become.
Sophia picked up her skirts and hurried to the door. She would not look at her mother-in-law the way the pitiable servants looked at members of this family— with lowered eyes and fear and subjugation. She was tired of seeing them look at
her
that way! She would not let the dowager break her spirit like she’d broken everyone else’s. No wonder James didn’t know how to love!
Sophia pulled open her door and swept out into the corridor. Marion was just disappearing around a corner. Sophia ran after her. She reached her at the top of the wide staircase in the main hall.
“Wait!” she called out. Marion stopped and turned.
Heart racing in her chest, Sophia approached. “I’ve had enough of this.”
“I beg your pardon?” Marion replied indignantly.
“I’ve had enough of your critical, disdainful tone. If you don’t like me, that is your choice, but your son married me, and I’m here to stay. I am the mistress of this house and I expect from now on to be treated—at the very least!—with civility.”
Marion glared in dumbfounded shock, then without one retaliating word, turned to hurry down the stairs.
Typical
, Sophia thought.
Raise your nose in the air and ignore the lowly unpleasantness of emotion
.
Sophia stood at the top of the staircase, feeling triumphant at last. For days she had been struggling to hang on to her self-confidence and fit in here with these cold, unfeeling people. Agonizing over her husband’s cruel withdrawal, endlessly analyzing why he didn’t want to love her, and wishing for answers that were simply not going to come. Not if she continued to feel like a victim.
No more. Starting this minute, she would seize the reins. She would live here as duchess on her own terms. She would never again allow her mother-in-law to intimidate her, nor would she allow her husband to think that she was going to be a simpering, emotional burden, pining away for him. When he returned from London, he was going to learn that his wife was stronger than that. He was going to learn that
he
would have to do some fancy footwork to gain back her regard.
With a mental “so there,” she returned to her boudoir to redo the invitations. After that, she would take a buggy out to visit some of her husband’s tenants, and see what she could do to give something of herself to those who needed her, and those who would welcome her.
Two weeks later, James returned. He had been gone for a month. It was late in the evening—past eleven. He entered his rooms to find the fire already burning and Thompson waiting dutifully with a glass of brandy on a tray.
“Ah, just what I need.” James picked up the glass and took a deep draught. He tugged at his neckcloth and sat down.
“Welcome home, Your Grace.”
“Thank you, Thompson. It was a tiring journey this time around, don’t you agree? It seemed so much longer than usual.”
Probably because he’d had to deal with more problems concerning Martin. The boy had been suspended from Eton again, and James had been forced to make arrangements for him to go and stay with their aunt Caroline.
Just then, a knock tapped at the door. “Enter,” James called out.
The door swung open, and his wife stood there in the threshold wearing a white dressing gown with a shawl around her shoulders. She held a large brass candelabra. Her hair spilled down over her shoulders in thick, wavy locks, and the candlelight glimmered in the deep blue of her eyes.
Feeling a sharp surge of arousal at his wife’s incredible beauty, James stood up.
Without ever taking his eyes off Sophia, he said to Thompson, “That will be all.” The valet obediently took his leave.
Sophia walked in and closed the door behind her, then set her candles on a desk. “You never told me you were leaving to go to London.”
James let his gaze sweep down the full length of his wife’s slender body. His eyes fixed for a second on her tiny bare feet, then rose again so that he could look her in the eye when he answered her question.
Words, however, seemed elusive to him, like fluffy feathers on a breeze that he was clumsily trying to grab at.
He tried not to concern himself too much about it. Their separation—though unpleasant at times—had provided the much-needed proof to him that everything was normal. That he was still in control. He’d managed to justify all the cruel things he’d said to her the last time they spoke, and he’d even managed to forget about her completely for certain extended periods of time during the days.
But not at night. Never at night.
That, however, was manageable, he told himself now, for it was only lust. He’d felt lust for women before and he’d never lost his head over it, and he would not lose his head over Sophia.
He tipped his glass and downed all of his brandy. “The decision was a sudden one.”
“I would prefer it,” she said flatly, “if from now on you would inform me of any overnight trips and kiss me good-bye.”
He studied her expression—austere with a hint of arrogance.
He had expected wrath—she certainly had good reason—and had even braced himself for it.
If not wrath, then tears.
At the very least, some form of pleading.
“Agreed,” he said, gazing at her ivory face and the rigid set of her jaw.
“Good.” She padded across the floor toward him with a determined look in her eyes, and his trousers tightened around an arousal he did not even consider resisting. He had been a whole month away from his wife, and seeing this self-assured air of hers without any of the tears he had expected to come home to, he was pleasantly surprised.
He was all of a sudden hotly in the mood for sex.
She stood before him, her full lips moist and inviting, her perfume like a potent aphrodisiac to his senses. He laid his palm on her cheek and stroked her bottom lip. She closed her eyes and kissed his thumb, then took it into her mouth and sucked on it. The intense wet heat of her mouth sent a wild yearning through him.
He took her whole face in his hands and lowered his lips to hers, but she gently pulled back. Momentarily stalled, he opened his eyes.
Sophia stepped away from him. “I’m sorry, James, I won’t be performing my duty tonight.”