It grew so thick that Amelia could endure it no longer. “Graham, what have I done?” she whispered, her voice breaking. “You have darkness in you, I understand that, but what have I done that you continue to punish me with your silence yet you…. yet you follow me and make sure I am well?”
She wrapped her arms around herself, both trying to hold herself together and block out the cold air.
Graham’s hand twitched, and she couldn’t help wonder if he wanted to reach for her. He clenched his hand into a fist, and the look on his face as he gazed at her was utter pain. The moonlight cast hard shadows over his face, and Amelia couldn’t stop mapping out every part of him even as her heart broke in her chest.
“It is notfair,” she whispered, her throat closing with tears. “I have done nothing but stand at your side and yet you give me this wall of silence. Does it not feel unbearable to you?”
His eyes betrayed the silence—for they showed her a whole world of emotions he dared not speak. But sheneededhim to.
“Heavens, it is rather cold out here.”
Percival’s voice broke the air between them and although Amelia looked at him, Graham’s gaze did not leave her, ignoring his cousin outright.
“Although, the tension between you both might as well heat up this whole house,” Percival chuckled. “Your Graces, forgive me for not seeking you both out sooner but I wished to apologise for my abhorrent behaviour at your ball the other night. I was very severely in my cups, and I did not mean to have an outburst like that. Graham, it was the most disrespectfulthing I have ever done, and I am sorry.”
Graham finally looked at his cousin, nodding sharply once. Amelia had the sense that he was merely acknowledging the apology without forgiving Percival.
“It appears the second half of the evening is about to begin,” Percival said, as if finally realizing he was in the middle of an awkward moment. He bid them goodbye and slipped back through the doors.
Without another word, Amelia walked on, behind him, but her wrist was caught by Graham. He tugged her back but only held her gaze, saying nothing. It both endeared and infuriated Amelia, not wanting him to let go, but wishing he would speak his mind.
Amelia pulled away first, filing into the drawing room with the rest of the guests. Graham rejoined her moments later. People kept looking her way, and the whispers flurried around her. She caught a snatch of Lord Ambrose being mentioned, and her own name. Last Cassandra’s was mentioned, and suddenly Amelia felt as though the room had shrunk in size.
It is only rumours, she thought, as the next performance began.It is not true, and they cannot hurt you. Except they did. Oh, they did. Stories swirled—how she had wanted Lord Ambrose from the start, how she had never wanted the Duke of Blackthorn at all, how she was now stuck with him and miserable. Her breastbone ached with tightness, and she could not endure it. Daphne curled her fingers around Amelia’s, a silent show of support. She burned with humiliation as people whispered about her so-called desperate attempts to be courted, the names switching from lord to lord. And her husband, who already blamed himself so much, would hear every single name, and she could only hope he believed in her, as she had believed in him.
The harp filled the room with a beautiful symphony but Amelia could only hear the blood rushing through her ears. She tightened her grip on Daphne’s hand, her breaths coming fast. The walls shrunk and shrunk—soon, they would close on her. Sitting among the crowd, Graham a tense solid wall next to her, and Daphne’s softness on her other side, Amelia was heated, unable to think. Voices swirled around her.
So is she a seductress of His Grace or simply every man in the ton?
Desperation drives a woman to terrible measures.
The Hawthornes must be so ashamed.
Amelia’s eyes stung with tears. She wanted to cry—to scream, to beg for help, but she was trapped. The harp grated on her nerves, shivering through her in a way that made her feel so on-edge. Everything she did was wrong; everything was twisted, and she could not escape.
Help, she thought.Help me.
And she did not know who she hoped to hear her.
All that she knew was that she needed to escape and not look back. Not tonight.
“Excuse me,” she mumbled. “It is rather hot in here.”
Her heart ached, her mind was exhausted, and her life felt in shambles. Dashing out of the drawing room, she heard the giggles and gasps following her but Amelia did not look back. She fled the room, in this townhouse where her story with Graham had begun, and she could not bear any of it. She made it to the steps of the townhouse’s entrance when she heard her name being called.
“Amelia!” Graham called, standing at the top of the stairs. In this light, he looked devastatingly handsome, and Amelia could not bear it. The dam burst, and angry tears began to spill as she looked at him. “Do not go.”
“Why not?” she cried. “Give me one reason, for my husband will not even speak to me, and the crowd gathered is using me as their favourite gossip topic. The music is beautiful but not so much that I will stay to endure all of that. You cannot ask me to do that.”
“They say you were trying to meet Lord Ambrose that day,” Graham said quietly, his voice carrying over the steps. He looked weary, angry. “Is it true?”
“How can you ask me that?” she spat. “Of course it is not. Of all the things I have blindly believed in you for simply because I knew your character…” She shook her head. “I am hurt, Graham.”
“I believe you,” he said. “I only wished to hear it from your lips, for I am tired of hearing every story beneath the sun from the lips of others.”
“Now you may answer my question, then.” Amelia faced her husband, emboldened only by her anger. “What have I done to earn your cruel silence?”
“Cruel?” he echoed. “My sister suggested I give you time to gather your thoughts and let you enjoy the night’s events without causing any further spectacle. Heavens knows I have ruined enough things for you.”
