Gaetan could not possibly deny it. All his tenderness had been intended for them. He did not smile at Valérie the way he smiled at Madelena or Antonina. He never was half so delighted with Valérie, even if Valérie was more accomplished, more learned, more beautiful than his silly cousins. Gaetan knew only the pull of blood, the bonds of familial duty.
“Only one man has loved me,” Valérie insisted.
It hurt to admit this, and yet she had to. She was burning inside, consumed with a roaring pain, and if she did not speak this truth, she would be reduced to ashes. Hector had adored her. But even Hector had not been enough. Even his love had not been enough, and Valérie hated herself for it.
Her hands shook. She might have wept, humiliating herself in this man’s presence, but then Gaetan spoke.
“At last I understand your indifference,” Gaetan said.
His tone, the disappointment in his voice, made her snap up straight. She was the one who had a right to be disappointed! What could Gaetan complain about? How dare he look at her as if she were at fault.
Shehad been dutiful.Shehad been a proper wife.
“I would have his name,” Gaetan said.
“Do you really want me to say it? Can’t you guess it?” Valérie replied.
“I will have his name, damn you!”
He was angry. Finally true emotion coursed through him instead of the tepid affection he had always granted her, she who demanded a roaring fire and had been given but a tiny match to light her heart. No wonder he disgusted her.
“Hector Auvray,” Valérie said. “We were engaged once. But I was forced to wed you and then he came back for me. From across the water, from Iblevad, as he said he would. He waited ten years for me.”
A decade,she thought desperately. Despite everything, it meant something.
“He’ll ask you for Antonina’s hand in marriage. Can you possibly grant it, knowing this?” Valérie asked, a smile dancing on her lips.
“I have granted it. I will not rescind it.”
“Even—”
“You are correct on one point, Valérie. And that is that I care for Antonina very much. I would like to see my cousin be happy, and she loves that man with all her heart, as was obvious today.
“And he loves her,” Gaetan added.
She would have slapped him this time, but he moved across the room and opened the armoire, pulling dresses and tossing them on the bed as though they were old rags rather than precious silks and velvets.
“You will pack your bags tonight. You are leaving for Eli, near the northern border. There you will remain,” Gaetan said.
“You will attempt to send me away from Loisail?” Valérie asked. “As if I’d go.”
Loisail was as important as the air that she breathed. It washercity. She was in the society pages every other week, a constant fixture at the most lavish parties. The boulevards might as well have been named after her.
“You have no choice.”
“Attempt to put me on a train, and tomorrowThe Courierwill have the most scandalous story printed on the front page, and it will concern Antonina Beaulieu. All a woman has is her reputation,” she warned him.
He moved back toward her, clasping her arm with a force she did not know he possessed, his fingers tight.
“Attempt to say a word against my family, Valérie, and not only will I divorce you, I will see that you are left begging in the streets.”
She tried to shove him off, but Gaetan only squeezed her arm tighter until at last he flung her away. Valérie landed by the bed, stumbling and almost tripping as her foot tangled in a dress that lay on the floor.
She heard the fabric rip as she straightened herself up.
“You wouldn’t divorce me,” Valérie said. “They’d blather all around the city about it.”
“Yes, they would. Which is why I’m sending you to Eli. A separation of this sort is not unheard of and better for both of us. I’ll give youan annuity. But my kindness has a price, and that price is that you stay far away from me and my kin, that you never speak of us.”
