Page 49 of Manufacturing a Duchess

She stopped, a brief look of horror at what she had let slip, but she did not elaborate further on who she meant. But she could not stay silent for long. “He is everything I want! I. Want. Him. And everything I’ve always wanted, I have managed to get. Except for money. You have the money. I do not.” She stopped and shot a look of pure venom at Aurora.

“At least I can comfort myself that he is simply marrying you for your money. Poor man. Having to put up with you when he could have had this—me! How does it feel, Aurora, to be so obviously an afterthought, well, a choice made by necessity only? A bluestocking without breeding, who will never, ever, ever fit in with the Ton. I would advise you to hide yourself away in the country. And let him take a mistress, as I know he will need to.” At that, Missie’s eyes narrowed. “And whatever arrangement I eventually enter into, I believe I will be able to find a way to make him mine. All that beauty in a man should not be thrown away, wasted, on the likes of you!”

Aurora sucked in a breath. “Missie, you cannot mean that. If you take the Duke of Galloway as your husband, he is cousin to—and also best friends—with Alec. You cannot do that to them. It is hateful!”

“Oh, Alec, is it? Are you now so very cozy, the two of you? What were you doing yesterday morning? Or this morning? I did not see you at the breakfast table on either day. Has he made sure you are his, now? Or is it that you have attempted to secure him that way? Are you well and properly soiled, Aurora?”

Aurora reached out and slapped Missie across the face. “How dare you!” she spat out between clenched teeth. “How. Dare. You. You have an ugly, ugly mind, Millicent Wentworth. If I have been able to do one thing for him, at least I have saved Alec Raeburn from you.”

Missie sat there, stunned, as if a kitten had abruptly transformed into a full-grown lion before her eyes. She blinked, and her mouth opened and closed, but no sound came out. An imprint of Aurora’s hand stood out starkly against the flush of Missie’s cheek.

Aurora said nothing further, but straightened herself, feeling as if her spine had been replaced with some form of unbreakable metal, and headed to the door. She turned back at the last minute, with her hand curled around the handle. “Consider this our farewell, Missie. I hope to never see you again.”

And with that, Aurora left the room, shutting the door with a firm click behind her.

Her knees abruptly sagged, and she leaned back against the wall to keep from sliding down to the floor. Breathe, Aurora, just breathe. She suddenly remembered back to the time at school—they had been thirteen? Fourteen?—when she had asked Missie, “Why are you friends with me?” They had been huddled around the fire, working on their embroidery.

Missie had set down her hoop and scrunched her mouth in concentration. “Because you really look at people, Rorie. You see me. Too many people don’t. They see—” She gestured at her face and hair and dress. “—This, and they think it’s me. It isn’t.”

Aurora had gone to bed that night, turning over the words in her head: I see things, I see things. Now, those same words came back to mock her. Because she clearly had not seen this depth of cruelty in Missie, the anger which spilled over into rage. It made her question whether they had ever really been friends. The taste in her mouth was suddenly bitter, as if she had swallowed something vile. A tiny voice spoke of pity, but she was not ready to listen to it yet.

To try and allay the shaking of her body in reaction to what had taken place with Missie, she brought strangely freezing cold hands to her hot and flustered face. Gradually, Aurora stopped her trembling and let her hands fall once again to her sides, smoothing down her skirts until she noticed she was doing so and stopped. Squaring her shoulders, she looked in the direction of the staircase and took a step toward it.

A slight sound caused her to turn her head. Her eyes met those of the Duke of Galloway, stepping outside of his room directly across the hall at this exact moment.

He took one look at her, and Aurora watched his carefully cultivated air of nonchalance slide away. She watched realization and compassion cross his face; he momentarily appeared as if he would cross to her. She quietly shook her head, and he ducked his own in acknowledgement. Without saying anything, he turned and went back into his room, quietly shutting the door behind him.

Holding onto the banister, Aurora made herself walk downstairs and back into the drawing room. It seemed an age since she had left it, though, in truth, it had only been ten or fifteen minutes. Marjorie leapt out of her father’s lap when she entered and ran to Aurora, grabbing her around the waist. Aurora bent to kiss the top of her head.

“It is all right, Marjorie. I am fine. It will be all right, I promise.”

Marjorie lifted her head and looked into her face. “Is the Beautiful Lady leaving?”

“Yes, Marjorie, she is leaving. And you never have to see her again.” At those words, Aurora turned and looked at Alec, who nodded and slowly rose to his feet.

“If you would excuse me,” he said, “I think it is my turn.”

Forty

Alec gave three short, sharp knocks on Finn’s door, the same signal they had used since they were boys.

“Come in, Alec,” he heard, and Alec entered.

Alec saw his friend standing over his open trunk, directing his valet to complete the process of packing. “If you would leave us, Davies. I will call you back when I am ready to resume.”

“Very good, Your Grace.” The man quietly stepped through into the dressing room and shut the door, leaving the two cousins standing together in the middle of the room.

“So, you are going to return to London with her, Finn?”

Finn sighed and ran his fingers through his hair, thoroughly displacing the complicated and precise arrangement his valet had prepared for him. “Yes, cousin. I feel obligated, for her own honor⁠—”

“Honor? What type of honor does that woman have? Good God, Finn!”

Finn put up a hand to stop him. “Alec, I know. She is still very young. And underneath all that seemingly polished sophistication and beauty, there is a person there who is in pain.”

“And you feel you need to rescue her?” Alec could feel the edge and impatience in his voice, and he tried to tamp it down. This was not Finn’s fault.

“Only as far as London, Alec. I want no scandal to touch her. Well, at least as little as possible. With a ne’er-do-well for a father, she is in desperate financial straits. Any rumor that I had abruptly dropped her could ruin her by starting the tongues wagging. And—no, Alec, no.” Finn interrupted himself to forestall the next outburst from his cousin. “I am not going to offer for her. Any consideration of that ended today.” His mouth twisted and he continued. “In spite of my lectures on how I have wished to behave like the Ton, how this is the way our world works, and how I wanted to be the ultimate Pink of the Pinks—would this marriage of convenience be enough? No, Alec. No. I cannot go through with this. I have no desire to have a calculatedly arranged and coldly executed marriage, with each person living a different, separate life and trying to scrape together some sort of happiness.