Page 2 of The Mister I Married

“But isn’t it possible you’ve already met the right man?” Lady Keswick asked. “He might even be in this very room with us.”

Emmy stopped just short of snorting her skepticism. “I assure you, he is not.”

“I don’t know how you can say that with such certainty when you barely know any of the eligible gentlemen in Town. If you would only give them a chance—”

“I have given them a chance.” A negligible one, yes, but a chance all the same.

“You have not,” her mother argued. “Not a proper one. Only think of that nice Lord Truesdale. He would offer for you tomorrow if you would show him even the slightest encouragement.”

Emmy pursed her lips. “Lord Truesdale is a nincompoop.”

“He is an earl,” Lady Keswick huffed, “and an amiable one at that. You could do worse.”

Frustration flooded Emmy’s body, tensing her limbs and heating her cheeks. Of course she could do worse. She could probably do far worse, but was it really so terrible to yearn for far better?

It was true, she was no raving beauty like her friend Olivia—or her mother, for that matter, whose loveliness had not faded one bit, even as she approached her fiftieth birthday.

But while Emmy was not beautiful, neither was she a warty hag. She was reasonably intelligent, occasionally clever and always kind, and she deserved a husband who was her equal, someone she enjoyed being with and talking to. Was that truly too much to hope for?

“Forgive me, Mother, but I must excuse myself for a moment,” she said, struggling to keep her voice even. “I have just noticed a tear in my hem, and I must see it repaired before it worsens.”

Avoiding her mother’s gaze, she turned and walked away, her steps quick under the weight of her mother’s surely disapproving stare boring holes in her back. This was hardly a proud moment for her—she was literally running away from the conversation—but she didn’t care. She could not take even one more word on the topic of marriage, not if she had any hope of holding onto her temper.

Forcing a small smile to her lips, she weaved her way through the crush of bodies toward the exit, frustration still coursing through her veins. Honestly, one would think marriage was the sole reason she’d been put on this earth. Would it really be so terrible if she didn’t marry? It was generally believed to be a woman’s lot in life, to marry and bear children, but surely there was more to life than that? More to her than that?

She let go of her smile as she moved into the dim corridor, leaving the heat and noise of the ballroom behind her. Her steps slowed to a halt, and she breathed deeply, willing her thudding heart to slow. She had nothing against marriage as an institution. She had seen the happiness it could bring, the family it could lead to.

But it could also bring unhappiness, couldn’t it? And that was the crux of her worries. There were no guarantees in life, and marriage was a gamble, even when it began with love. Wouldn’t it be wiser to wait until she found a man who made her feel at least a little hopeful that their future together would be good?

After all, marriage would alter her life irrevocably, and if she was going to make that leap, that enormous change which would lay her own future in the hands of another, it would take more than a kindly, dim-witted earl to tempt her. No matter how desperate her mother was to marry her off.

Shoving the frustrating thoughts from her mind, she glanced to her left then her right, searching the faintly-lit corridor for the ladies’ retiring room. Spotting it, she headed left down the hallway, her yellow satin slippers shushing softly on the smooth marble floor. She had nearly reached her intended destination when a sound caught her ear—the low murmur of female voices.

She stilled, straining to hear, but the words were too low to make out, so she moved closer, following the sound down a separate corridor until she was close enough to hear. The hushed voices were coming from a small alcove, though she could not see who they belonged to. She hovered out of view, hidden behind a potted fig tree, and listened.

“…and we are only telling you this to spare your pride, Miss Whitcomb,” a low voice was saying, nasally and cool. “Lord Monroe danced with you tonight because he wants your dowry, nothing more.”

A second voice chimed in, this one higher in pitch and treacle sweet. “This is, no doubt, difficult for you to hear, but we are only trying to help you. This is your first Season, after all, and we should hate to see you embarrass yourself. Isn’t that so, Lady Anne?”

Emmy frowned. She knew these voices and whom they belonged to, and in all the time she’d known Lady Anne Hughes and Miss Delia Peyton, she’d never heard of either one doing anything which did not serve her own ends. Whatever the reason was for this little chat with Miss Whitcomb, it was not to offer the girl a helping hand.

“Indeed it is,” Lady Anne said, her voice even more nasally in her insincerity. “And it was so courageous of you to make your debut, Miss Whitcomb, considering your family’s…history. I know if I were in your place, I could never be so bold.”

“Nor I,” echoed Miss Peyton. “Why, I would rather die than see the pity and derision on everybody’s faces, and yet, here you are, as if it is nothing. You are so brave.” She said the word as if it meant something else, something dirty and wrong.

“I am not so very brave,” Miss Whitcomb said, and the misery in her voice made Emmy’s chest ache.

“Of course you are, poor thing,” Miss Peyton cooed. “If I had a mother as shameful as yours, I wouldn’t be able to show my face anywhere.”

“And knowing her scandalous blood flows through your veins…” Lady Anne tsked. “It must be terribly trying for you.”

That was it. The final straw. Emmy had heard enough.

She swooped into the alcove like an avenging angel, and drawled, “I shouldn’t be so quick to judge if I were you, Lady Anne. After all, haven’t you a great-uncle on your father’s side who was once a patient at Bethlem Hospital? And as for you, Miss Peyton”—she turned her gaze on the scowling brunette—“I believe I heard something about a distant cousin who was hanged for high treason against the Crown?” She gave her head a pitying shake. “Very naughty, indeed.”

Miss Peyton crossed her arms over her chest and gave a haughty sniff, but she made no effort to defend herself.

Lady Anne, the bolder of the two, gave Emmy a cold smile. “Come, Lady Emmaline, you know as well as I that an eccentric great-uncle is nothing to having a whore for a mother.”