Page 55 of The Duke’s Matchmaker

“Oh, Dorothy, I know you’ve said you mean to remain a spinster, but surely this changes things,” Violet urged. “If you’ve realized that you have feelings for someone, that’s something you must consider. You owe it to yourself to give it a chance. And I truly believe that you’ll be glad you did!”

“I won’t,” Dorothy said. “I won’t do it, and I wouldn’t be glad.”

“Dorothy, why are you so determined to push everyone away?” Agnes asked with a sigh. “I know you’ve envisioned yourself as a wallflower, alone forever, but don’t you see that it doesn’t have to be that way? You don’t have to be on your own at all. You’re a lovely person, and Nathaniel is a good man, and the two of you could find love together if you would only allow it to happen.”

She gritted her teeth. “I can’t.”

“Why not?”

Dorothy hung her head. She was going to have to tell the truth, and she knew it. “Because…because of what happened to my sisters,” she said. “What happened to their husbands.”

Neither Violet nor Agnes spoke.

“I’m sure you think that’s foolish,” Dorothy murmured. “I’m sure you think that I’m wasting my life, that I’m allowing my fear to get the better of me. And maybe I am. But I can’t face it. I couldn’t allow myself to love someone, as my sisters did, only to lose him. I couldn’t go through all that pain and heartbreak. It’s too much. It destroyed them, and they are stronger than I could ever hope to be. I don’t know what it would do to me to try to live through such a thing, but I never want to find out. I never want to go through the pain I saw my sisters live through.”

“But, Dorothy, you know it’s not likely that you would,” Agnes said slowly. “Nathaniel is young and healthy. He has a long life ahead of him. The two of you could live that life together. I understand your fears, but it’s not likely you would lose him.”

“It wasn’t likely that the same fate would befall both Honora and Abigail,” Dorothy pointed out. “But it did. Perhaps my family is simply cursed. Perhaps this is what happens to us when we try to love.”

“You don’t believe that, surely?” Violet asked.

“I don’t know what I believe. I only know I can’t take the chance,” Dorothy said. “I’m decided, Violet. I can’t be persuaded. I know what I want my life to look like, and I know it’s the only way for me to keep myself safe. That’s my answer.”

“All right,” Agnes said briskly. “If that’s what you want, truly, then you must keep your distance from Nathaniel. If you continue to spend time with him, it will make it that much harder for you to draw a line and separate from him. You’ve got to stay away.”

“But I can’t,” Dorothy said. “I promised him that I would help him find a wife.” It seemed so foolish now, that she had done that.

“You don’t have to see that through,” Violet said gently. “He’s a grown man. He’s more than capable of tending to his own affairs.”

The trouble was, Dorothy didn’t believe for a moment that Nathaniel was capable of that. She might have been willing to leave him to his own devices anyway, but there was Colin to consider. A little boy who needed a mother. It wasn’t Colin’s fault that Dorothy hadn’t been able to control her own heart.

“I have to do it,” she said. “I can’t turn my back on a promise.” For a moment she wished she could tell them about Colin. That was something they would be able to understand. They’d see why she couldn’t turn on her promise to help find a mother for that poor little boy.

But she knew she couldn’t tell. No matter what happened between Nathaniel and herself, his wish to keep Colin a secret until he was ready was something she would honor.

“We’ll help you,” Violet said.

“What do you mean? Help me how?” How could anyone help her with the predicament she’d gotten herself into?

“We’ll help Nathaniel, she means,” Agnes said. “If he needs assistance in finding a wife, we can be just as useful as you can. And having our aid means that you’ll be able to distance yourself a bit. You won’t have to abandon the effort, but we’ll make it a team effort. We will do whatever we can to step in and help him to find the right lady.”

Dorothy sat up straighter. “You would do that?”

“It won’t be easy,” Violet murmured. “Helping him to find someone else when we know you yearn for him.”

“But I don’t really want him,” Dorothy said. “You wouldn’t be taking anything from me that I wanted to keep.”

“I understand. That’s what makes it all right. But I still think it’s going to be hard.” Violet sighed. “You know that I always hoped you’d find the man who would change your mind someday.”

“We didn’t know it was fear of your sisters’ fate that was keeping you from marriage,” Agnes said. “Though I suppose we ought to have realized. Of course that would be the reason. It makes perfect sense in hindsight.”

“It will help tremendously not to have to speak to him all the time any longer,” Dorothy said. She felt as if a weight had been lifted from her. There was sadness in the prospect of a distance between Nathaniel and herself, but that sadness was something she could manage. She would have the time to herself, the space she needed to put her feelings behind her. That would be vastly more difficult if she was forced to keep seeing him, especially as he began to court Lady Amanda.

What a shock it had been to see the two of them out together. To know that he was already beginning to call on her. And it looked as if it was going well.

Had Dorothy been wrong when she had guessed that he was about to kiss her? Had she misread that moment? Maybe it had been nothing at all.

“I’m sure he’s going to want to speak to me at the masquerade ball on Saturday,” she said. “He’ll want more advice on how to court a lady. He’s been trying to make his advances with Lady Amanda.”