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“Bernard.” Her father gasped.
“You should be pleased with me, Judah. I’
ve at least made it possible to recover her reputation.”
“Bernard.” Red-faced, her father stumbled to his feet, rocking the carriage.
Her uncle raised his head and rolled his eyes. “She announced her behavior with Mr. Truitt to half of Philadelphia. News that there was actual marriage should solve that issue quite nicely. You owe me some gratitude.”
Uncle Bernard could hang. She didn’t shout it from the rooftops. She had more sense. She also hadn’t announced anything to her father—just fibbed about the kiss. Her cheeks burned.
“That’s a bit of a misrepresentation. I only discussed certain matters with Jay’s father. Yes, a few other people were present, but I needed to prove that he wasn’t the monster they all believed. That was more important than my reputation. People already hated me.”
Blast. The tears rolled down her cheeks again. She wiped with her elbow. Tears would detract from her point.
“Mr. Truitt apparently has some sort of marking on his body.” Her uncle gave her father a knowing look.
She scowled. Uncle or not, he was one gesture away from being cut off from his portion of the Nunes profits. That was the one advantage to learning the secrets. Two thirds of the holdings were hers. Her “suggestions” were now law.
Hecate screeched as her father threw a valise at the space next to her.
“I’ll kill him.” Her father punched his own fist.
Uncle Bernard gave another eyeroll, this one more theatrical than the last. “Judah, you can’t be serious. How did you not know?”
Her father picked up and tossed two volumes of balance sheets on the floor. Both spines cracked. More restringing, more expense.
“But she’s responsible. She prefers accounting to dancing. She frowns on frivolity.” Her father’s voice was more bewildered than angry.
She’d be humiliated if her soul wasn’t torn asunder.
Uncle Bernard’s eyes twinkled a smidge. “My dear brother-in-law, you truly are the most naïve man to ever live, even after—”
Dash it all—Rachel and Isaac. Her cousins were less skilled at holding their tongues than, well, she was.
“I’m going to murder your children—do you know that? I should’ve never given them gifts.” She scowled, but her lips twitched at the image of the conversation that must have been had.
Her uncle winked at her—winked at her like—well, like Jay. Bollocks. She was going to cry again.
“My children only confirmed what the Hales told me. Silence is not a family trait. You should’ve been more specific with your bribes, a lesson for next time.”
She blinked up at him through her tears. The unending pain remained but the numbness dissipated, almost as if she were alive again.
“Enough.” Her father had his hands over his ears.
Family. Regardless of what was said in the papers or what happened to her, he and her uncle and her cousins would always be her family, right or wrong, and she would take care of them. She wiped her eyes with the back of her hand.
Her father mopped his brow with the cuff of his sleeve. She should purchase something less tempting for him, so he’d use the dratted handkerchief in his pocket.
“I’m warning you, Ursula. You aren’t too old to be locked in your room and forbidden from attending that party.”
She sucked in her lips to prevent the full smile. Locked her in her room indeed. That’d been impossible since she was eight and discovered lattices. Besides, she was a married woman—if her marriage could sustain Rabbinic scrutiny, which she doubted.
To be fair, her uncle’s plot was actually genius. Even if the marriage wasn’t legal, in the Jewish or gentile world, going through the motions of asking a rabbinic court for the necessary paperwork—a Get—to undo the marriage contract, as if the parties believed it valid, would give the family plausible deniability regarding her reputation. Not that she’d actually need the process to remarry, if the marriage was valid, as Jay wasn’t a Jew, but gentile society wouldn’t know that.
Ursula shook her head. Just brilliant, especially as Uncle Bernard had no desire for her to marry Jay in the first place. He’d have his cake and eat it too. He should’ve been a lawyer.
Her father kicked the balance book corpses, so they ricocheted off her uncle’s footrest.
