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Chapter 21
Violette reeled on her feet, backing away from Lady Helen as the words sunk in.
“He beat her…?” she whispered into the air, not wanting to believe it. Of course, she had thought of her parents since she had left, but she had thought that her father’s anger would be directed at her. Her mother had hardly seemed to care for Violette at late, so in truth, she had thought her mother would be rather unaffected by the incident. This prospect though, was something new altogether. “No, tell me it is not true? Please?” Violette pleaded with Lady Helen.
“It is what I heard,” Lady Helen said, folding her arms again. “Interesting to see how little you care for your family to abandon them so.”
“Do not talk of things you know nothing about,” Violette said harshly, taking a step forward. “You talk of abandonment as though that is what I did, but it was not. Neither was it an easy decision to make. Do not talk to me like you are superior, Lady Helen. In some ways, you may be, but in others, you know little of me at all.”
“It seems your new friend knows little of you too.”
Violette had been about to walk away from Lady Helen when these words were uttered, forcing her to come to a stop and whip her head back round.
“I wonder what Lord Northrive would think to learn that the young man he has befriended is actually a young woman who has conned her way into his house?” Lady Helen said with a sneer, walking toward her.
“What? No,” Violette said, her voice more akin to a whimper as it quickly lost all signs of strength. She quickly glanced around them in the garden, fearful of being overheard, but no one else was up yet, and even the gardeners weren’t nearby. “I never conned him.”
“Didn’t you?”
“I was myself with him.”
“This is yourself? Pah! Truly?” Lady Helen laughed, gesturing down at Violette until she recoiled away.
“In some ways, more than you can imagine,” Violette said with honesty. In truth, the real her was halfway between this version and the version of herself that used to wear dresses.
“That does not concern me.”
“Then what does?”
Lady Helen didn’t answer straight away, but she lifted her chin a little higher and came closer to Violette, until she was staring down at her.
“Oh…there is something you want of me?” Violette asked, summarising the answer for herself.
“Well done,” Lady Helen said with a flicker of a smile. “I want you to leave.”
“What!?” Violette asked, her voice hitching loud.
“Leave this house, and do not come back.”
“I cannot do that. Lord…” She stopped, thinking only of Lord Northrive and the fear of having to say goodbye to him.
“Listen, your friendship is over with Lord Northrive one way or another. Either you end it now for yourself and leave on your own terms, or I will march back to the house now and tell them your secret.”
The threat hung in the air, making Violette back away until the acorns that had fallen from the nearby oak trees crunched under her boots.
“Is that understood?” Lady Helen said, walking closer and closer to Violette, no matter how much she backed away. “You will leave this house. Not only this morning, but in the next hour. I do not understand why you are here in the first place, but with Lord Northrive constantly staring at you, what chance do I really have?”
“I beg your pardon?” Violette said in surprise.
“His friendship with you is a distraction,” Lady Helen said insistently. “Before the week is out, Lord Northrive and I will be betrothed. I will make certain of it.”
“And you see me as delaying that possibility?”
“You are distracting him!” Lady Helen said, waving an errant arm back toward the house. “You will leave this house within the next hour. Is that understood? Or I will tell everyone here exactly who you are.”
Violette backed away.
“You have left me with no choice.”
