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She pulled on her undergarments when the door handle rattled again. This time, the door opened and Beatrice entered the room.
“My lady! You are back from London so soon?”
“No, I haven’t—it’s a long story, but I came back.”
“I thought it was odd how you left without your things and Miss Gale.”
Miss Gale!
“I trust you took good care of her?” Lavinia asked as she started combing her hair.
“Of course, she is walking around the premises like she is the queen. All the servants adore her, although she doesn’t seem to like men,” Beatrice said with a chuckle.
“That she doesn’t.” Lavinia smiled.
“I’ll bring her up to your room now if you want!”
“Yes, I’d love to see her, but later. I am in a bit of a hurry. Can you help me dress, please? And then I need you to go and wake the duchess.”
Beatrice halted mid-step. “You want me to wake the duchess?”
Lavinia threw her an irritated glance. “Or ask somebody to do it, please. It’s important.”
“No one wakes the duchess,” the girl insisted, still not moving from her spot.
“Very well, then help me get dressed, and I shall wake her myself. But for the love of all that’s holy, please, make haste.”
Beatrice rushed toward the corset and helped Lavinia into it. Lavinia quickly got dressed with the help of her maid and fidgeted in her chair while Beatrice braided her hair. Before she could say she was done, Lavinia jumped up, rushed out of her room, and started frantically knocking on Caroline’s door.
After what seemed like forever, the door cracked open, and Caroline peeked out, a worried pucker between her brows, a billowing nightdress covering her body.
“Lavinia? What’s wrong?” She looked around the hall and then opened the door wider. “Please, come in.”
Lavinia started pacing the moment she entered the room. “I do not know what to do. You always know what to do, so please, I need your help.”
“Lavinia, please, sit.”
“No!” Frustration, the sleepless night, and all the stress finally got to her. She could feel her body shaking as a tear slid down her cheek. “He is going to kill him!”
“Who?” Caroline walked toward the servants’ bell. She rang it and turned back to Lavinia. “Who is going to kill whom?”
“Sebastian called William out on a duel last night—”
“Well, duels do not get arranged for days. We have time to—”
“No!” Lavinia threw her hands up. “He is gone. It is today. Now!”
“That’s impossible.”
“When Sebastian wants something, nothing is impossible,” Lavinia said heatedly. And it was true. He always got what he wanted, and now he was on his way to kill the man his niece loved.
“Damn him and his hot-headed tendencies!” Caroline said as she paced into her dressing room.
Lavinia reached into her pocket for a handkerchief. “Perhaps if it was one or the other, but the fact that William hired thugs to kidnap us and put me in danger in order to take this time to seduce Victoria all made it too much of an unforgivable sin in Sebastian’s mind.”
“We could have discussed the marriage and come to a mutually beneficial decision,” Caroline yelled from her dressing room. “Perhaps we could even send William away, threaten him with the magistrate for what he did to you and Roth—for the kidnapping.”
Lavinia nodded as she wiped her tears with the handkerchief and folded it. “I know, I wanted to talk him out of it but—” She paused as she noticed the rose in the corner of the handkerchief. It was the same one as on the handkerchief Sebastian had wrapped her foot in while at Watchet.
