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“You do?” he asked, holding back the words that he did too.
“She is everything I could hope for in a daughter-in-law.” Her words made Antony shift in his seat and open his book, pretending to be avidly reading.
“I do not believe Fergus has noticed her virtues, mother. You may have to give up hope for her being your daughter-in-law.”
“It was you I was thinking of. Not Fergus,” she said quickly.
“Mother, please,” he pinched the bridge of his nose. “We have been over this, many times.”
“I wish to speak of it again,” she leaned toward him, placing a hand on his arm, “for I do not understand why you have condemned yourself to being alone. There seems no sense in cutting your nose off to spite your own cheeks–”
“Face, mother,” he said quickly. “The phrase is face.”
“Do not change the subject,” she said, shaking her head. “I wish to talk about Lady Hermione.”
“And I do not.” He moved to his feet. He pushed the book under his arm to carry it as he walked toward the doorway of the library. If he could not hide from his mother’s pleas in here, then he would retreat to his room, where he could easily hide from her.
“Antony, please, just speak with me,” she pleaded with him, tottering behind him as they walked through the labyrinth of shelves. He glanced back just once, seeing her tottering on her feet with the slim skirt. It would have been a rather funny sight had he not been so angry at the topic of conversation.
“Mother, I am not doing this again,” he said plainly. He stopped by the doorway to the library with his hand on the handle, ready to open it, as he turned back to his mother. “I have no wish to marry. Least of all Lady Hermione.”
“Why not?” she asked.
“For starters, we barely know her.”
“That’s how all relationships begin. You can get to know her,” his mother said with hope. He had to shut down that hope.
Flirtation was fine, fun even, but marriage? No, never!I experimented with that life once; I will not put myself through that pain ever again.
“I have no wish to get to know her,” he said quite loudly, speaking over his mother so she couldn’t plead with him anymore. “As far as I’m concerned, Lady Hermione could leave this house tomorrow, and I’d think no more of her than I would the next wave that crashes onto the shores of Lyme Regis Bay.”
He didn’t wait to see his mother’s reaction; he just hoped he had made himself plain. He opened the door and was about to march through it when he stumbled to a frantic stop in the doorway. Lady Hermione was standing just a step away with her hand outstretched as though she had been about to enter the library. The paleness to her cheeks, the widened eyes, and the open lips told Antony of her shock.
Oh God… she heard me.
