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Albert sighed. “We could, but you know how our Emma is. She would be more comfortable back at home.”
Matthew smiled. “I noticed she was quite open with Diana this evening.”
A wide grin brightened Albert’s features. “And I was pleasantly surprised. Perhaps I will not have to take her to London next season, after all.” Albert’s parents had died of a fever when Albert and Matthew were in Oxford, and Emma had been in the care of her aunt. Now she was under Albert’s care, and he was looking for a husband for her.
“Perhaps,” Matthew agreed. He leaned his head back and closed his eyes, pushing all thoughts of Diana and Dee from his mind. He wanted it to be as blank as parchment, but he soon learned how impossible a feat it was.
“Tell me a story, Bert,” he said. “Any story.”
“One day, long ago,” he began, and Matthew laughed.
“Are you in earnest?”
“You asked me to tell you a story, so I will tell you one of those I read to Emma.”
“It better not be about the girl with the glass slippers.”
“Precisely!”
Matthew shook his head, chuckling, but said, “Please continue.” He would listen to anything to keep himself from thinking.
“I am certain the duke is courting my Florence,” Margaret said when they arrived home, and Florence grinned like a cat who caught a mouse.
“I say Diana has behaved well today, Mother. Should we give her a reward?” Florence flopped onto the sofa, still grinning.
“I would have rewarded her if she had not disappeared,” her aunt’s hawkish gaze landed on Diana. “Where were you?”
“The ladies’ retiring room,” Diana replied wearily from the doorway.
Margaret’s eyes narrowed. “I do not believe you.”
“You may believe what you wish, Aunty.” A yawn made her pause. She knew she would not be able to sleep even if she tried but she wanted to attempt it. “Have a good night.”
No one replied to her as they continued talking about the attention Matthew had given Florence. Diana made her way up to her bedchamber to change.
When she entered the room, she looked about to ensure everything was the way she had left it because Margaret often ordered her own lady’s maid to search Diana’s room when she was out. Nothing appeared to be out of place, and she proceeded to her dressing room to remove her clothes and undo her hair.
She cursed to herself when she found her hands trembling as she unlaced her short stays. So much was happening so suddenly that she did not know what to do. She knew she should not ignore Crawford’s threats but she did not have any money to give him, not yet, at least.
She sat on the chair in front of her vanity and regarded herself in the mirror. She looked afraid, and she truly was. She feared Matthew would learn the truth and resent her, she feared her plans to run away after her twenty-first birthday might not be realized. Lastly, she was unsure how to save Matthew from courting and possibly marrying Florence because he thought she was Dee, which was all her fault.
She could distract him by meeting him but the more she interacted with him, the closer he would be to discovering all that she had hidden. Undoing her hair, she decided she would force herself to sleep, then find a way out of her troubles in the morning.
She finished undressing and washed her face, but when she returned to her bedchamber, she found Florence seated at her small writing desk with Matthew’s letters, which Diana always kept in a locked drawer, in her hands.
Chapter 10
“Iam learning how to become Dee, my dear cousin,” Florence said, looking up at Diana with a devious smile.
“How did you find them?” Diana asked, moving to snatch the letters back.
Florence shot to her feet and ran to the fireplace, holding the stack near the flames. “Come any closer and I will incinerate them.” Diana stopped where she was, her back as rigid as a tree trunk. “Good.” Florence held them away. “If you must know, I unlocked your drawer with my hairpin. I am sure you never thought I could do that.”
“Give them back to me, Florence.” Pleading with her would be futile.
“Oh, Diana.” Her cousin clicked her tongue. “You asked me to become Dee. Why do you wish to stop me now?”
Because she had realized her mistake. “You do not want to do this.”
