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It was as though I had been slapped. Had anything been in my arms, I would have dropped it. Had I been standing, I would have fallen to the floor. Nothing could have stripped the joy from me faster. It was as if I had been dragged once more into that room, and I could not speak or see. Everything was dark, and I was scared, and all I could do was suffer.
Why?
Why had the marchioness gone that far?
Was that not my past to tell or to keep secret?
I wanted to go home.
Please…
“Verity!”
Blinking, I looked to see him before me now.
“Ver—”
“I am tired. I think we should speak some other time—”
“Now it is you who is running away?” he asked. “After your great effort to create this time for us?”
I frowned. “I am not.”
“I know what it looks like to run away, for I do it often,” he said, pulling a chair in front of me. “I am expert at running from my past as well. What I began to say in the garden I wish to finish now.”
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“As I now know some of your past, I shall share my own,” he whispered as he took a seat across from me.
“So, you tell me not because you want to but because you feel guilty for prying into mine?” I did not want that to be the reason.
“I did not pry—well, I did, but I do not feel guilty. Do you not want to know more of me?”
I said nothing, looking away from him to see Ingrid peering into the room again.
“Now that I am to start, I do not know where to begin.” He chuckled, gripping his hands. It was only now that I saw his nervousness. “As you know, I am illegitimate, the bastard of the Marquess of Whitmear. My mother was named Sarah Darrington, and she was the daughter of a doctor. Actually, she wanted to be a doctor as well.”
“A female physician?” I grinned, for I had never heard of such a thing. “Not a midwife or an aide?”
“No, specifically a physician. My grandfather says she was clear on it. She practiced alongside him as an aide, despite his best efforts to deter her, and she always complained about not furthering her studies. She told him she would not marry if he did not teach her himself.”
“I quite like her.” I giggled. Hathor would have fainted. “Is your grandfather still alive?”
He nodded. “Yes, as is my uncle, my mother’s younger brother. He is an ironsmith and has forsaken medicine.”
“Why?”
“It is a long story that also involves my mother,” he said with a deep frown. “You see, my mother loved medicine, she believed in it, and she loved to see people recover from whatever ailed them. She thought it a miracle each time she saw someone she had once tended look as though they had never been ill. It also allowed her a great deal of freedom.”
“Just hearing it makes me wish to become a physician myself.”
He smiled, but it was half sullen. “I believe it was truly the happiest she was, and I wish I could have seen her so, for that was not how I remember her. She changed after meeting my father. A meeting of sheer luck. She and my grandfather had been called to attend to one of his friends while in London, and from every account, my mother and father fell madly in love at first sight. I never thought such a thing was possible until I myself became victim.”
I smiled. “So, your heart is similar to those of your parents?”
“It would seem so. Which is why I wish to run from you, for their love was a tragedy,” he replied, nearly whispering. “They were in love with each other, but she was simply a doctor’s daughter, and he was the future Marquess of Whitmear. A great many responsibilities were before him. Nevertheless, he could not deny himself with my mother. There are rumors he planned to elope with her despite his parents’ wishes.”
I gasped. “Elope? Gretna Green?”
“What do you know of Gretna Green?”
“I may not know much but I am not so naïve either. I have seen plenty in my freedom at Everely. Well…I have seen enough.” Young lovers who were denied permission would flee to this place in Scotland to take their vows. “Let us not be distracted from what happened next—I mean, from what happened to your mother.”
It was not just a story in a book. It had been his mama.
“What always happens. Gossip among the ton spread like fire, and of course, it burned the weaker of the two parties, my mother,” he whispered and leaned back in his chair. “My father’s family could weather a scandal. It was embarrassing, yes, but it would not ruin them. For my mother’s family, that was not the case. Everyone severed ties and accounts with my grandfather once the talk began. My grandfather was not a poor man, but he nonetheless needed income and standing. My father said not to worry, that once they were married, he would see things made right. He promised to return the first night of summer for my mother.”
