Page 3 of Duke of Destruction
Ariadne didn’t have the same distraction.
But perhaps, Catherine thought hopefully, this party would prove fruitful for her sister. Even if it didn’t result in an engagement, perhaps Ariadne would make a connection that would lead somewhere. There were months and months before the next Season would start. That was plenty of time for Ariadne to make a match without having to go through the chaos of another year’s entertainments.
The mere mention of the Season made Ariadne’s expression move more overtly into a grimace.
“Can’t I just give up and become a spinster?” Ari asked, a note of genuine pleading in her voice.
Catherine shook her head. “I’m afraid not, darling. If you want to be a spinster, you’ll have to earn it. Three or four Seasons at least.”
That was how I earned my spinster title,Catherine didn’t say. It would have smacked of bitterness if she did, and she truly wasn’t bitter about her lot in life. She loved Ariadne and Jason, the two siblings she’d helped raise after her father’s death in a fire and her mother’s subsequent inability to see beyond her grief to do much of… anything.
Catherine and Xander, her eldest brother, had taken control of the family. And for a long time, that had worked well.
But now Xander was married and a father. Jason, too, had married—young enough that it had surprised them all. They were both charmingly, nauseatingly happy in their marriages—to a pair of sisters, no less.
And now Ariadne was on the marriage market.
Catherine wanted her sister to make a good match. Of course she did. All Ariadne’s jokes about being a spinster aside, Catherine suspected that Ariadne was the kind of person who would thrive in a marriage to a man who truly saw her. She’d do well being settled. And she would be a marvelous, wonderful mother.
Catherine tried not to think about how much her own life would change after she was no longer responsible for her sister’s care.
Ariadne was looking at her suspiciously. “How many Seasons didyouhave, Kitty?”
Catherine raised an eyebrow. Ariadne knew this answer; she was just being a little pest. Perhaps her sister wasn’t all the way grown, after all.
“Three,” Catherine replied sweetly.
“Then it sounds like you have one more before you can quit,” Ariadne said, just as sweetly.
Catherine rolled her eyes. She was six and twenty and more and more firmly on the shelf every day. Anyone who still wanted her would be after a connection to the Lightholder name and nothing else.
Catherine was not interested in someone who wanted to marry her to get access to her brother, his name, and his money.
And she wasn’t about to let Ariadne fall prey to any fortune hunters either.
Which brought her back to planning. Drat, little sisters—Ari had almost managed to distract her.
“As I was saying,” she went on—and not a moment too soon, as she could see the Wilds estate rising in the distance. “The Duke of Wilds himself is a rake, but heisknown for throwing marvelous parties, which means that there will be lots of peoplehere. Young ladies often overlook the other women at house parties, but don’t forget—those ladies are mothers and sisters and aunts and?—”
“I’m familiar with the types of family relationships, thank you,” Ari quipped.
Catherine gave her one of her best older sister looks. “Why is it that you aren’t shy with me, hm?”
“You’re just lucky, I suppose.”
“Hm. Yes.Lucky. Anyway, don’t overlook the women, is all I’m saying. This house party will be—don’t give me that look; I’m not going to say it’s going to be fun again—it will be a valuable experience. Productive.”
“The Catherine Lightholder guarantee,” Ariadne joked.
Catherine stuck out her tongue. She might have teased Ariadne for behaving differently among family than she did among the greater environs of theton, but Catherine was no different, not really.
She had always been adept at showing a proper, demure face to the world. She knew the rules of theton. They were… well, noteasyto follow. There were too many rules for it to be called easy. But they were straightforward, and Catherine had the means to help her stay on the straight path that Society laid out.
She could only ever be her true self with her family. And maybe that was why, for all that much of her was eager to see Ariadne happily settled, a small part of her worried about what would happen after all her siblings were married and busy with their own lives, their own families.
That was a worry for later, however. For now, they had arrived.
So she pulled on the Catherine Lightholder mask and prepared to do what she did best: make sure that everything went perfectly for her family.
