Page 83 of Ladies in Hating
Only—
When she thought of her future now, all she could see in it was Cat.
Perhaps she had ruined everything, there in Cat’s gold-saturated bedchamber at dawn. Perhaps she had destroyed what was flowering between them. Perhaps Cat never wished to see her again.
Perhaps Georgiana had been too great a coward.
But could she not at leasttry?
She looked very hard at the wrinkled mess of her skirts and the trail of white hairs that Bacon was depositing across the fabric. “The truth is,” she said to her mother, “I am in love.”
There. She’d said it. And the world had not fallen apart.
She peered up at Edith, whose face was evincing no expression whatsoever.
“Ah,” Edith said finally. “I must admit, I did not expect that.”
“With Lady Darling.”
“Oh!” Edith said, and there was a curious note in her voice before she hastily smoothed it out. “Oh.”
Georgiana took a careful breath. She had told her mother, many years ago now, that she would not ever marry. That she would never feel the proper sort of love and passion.About a man,she had said, slowly and precisely. And Edith had paused, and nodded, and they had not spoken of it again.
But she had felt certain that her mother knew and understood. When they’d readEmmatogether a few years ago, Edith had remarked calmly that Miss Woodhouse seemed to fancy Miss Smith for herself. And when a Piccadilly print shop had displayed a satirical cartoon of Louisa Strachan and Sarah Greville kissing in the park, Edith had only murmured, “I think they look very happy.”
They were reserved, both of them—reluctant to speak of their feelings aloud. But Georgiana had heard each measured remark for what it was.You are safe with me. You need not be afraid.
But even so, this was the first time she had ever declared her feelings quite so openly.
Courage,she thought,and light.
“Dearest,” Edith said finally, “if you should like for me to watch Bacon while you work up the nerve to declare yourself, you need only ask.”
Georgiana made a sound halfway between a laugh and a sob. “I think that might be very useful, yes.”
Edith brushed her hand over Bacon’s one drooping ear. “We get on quite well, you know.”
“Oh, Mama.” Carefully, cautiously, she tipped her head against Edith’s shoulder. Just as carefully, Edith patted back hertangled hair. “I’ve blundered so badly. I broke a promise. And I—Ihurther.”
“Then you will make things right.”
“I don’t know if I can. And I don’t”—oh God, it was so hard to say it—“I don’t know if she will…”Forgive me. Want me, broken and wrong-headed as I am.
“Dearest,” her mother said firmly, “I know you. It is not in your nature to give up.”
Chapter 26
Iris’s efforts with the Renwick papers have borne fruit. Meet me at dusk at Belvoir’s. Please.
—from Georgiana to Cat
Cat folded and refolded the note between her fingers in the alley behind Belvoir’s Library. It had gone worn already—she’d worried her thumb over the crease in the paper enough times that it felt soft beneath her fingers.
She was familiar enough with Georgiana’s hand by now that her heart had leapt before she’d even read the thing, the moment she’d taken it from the message boy who’d deposited it at her apartment. She’d recognized the flowing script—even Georgiana’shandwritingwas exquisite, a fact which Cat took some offense to—and she’d hoped…
She scarcely knew what she had hoped for.
In any case, she hadn’t got it. The words on the page were clipped and concise, and she could almost hear Georgiana’s cool voice articulating the words.
