Page 10 of What's a Duke Got to Do With It
“Honoria,” Adelaide reprimanded gently.
“Oh, don’t tell me you aren’t just as surprised as me,” Honoria shot back. She returned her attention to Katrina. “You’ve been waiting for that blasted letter for a month. It’s all you’ve talked about. And you haven’t read it yet?”
Miserable, Katrina could only shake her head.
“Honoria,” Adelaide tried again, her voice sharper this time. “Enough.”
“No, she’s right,” Katrina said. “I should have opened it the moment I received it. But once I read it…”
Her voice trailed off, unable to finish the sentence. But her friends knew her heart better than anyone.
“Once you read it, you shall have your answer,” Seraphina replied quietly. “And it may not be the answer you want.”
“And so you keep it shut up, much like shutting up a cat in a box,” Bronwyn mused. Excitement began to light her eyes, which glittered behind the lenses of her spectacles. “While it’s in the box, it can be both alive and dead.”
“A paradox,” Seraphina said thoughtfully, looking at Bronwyn, one auburn brow raised. “Interesting. Do you suppose—”
“I do believe,” Adelaide cut in loudly, “that we should focus on the problem at hand, ladies.” Returning her attention to Katrina, she gentled her tone. “Is that why you haven’t opened the letter yet? You fear what his answer might be?”
“Yes.”
Suddenly Honoria was before her, snatching the letter from Katrina’s grasp. “Well, there is only one way to fix that particular problem,” she declared. “We open and read it for you.”
This time Adelaide did not resort to merely a verbal reminder that their friend had crossed a line. In an instant she was on her feet, diving for the paper.
“You most certainly shall not,” she declared, straining to reach the missive.
Honoria, however, was considerably taller than Adelaide, and able to lift the letter thoroughly out of reach. “Oh, come along,” she said. “Even you in all your patience and goodness must want to know what the letter contains.”
“That is neither here nor there,” Adelaide gritted, straining up on her toes to reach the piece of foolscap, giving a tiny hop for good measure. “We are not the ones who should be deciding when and where the letter is opened.”
“Oh, for goodness’ sake.” Seraphina sighed, rising and plucking the letter from Honoria’s hand with ease. “Katrina,” she said in a carrying voice to drown out Honoria’s objections, “would you like one of us to open the letter for you?”
The room went silent, each woman turning to Katrina, seemingly with bated breath. Katrina, for her part, bit her lip in uncertainty. Then, before she could think better of it—really, it was the ideal plan, for she would have her dear friends surrounding and supporting her no matter what the letter read—she closed her eyes tight and nodded.
“Yes. Do it. Please, before I lose my nerve.”
There was a general sound of scuffling, quiet quarreling as it was decided who would do the deed. And then silence descended, broken only by the sound of the seal being opened.
Then and only then did Katrina dare to open her eyes. Adelaide had the letter in her hands and was carefully unfolding it. From her spot beside her, Katrina could see the letter was short, a worryingly concise message. In the next moment Adelaide, face tight with unease, began to read aloud.
“Katrina, I am—”
Adelaide paused, looking about the room in outraged disbelief before her gaze finally came to rest on Katrina. And there was so much pity in her dark eyes that Katrina felt she might cast up her accounts then and there.
But it was too late to put Bronwyn’s hypothetical cat back in its box. Straightening her shoulders, she swallowed down her bile and said with as much poise as she could manage, “Please finish.”
Pressing her lips tight, Adelaide nodded and turned resolutely back to the letter in her hands. Her voice shook as she continued. “I am ashamed of you, even more so than I was four years ago. Do not contact me again, and do not return home; there is no place for you here. Francis.”
How strange, Katrina thought a moment later, for while her friends had not uttered even the faintest noise at the commencement of the letter, a peculiar rhythmic rushing filled the room now, a sound that grew louder and louder with each passing second. It took her some moments to realize the sound was her blood rushing in her ears. When spots began to swim in her vision and she swayed in her seat, she came to the troubling conclusion that she had not drawn breath for some time. It was not until Adelaide’s hand took tight hold of her arm, however, that she was able to inhale at all.
She dragged in a great gulp of air, her head clearing as she fought to right herself. All the while her friends’ voices surrounded her, muffled at first, then growing clearer, their outrage a palpable thing.
“How could he?”
“The bloody idiot.”
“If he was here, I would call him out and shoot off his other arm.”
