Page 106 of A Lady of Means
“And I will be nothing more to you than some shameful secret,” he said, eyes avoidant, hands steepled against his lips, voice thick.
Moria reached for him, but he pulled back.She felt a new kind of missing him when he held her off with a hand.“Let me,” he said.“I have to say this.”
He met her eyes, beyond her eyes, to all of her.“You are it for me.”
At his words, she shook her head, dabbing at the tears that were already running free, but he kept going.“I didn’t use the time that I had to stand before God and everyone we care about in a church, and I will not be able to make you a duchess, or even give you half the life you’re accustomed to.But I have made plans, Moria.”
He made her look at him; his soft grasp on her chin an affectionate tether, his other hand resting on her thigh.
“I have made plans with the skills and connections I have to provide a good life, albeit not a grand one.I have said all that there is to say by now, but I can love every part of you, every day that we have left.”
Moria opened her mouth to speak, to acquiesce, to agree to whatever terms he’d just put on the table; but just as she’d known moments before, their time had already run out.
A banging sounded on the door of the caretaker’s cottage.
“My lady, are you in there?Please, it’s me, you have to come quick.”
Moria and Devyn looked from the door some feet away, to each other, in recognition.It was Ella’s voice.
Moria sank back against the pillows, defeat washed over her features.She dabbed at her eyes and cleared her throat.Devyn reached for her, she threw herself into his arms.She held onto him like she’d hold onto a cliff before flinging herself to the depths awaiting below.Maybe he’d feel the desperation in her trembling hands and pressing fingernails and know this was an impossibly hard choice.
“My lady?”Ella called again, sounding frantic.
“Yes, Ella, give me one moment.”
“Don’t,” Devyn whispered, those arms she’d miss holding her against him, holding her together.
And when he removed them, silken inch by muscular inch, she crumpled.As she threw on her chemise, and he unbolted the door for Ella.She stood on shaky legs, searching through the haze of her tears for her stockings and her bodice.
“Let me, my lady,” Ella said gently, turning her to loosely lace her into her corset.
“You said I needed to be quick.Has something happened?”
Moria saw Devyn out of the corner of her eye, the arch of his back as he pulled his shirt over his head.She’d miss that view.That nibbling voice in her head said“you don’t have to, he could be yours.”
But at what cost to everyone around them?
“It’s Wednesday,” Ella elaborated as she attempted to tame Moria’s hair into something ladylike.“You’re supposed to attend a luncheon in your honor in an hour.”
Moria swallowed down her rising panic, focused on only her breaths as she pictured the faces who would be waiting for her.She could hear their greetings and their felicitations, she could smell the tea and all the sweet meats and cakes laid out on lace tablecloths.The luncheon was supposed to be for female friends and family of the bride only, but that number had been expanded to include so many faces she barely knew who only wanted to curry favor with a future duchess.Her holding court over preening nobles and elites alike who no longer held any past indiscretion over her.It’s what she’d wanted.
“My honor,” Moria said, the words weaker than she’d meant, “since that’s worth so much.”
She saw Devyn and Ella exchange worried glances.She looked down at the dress she was wearing.Ella had brought the dress they’d selected for the event.It was pink with pearl embellishments and two tiers of skirts.She hadn’t even noticed Ella putting them on her.Matching gloves adorned her hands.It was beautiful and ornate, but it was all wrong.
A hiccup started in her throat and came out as a sob before she could chase it back down.
Devyn was pushing Ella aside to wrap her in his arms.
Yes, this was right.Holding him in her arms, the smell of him in her nose and the linen of his shirt against her cheek.He was stroking her hair and he wasn’t telling her not to go, only that he loved her.
“Did you bring a carriage?”Devyn asked Ella, still holding Moria against his chest.
Moria didn’t listen for her answer.It didn’t matter if she rode in a carriage pulled by fine horses or walked several blocks, she had somewhere to be and she’d do what she’d been training for her whole life.
It would be so much easier if she could say something heartbreaking, deliver some blow that would let him see that she was just as awful as she’d warned him and he was better off without her.Only she couldn’t think of anything terrible to deliver, the only aspersions she could hurl like stones, were at herself.
She looked up at him.“Tell me you won’t miss me.”
