Page 8 of Duke of Diamonds
Fiona reached for her teacup. “I could not sleep.”
Prudence snorted lightly. “And what, pray, could keep you awake at night? You’ve no responsibilities beyond choosing a gown and remembering which fork to use.”
Fiona glanced down at her untouched plate. “May I speak with you both? It is a matter of some consequence.”
Lord Holden, seated behind the broadsheet, lowered it by an inch to peer at her. “What has you wriggling like a mouse?”
“It concerns the Earl of Canterlack,” Fiona said.
The paper fell completely.
“What about him?” Prudence asked sharply, pausing mid-slice of her toast.
Fiona steadied herself. “I cannot marry him.”
The silence that followed wound every nerve in her body.
CHAPTER 3
“Fiona, are you ill?” Prudence asked, her voice dripping with exaggerated concern that made Fiona’s skin prickle with irritation.
Ill? Is that truly what must be assumed? That one must be feverish to object to marrying a man who so shamelessly betrayed her?
“I am perfectly well, Mama,” Fiona replied with as much composure as she could summon, keeping her tone even and her posture measured, though her stomach twisted in protest. “And it is exactly as I said—I cannot marry the Earl.”
Her declaration seemed to settle in the room like a thick fog, obscuring all movement and muting all sound. Her mother’s fork hovered halfway to her mouth, forgotten, while her father, seated at the head of the table and obscured behind the morning paper, did not so much as twitch. He simply nursed his coffee with that same unreadable calm he always wore—like a mask he had long since mastered.
It was his silence that most unnerved her. That stillness.
At last, his voice broke through.
“Why?”
It was just one word, but it was enough to make Fiona feel as though she’d been struck. Sharp and cold, it cleaved through the air with the efficiency of a sword. There was no room for ambiguity in his tone. It was a command.
Fiona straightened in her chair, her hands clasped tightly together in her lap to still their trembling. “Because he has another woman,” she said plainly, the words dropping like stones between them.
Her father’s reaction was immediate.
He laughed.
A full, unrestrained, amused laugh that rang out across the breakfast room like a peal of mockery. It took Fiona a moment to understand what she was hearing. Her mouth parted, and she blinked, slowly, as though disbelieving.
How could he?—?
“Is this amusing to you, Papa?” she asked, her voice sharpening. “I fail to see the humour.”
“If that is the case,” he said, still chuckling, “then all the more reason for you to marry him. At least you know he’s experienced.”
“I beg your pardon?” Her voice cracked on the edge of disbelief, rising despite her efforts to contain it.
Her mother interjected then, smoothly and without looking up from her plate. “What your father means is?—”
But Lord Holden lifted a hand, silencing her without so much as a glance. His eyes, when they met Fiona’s, were no longer amused. They were steel.
“You are being naive and foolish, girl. Utterly foolish,” he said, his voice now low and taut with warning. “So allow me to be perfectly clear: I do not wish to hear another word of this nonsense. You shall marry Canterlack, and that is the end of it.”
Each syllable landed with brutal precision.
