Mr. Cavendish, I Presume

Amelia’s father nodded approvingly. He’d always wanted to join the military, she remembered. He couldn’t, of course. He’d gained the earldom at the age of seventeen, with no male heirs behind him. Crowland could not risk losing the last earl before he’d had a chance to procreate. As it was, he’d had five daughters.

Amelia wondered if he sometimes wished he’d just gone into the army. The outcome would have been the same, as far as the earldom was concerned.

“I am satisfied that he is a blood relation,” Thomas said quietly. “All that remains is to determine whether he is also one by law.”

“This is a disaster,” her father muttered, and he walked over to the window to look out.

All eyes followed him—what else were they meant to look at, in such a silent room?

“I signed the contract in good faith,” he said, still staring out over the lawn. “Twenty years ago, I signed the contract.”

Amelia’s eyes widened. She’d never heard her father speak this way. His voice was tense, barely controlled, like a string pulled taut and trembling, just waiting to snap.

Abruptly, he turned around. “Do you understand?”

he demanded, and it was difficult to know just who he was yelling at until his eyes came to rest on Thomas’s face.

“Your father came to me with his plans, and I agreed to them, believing you to be the rightful heir to the dukedom. She was to be a duchess. A duchess! Do you think I would have signed away my daughter had I known you were nothing but . . . but . . . ”

Her father’s face turned red and ugly as he tried to figure out just what Thomas was. Or would be, if Mr.

Audley’s claim was authenticated. Amelia felt sick. For herself. For Thomas.

“You may call me Mr. Cavendish, if you so desire,”

Thomas said, his voice terrifyingly calm. “If you think it might help you to accustom yourself to the idea.”

But her father was not finished. “I will not allow my daughter to be cheated. If you do not prove to be the right and lawful Duke of Wyndham, you may consider the betrothal null and void.”

No!

Amelia wanted to shout it. He couldn’t just tear it all up. He couldn’t do this to her. She looked frantically to Thomas. Surely he would say something. Something had happened between them. They were no longer strangers. He liked her. He cared for her. He would fight for her.

But no.

Her heart sank. Crushed under its own leaden weight.

Apparently he would not.

Because when her mind cleared enough for her to focus on his face, she saw that he was nodding. And he said, “As you wish.”

“As you wish,” she echoed, unable to believe it. But no one heard her. It was just a whisper. Just a horror-struck whisper from a woman no one seemed to notice.

They weren’t looking at her. None of them. Not even Grace.

And then her father turned, and he looked at Mr.

Audley, and he pointed his finger at him. “If that is the case,” he said, “if you are the Duke of Wyndham, you will marry her.”

Later that night, and every night for many weeks, Amelia relived that moment in her head. She saw her father move, turning, pointing. She saw his lips form the words. Heard his voice. Saw the shock on everyone’s faces.

Saw the horror on Mr. Audley’s.

And every time, when it all played out again, she said something different. Something clever, or something cutting. Maybe something witty, or something furious.

But always something.

In actuality, however, she said nothing. Not a word.

Her own father was trying to foist her onto a man she did not know, in front of people she did know, and she said . . .

Nothing.

She did not even gasp. She felt her face freeze up like some hideous gargoyle, trapped in eternal torment. Her chin fell forward and her lips turned to stone in a hideous, shocked mask.

But she didn’t make a sound. Her father was probably quite proud of her for that. No female hysterics from this quarter.

Mr. Audley appeared to have been similarly affected, but he regained his composure far more quickly, even if the first words out of his mouth were:

“Oh.”

and:

“No.”

Amelia thought she might be sick.

“Oh, you will,” her father warned him, and she knew that tone. He did not use it often, but no one crossed him when he spoke like that. “You will marry her if I have to march you to the altar with my blunderbuss at your back.”

“Father,” she said, her voice cracking on the word,

“you cannot do this.”

But he paid her no mind. In fact, he took another furious step toward Mr. Audley. “My daughter is betrothed to the Duke of Wyndham,” he hissed, “and the Duke of Wyndham she will marry.”

“I am not the Duke of Wyndham,” Mr. Audley said.

“Not yet,” her father returned. “Perhaps not ever. But I will be present when the truth comes out. And I will make sure she marries the right man.”

“This is madness,” Mr. Audley exclaimed. He was visibly distressed now, and Amelia almost laughed at the horror of it. It was something to see, a man reduced to panic over the thought of marrying her.

She’d looked down at her arms, half expecting to see boils. Perhaps locusts would stream through the room.

“I do not even know her,” Mr. Audley said.

To which her father replied, “That is hardly a concern.”

“You are mad! ” Mr. Audley cried out. “I am not going to marry her.”

Amelia covered her mouth and nose with her hands, taking a deep breath. She was unsteady. She did not want to cry. Above all else, she did not want that.