“I think you did better with Damara than you thought,” Loretta told Celia. “She’s exactly the kind of lady who belongs here.” She looked back at her friend. “And you only spent one morning teaching her what to do?”
“Not exactly. I was trying to ruin her confidence so she’d embarrass herself,” Celia replied. “I insulted her while pretending to help. The truth was, I wanted to hurt her because she hurt you.” Her gaze went over to Damara and Lady Eloise, and she groaned. “A lot of good that did. It only made Damara try harder.”
“It’s amazing how you managed to do in one day what it took the Duchess of Ironstone two months to do.”
“I don’t care how Damara acts. There’s something wrong with her. She still won’t say anything about her past. She can’t be as perfect as she seems.”
“What does it matter?”
“It matters a lot. She married my brother, and now she’s carrying his child.”
Loretta shouldn’t have been dismayed at the news of the pregnancy, but it was yet another blow to her self-confidence. Beautiful. Graceful. Able to conceive. Yep. Some ladies had all the luck. The more she learned about Damara, the less she wanted to know.
Chapter Twenty
“Oh yes,” Damara told Lady Eloise, “Celia has been very kind. She’s an asset to this group.”
Lady Eloise, and the other four ladies sitting around her, chuckled. “You certainly are loyal to your sister-in-law,” Lady Eloise noted. “I can see why Celia wanted to bring you here. You make her look good.”
“Last Season, Celia’s brother was at the top of Lady Eloise’s list of marriageable gentlemen,” Miss Webb said. “We thought he was going to marry Loretta.” She gestured to Celia and Loretta, who were engaged in a private conversation a few feet away from them.
“I feel terrible about that,” Damara replied. “I had no idea that was the case.”
“Don’t feel terrible,” Lady Eloise said. “The reason the gentlemen get placed on my list of London’s most desirable gentlemen is because they are difficult to obtain. The harder a gentleman is to get, the better. Celia thinks she’ll marry your husband’s good friend, the Earl of Durrant. She wasn’t able to secure his hand last Season. We’ll see if she can do it this time.”
Lady Stacey chuckled. “It’ll be a miracle if she does. I hear he can barely tolerate her.”
Miss Wilmington’s eyes grew wide, and she leaned forward in interest. “It can’t be true.” She glanced at the others. “Can it? I know he’s been her escort at her brother’s dinner parties. Celia swears he’s in love with her.”
“Celia wants him to be in love with her,” Lady Stacey replied with a pointed look. “Lord Durrant is good friends with her brother. I think he only escorts her because no other gentleman will have her.”
Damara’s face warmed. She had promised Celia she wouldn’t do anything to embarrass her, but it seemed wrong to sit idly by while someone made fun of her. “Celia has been very kind to me,” she said. “Any gentleman would be lucky to marry her.”
“I like you, Damara,” Lady Eloise said. “You’re as kind as you are beautiful. A rare combination, if I say so myself. But let’s not fool ourselves about Celia. She’s not as sweet as she pretends to be. She does, however, have a good reputation, she knows how to conduct herself in social situations, and she has suitable connections through her brother. We do see the value in having her as a member of this group. We’re sure she’ll find a way to secure a suitable husband. We just hope she has the good sense to pursue other gentlemen. She’ll be a spinster if she keeps pining for Lord Durrant.”
Damara wasn’t sure what she could say to that. Lady Eloise had taken her argument into consideration, and while she didn’t agree with her, she had listed things she did like about Celia. It seemed to be an offer of a compromise, of allowing Damara to hold her own opinion while maintaining hers.
“You’ll probably think the question I want to ask is silly,” Damara began, “but I have much to learn about properly engaging with others in these situations.” She cleared her throat. “I was wondering, is it acceptable if ladies agree to disagree on a certain matter?”
Lady Eloise smiled. “You’re determined to think the best of your sister-in-law, aren’t you?”
Damara wasn’t sure how to best respond, but ultimately, she decided it was best to tell the truth. “I can only tell you what I think of her. She has been kind to me. She befriended me, and she brought me to this group, which, as she puts it, is the most important group in all of London. She even took the time to instruct me on how to act so that I can fit in. So yes, I suppose you could say I’m determined to think the best of her.”
“How is it that you haven’t been tainted by the world?” Lady Stacey asked, her voice soft.
Tainted by the world? What did that mean?
Before Damara could ask about it, Lady Eloise gave her a nod. Damara wasn’t sure what the nod meant, except that it was a good thing because the other ladies seemed happy with it and also gave a nod in turn.
“Usually, we have a vote when we invite a lady to become a member of this group,” Lady Eloise told Damara. “But I think we know enough. I would like to personally extend an invitation for you to become a Lady of Grace member. Take your time to consider the offer before making a decision.”
Lady Eloise gave her another nod before she headed over to Celia and Loretta. Three of the ladies went with her, but Lady Stacey lingered with Damara.
“No one’s been invited into this group on their first visit,” Lady Stacey said.
“Is that a good thing?” Damara asked.
“Good?” She laughed. “It’s the best thing that can happen to a lady. You’re very fortunate.”
Damara breathed a sigh of relief. That was good. Then it meant she hadn’t done anything to embarrass Celia. She’d managed to get through this social engagement without doing something wrong. Celia, no doubt, would be relieved.
***
“Damara’s a part of the group?” Celia asked Lady Eloise.
If Loretta hadn’t known Celia so well, she would have sworn Celia was happy about the news. Celia managed to keep a smile on her face at all times, even when she was upset. But there was a slight wrinkle that appeared on her forehead whenever something bothered her. And right now, judging by how deep that wrinkle on Celia’s forehead was, Loretta knew Celia wasn’t just upset. She was furious.
Not that Loretta could blame her. How had Damara managed to snag both Anthony and a membership into this group so easily? Loretta glanced over at Damara who seemed to be completely unaware of how monumental it was to be accepted by Lady Eloise upon the first meeting.
“I know I don’t often make decisions this important right away,” Lady Eloise said, “but Damara has an innocent charm about her. While she lacks a few social graces, she believes the best in everyone, even when they don’t deserve it.” She patted Celia’s arm. “I’m sure you know what I mean.”
Loretta frowned. She’d like to know what Lady Eloise meant, and by the confused expression on Celia’s face, it was apparent Celia didn’t know, either.
“It’ll be refreshing to have someone like her around,” Lady Eloise continued. “You are to be commended for bringing her to us.”
Lady Eloise left, her group of faithful lackeys following close behind.
Celia’s gaze met Loretta’s, and Loretta didn’t know what else to do but shrug and say, “Some ladies have all the luck.”
“This isn’t luck,” Celia hissed. “Damara deceives people. She deceived my brother, and now she’s deceiving Lady Eloise.”
“Maybe that’s what luck is. Maybe it’s the ability to deceive other people.” If only she had such a gift.
Celia shook her head. “No. She pretends to be someone she isn’t. That’s deceit. Luck is something one can’t control.”
Maybe Celia was right. Maybe Damara was good at deceiving people. “Well, if that’s the case, there’s nothing we can do about it.”
“Yes, there is. We can expose her.”
“How?”
“By stopping this charade of accepting her.”
Loretta gasped. “You aren’t thinking of telling Lady Eloise something bad about her, are you?”
“And risk getting thrown out of this group? Telling Lady Eloise she made a bad decision is the fastest way to lose my reputation. No. I need to deal with Anthony. It all started with him, and it’s going to end with him.”
“So what are you going to do?”
“I’m going to get him to think rationally again.”
Loretta had no idea how Celia was going to do that, but before she could ask, Celia marched over to Damara. This was one of those times Loretta would give anything to find out what Celia was going to do next. Unfortunately, she had no such recourse. She would have to go back to her townhouse and mourn the things that would never be.
***
Anthony was talking to Warren and Captain Egan in his den when Celia stormed into the room, a panicked butler following her.
“I need to speak with you at once,” Celia told Anthony, a determined look in her eye.
“Miss Barlow,” the butler began, “if you’ll just give your brother a few minutes to dismiss his guests-”
“No, I will not,” she snapped, glaring at him. “He is my brother. This is my townhouse. I want to talk to my brother, and I want to talk to him right now.”
Warren and Captain Egan jumped up in unison, and Warren grabbed the plans they’d been working on. “It’s all right. We’re finished.”
Anthony’s face warmed with a mixture of anger and embarrassment. How dare Celia barge in on one of his meetings like this? Not wishing to make matters worse, he waited until everyone left then hurried to shut the door.
“What is wrong with you?” he hissed. “That was the most humiliating thing you’ve ever done to me.”
“You think you’ve been humiliated?” she snapped. “You ran off and married that…that…Damara!...when you were supposed to marry Loretta. How was that supposed to make me feel?”
“I explained everything to you, and you said you were fine with it.”
“Well, I wasn’t! And I’m still not. Loretta’s been in tears ever since she found out. You hurt her, and because of that, you hurt me. Me!” She tapped her chest. “Your own sister.”
“I don’t understand. Why did you say you were happy when you weren’t?”
“What was I supposed to say? Thank you for ruining everything? Thank you for taking all of my dreams of the perfect future and throwing them aside? You were already married. You couldn’t annul the marriage or divorce her. You brought a stranger into this place and told me you married her within one day of knowing her. And worse, you don’t even know anything about her.”
“Yes, I do.”
“No, you don’t!” She pointed her finger at him. “You don’t know anything about her past. You only know the person she’s pretending to be.”
“She’s not pretending to be anything she isn’t.”
“How do you know that? What’s the proof?”
“I spent the past six months with her. You can’t spend six months with someone and not know them.”
“Then where did she come from?”
“What?”
“Where did she come from? Who are her parents? Where is their estate? Do they even have an estate? Or is she a beggar you picked up off the streets?”
“She’s not a beggar. She had money.”
“How do you know that?”
“Because she gave me a whole valise full of it when she asked me to marry her!”
Her jaw dropped, and she stared at him for a long moment before blurting out, “She paid you to marry her?”
“It wasn’t like that. She came up to my carriage and asked to talk to me.”
“When did she do this?”
“On my way to Hamilton. It was before I stopped for the night in one of the towns along the way.”
“Didn’t it seem odd that a stranger wanted to talk to you in the middle of nowhere?”
“She wasn’t with a group of thieves. She was all by herself. She only wanted to talk to me. I let her into the carriage. She asked if I’d marry her, and she told me I could have her valise, which was full of money. As you can tell, it all worked in my favor. No harm has come to me.”
“How did she get an entire valise full of money?”
“I don’t know.”
She crossed her arms and arched an eyebrow. “Really? And here I thought you said she wasn’t with thieves.”
“It’s not like that, Celia. She didn’t steal it. Damara’s incapable of stealing anything. She said the money was hers. It was her dowry.”
“I thought you were smarter than that. Anthony, you are the most naïve person in London, and she took advantage of your innocent nature. No reputable lady goes up to a gentleman with a valise full of money and proposes marriage. She’s made a fool of you. She’s hiding something, and it has to be something awful if she went to such lengths to snag a gentleman she didn’t know.”
He opened his mouth to argue that Damara wasn’t hiding anything from him. But even as he was ready to pose the argument, he realized he couldn’t. Because, deep down, he knew there was something she wasn’t telling him. She hadn’t told him much about her past. In fact, he barely knew anything about it. All he knew was that she’d been hurt.
Celia glowered at him. “I am disappointed in you. You were betrothed to a good, trustworthy lady who loved you. Loretta would have done anything for you, but you threw that all away because you wanted a valise full of money.”
“It wasn’t the money,” he told her, his voice softening.
“Then what was it? The way she looked? She was so beautiful that you couldn’t resist her?”
“No. Well, I was attracted to her,” he admitted. Noting the way Celia rolled her eyes, he quickly added, “But it was more than that. The truth is, I…I…” He tried to maintain eye contact with his sister, but he couldn’t do it. “I didn’t want to marry Loretta, and I was eager to get out of the betrothal.”
“Then what Loretta thinks is true. You didn’t want her at all?”
He heard the tears in his sister’s voice and winced. He didn’t want to hurt her. But what good was it to lie? What good was it to keep covering things up? It was time to come clean with everything. It was true for him, and it was true for Damara. Holding back the truth wasn’t doing them any favors.
“I didn’t want to be with Loretta the way a husband is supposed to be with his wife,” Anthony admitted. “I had no attraction for her. She’s pleasant enough to look at, but when I look at her, it’s like I’m looking at you. I don’t think I could have brought myself to be in bed with her. That’s important in a marriage. A gentleman needs to be physically attracted to his wife.”
“So it was nothing but lust that prompted you to marry the first lady who threw herself at you?”
“Attraction had a lot to do with it, yes. But it was more than that. Damara made me feel alive. She excited me.”
“I bet she did,” Celia snapped.
“Not in that way.” He sighed. “Damara was lively when she spoke. She was enthusiastic. She didn’t seem like so many of the ladies in London who are so worried about being proper that they lose their personality. I felt like she was the real thing. I wouldn’t have to guess who she was. I’d get exactly what she was showing me.”
“How can she be real when she doesn’t tell you about her past?”
As much as he hated to admit it, she made a good point.
“There’s no undoing this marriage, Anthony,” Celia finally said after a long pause passed between them. “You made a rash decision, and that decision is going to impact the rest of your life. Whether you will ever admit it or not, you would have been much better off with Loretta. At least with her, you knew what you were getting.”
She turned and left the room, slamming the door behind her.
&n
bsp; He stood in the room for the longest time, not sure what to do. Celia was right. Not about him marrying Loretta. Getting out of that situation was the best thing he ever did. But he should have known something about Damara before he jumped into marriage with her. They could have stayed in the town for a few days and gotten to know each other. He didn’t have to marry her that very evening.
Well, what could he do about it now? He was already married to her. There was no undoing anything in the past. All he could do was move forward. But that only posed the very pertinent question: what was the best way to proceed from here?
Chapter Twenty-One
Damara sat at her vanity, staring at her reflection in the mirror. She wished she knew what she’d done to upset Celia. All the way back home, Celia hadn’t spoken more than a few words to her. She’d only offered a cool congratulations to her then claimed a headache. After that, she stared out the carriage window, signaling that the two wouldn’t be talking.
Unlike her mother, Celia hadn’t come out and stated why Damara had disappointed her, and that made it even more difficult to know how to react. If only she knew what her error had been. As it was, she could only guess, and for the life of her, her mind kept coming up blank. She’d behaved exactly the way Celia had instructed her to at Lady Eloise’s, and yet, she didn’t do something right.
When they reached the townhouse, Celia had told her she needed to speak to Anthony in private, so Damara went to her bedchamber. She wasn’t sure when she would be able to leave. She didn’t feel at liberty to go to any other room until she knew Celia was finished talking to Anthony.
Go to your bedchamber while I speak with your father, her mother would say. When I’m ready to see you again, I’ll let you know.
The Viscount's Runaway Bride (Marriage by Bargain Book 1) Page 16
