“You and Lord Dunn both, it would seem. Ha!” Sarah countered as she sat down on a settee across from Dory, just as prim and proper as ever. “It wouldn’t surprise me a bit if, one random morning, the papers linked the two of you together simply for shock value! How absurd would that be?”
Dory felt the bit of cake she had just swallowed catch in her throat and she nearly choked on it before managing to wash the sweet down with a bit of tea. “Me? And Lord Dunn?”
Sarah laughed. “Absurd, of course, isn’t it? Jeremy Dunn is indescribably handsome, and I say that even as a married woman hopelessly in love with my husband. Why, the man is sin and seduction personified, even if he is something of a rogue! Though he is still a lord, and everyone knows he will be named the Duke of Wyncliffe sooner rather than later. And you, Dee? Well, you are hardly…” At that, Sarah’s hand flew to her mouth, apparently horrified by what she had nearly said.
Though not all that horrified because this was Sarah, after all, and it wasn’t the first time she had said something like this. Nor would it likely be the last.
“I am hardly an appropriate match for him.” Dory looked at her sister askance. “That is what you were going to say, was it not?”
“Dory, I didn’t mean…that is to say…” Sarah was doing her best to backtrack now. “It is simply that this Lady Peacock he has been linked with lately? Every paper from The Tattler to The London Daily reports that she is a complete seductress in her scandalous gowns and lush body dripping with jewels. Have you not read the reports that she is a temptress, all confident teasing and witty conversation? They say that the men at Dionysus all but beg for her attentions, but that she only ever has eyes for Lord Dunn. That is hardly you, my dear. You are, well, let us just say not that bold these days, so to even imagine that the two of you might be linked? Well, it really is beyond the pale.”
Dory bit her lip. Oh, how she wanted to throw those words back into her sister’s face and confess that she was, in fact, the bold and brash Lady Peacock. But she couldn’t do that. To do so would be to ensure that she would be locked away in her room and the key thrown away faster than one could blink. Just because Frost was otherwise occupied with Lavinia didn’t mean that Dory was unprotected here in London. If there were even one whisper that Dory was being seen in Jeremy’s company, Rayne would not hesitate to act on Frost’s behalf and ship Dory off to the nearest convent as soon as transportation could be arranged.
Rather than snip at her sister as she wished to do, Dory carefully placed her cup and saucer back on the table. “I know what I am, Sarah. I also know that most people have come to realize that Harry is in love with another. He and I will not wed, even though there was nothing formal between us anyway. It was merely assumed and those assumptions have been proven wrong.”
“Er, about that…” Once more, Sarah seemed to struggle for words and instantly, Dory became alert. “Rayne tells me that he hears you have been sneaking off? Something about arguing with Harry at balls and what not and running off? Something about Nick becoming concerned as well.”
“The megrims,” Dory replied, hoping that Harry hadn’t said anything about her desire to venture to Dionysus that night they had fought at Lady Covington’s. “There is nothing more to my disappearances than that. Certainly nothing at all for the Bloody Duke to be worried about.”
Sarah clucked her tongue. “Nicholas is our friend. He is merely worried for you.”
Lord, that was the last thing Dory needed! If Nicholas Rosemont began to poke his nose into her affairs, she really would be exposed as Lady Peacock!
“He need not be. It is simply that Harry and I have begun to travel down different paths in our lives.” Dory prayed the slight hesitation in her voice didn’t betray her. “Though he denies it, Harry has been enjoying the social events as of late. Mostly, I suspect, because of Miss Penelope Marshwood and no other reason. While I myself? I find them…lacking.”
Sarah pursed her lips. “Oh. I see.”
“Harry and Lady Penny are in love,” Dory countered. “It is plain for all to see. While I have not spoken to Harry in some days, the servants at Chilton House still gossip. Harry was seen with Miss Marshwood at Vauxhall just the other night. Curiosities Night. Harry despises that night. Yet he was there and, though he and I do not suit as husband and wife, I do still know him better than most. He would not be there unless it were under duress.” She paused. “Or unless he was falling in love.”
Though Harry hadn’t spoken to Dory since the fateful night at the Covington’s, Dory had read the reports of his activities in the papers each morning. For someone who knew the Runner as well as she did? It was easy for Dory to tell that Harry had finally, well and truly lost his heart to a young woman – and it wasn’t Dory.
He was utterly besotted with Miss Marshwood and Dory couldn’t be happier for the both of them. Even if others were not.
“And you are fine with this?” Sarah was incredulous now and she leaned forward to snare Dory’s hands in her own. “We all thought, well, that you and Harry…”
Dory shook her head and grasped Sarah’s hands tightly in return. “Harry and I are different people now than we were a year ago. We all are, really, for much has transpired and changed in our lives since then. Frost is now a father. You and Aurelia are both wed to wonderful, caring men. Mother has taken ill and will likely never be the same. Does it not make sense that I would be different as well?
“Well, no.” Sarah shook her head as she extracted herself from Dory’s grasp and poured more tea, clearly refusing to accept what Dory was saying. “You are, simply put, just Dory. You are always the same. You changed long before the rest of us, back at Mrs. Smithson’s when you gave up your hellion ways and became a lady.”
But I didn’t change, Dory wanted to cry. I only pretended to change to keep everyone happy. Inside? I am still the same as I was. Still looking for something I cannot name and should not want – assuming I even knew what I was looking for in the first place. But I think I found what I was looking for, even if I can’t give voice to his name. I also can’t tell anyone about him.
Instead, she opted for a more measured reply, picking at her cucumber sandwich now so she had something to occupy her hands. “That does not mean that I cannot change again. And even if I did not change? Harry has and is still changing, even now. It requires two people to make a marriage, Sarah, and Harry no longer wishes to court me. Or wed me. Assuming that he ever did.”
For Dory wasn’t certain of that any longer, either. Yes, Harry had been attentive to her in the past, but it was almost as if he assumed that was what he was supposed to do when presented with Frost’s unwed sister who was, yes, utterly and perhaps quite stupidly, infatuated with him.
Or she had been then. No longer, however.
There were also those, of course, who had never understood what Harry supposedly saw in Dory in the first place. He was a handsome, mysterious Bow Street Runner, a man that every lady longed to know, though few actually did. Dory was a plain and uninteresting wallflower that had been passed over time and again.
Their pairing had never truly made sense. People had only tried to make them a couple because it was neat and tidy after Harry had protected her from Michel Balon, a man from Lavinia’s past who was evil to his core and wished only to cause trouble. After all, Aurelia had fallen in love with Lord Hugh Hunt who had been her protector and Frost had gone on to wed Lavinia. So Dory and Harry falling in love had been a perfect conclusion to that story.
Except that, in truth, it wasn’t perfect and never had been. Though both of them had tried their best to make their lives into the fairy tale people expected. Then, around this past Christmastide, Dory had started to come to the conclusion that Harry was with her simply because he felt that was where certain people assumed he should be. Not because he truly wished to be. And Dory discovered that she felt the same way.
Harry didn’t deserve that. Neither did Dory. Not even if it meant that she had to endure her
sister’s pity.
“I have changed,” Dory countered gently, not wishing to quarrel with her sister. “I have new friends. New interests.” Well, no new interests really. She still enjoyed reading inappropriate books, spying, picking locks, riding, shooting, and generally behaving in ways that were completely inappropriate for a young woman of just about any standing. She also had a note from Cecy, one of her newer friends, that she had ignored for nearly three days now. Some friend she was.
“Have you taken up watercolors then?” Sarah asked. “I know Mama would be so overjoyed if you had! I know you said you were coming to enjoy your needlepoint, but she was hoping that you might branch out a bit.”
Needlepoint? Watercolors? “You know very well that I don’t care for any of those things! I never have and I never will! Who on earth are you and what have you done with my real sister?” Dory asked as she tried to rise from the sofa just before Sarah yanked her back down.
Sarah’s eyes flashed with annoyance. Ah, there was the sister that Dory remembered. “I am your sister. I am simply more…settled than I was before. As I would like to see you be. You drift, Dory, aimless. You have for years now. Other than doing your best to be as inappropriate as possible in your youth, I am not certain you have ever cultivated an interest in anything. Marrying would Harry would help that restlessness, I think. It would give you focus.”
“I am not aimless!” Which maybe she was, a little. Except for enjoying things that were inappropriate for a young lady, of course. That much was true. “And I am not marrying Harry. Not now and not ever.” She managed that last bit in a much calmer tone.
“Yes, I know,” her sister snorted. “You like picking locks and listening at doors and reading inappropriate books. That is hardly a ladylike pursuit and ones I thought you outgrew.” Sarah glared at her suspiciously. “Have you really not changed at all, Dory?”
Dory sighed as she plunked more sugar in her tea before taking a sip. Gah! The brew was so sweet she nearly spit it out!
Putting the teacup down, Dory crossed her hands in her lap. “I have changed. Truly I have, but not in ways that are easy to define. Not that anyone has ever noticed because no one ever asks.”
“That’s not true!” Sarah’s own ire was growing now. “We ask after you all of the time!”
“Yes! To see if I am alive and well and nothing more!” Dory sniped, her hold on her own anger slipping now. “You never ask what I am doing with my days or if I am happy or if I am falling in love. Everyone just assumes they know the answers to questions they never even bothered to ask.”
For a long moment, Sarah simply stared at her sister before cocking her head to the side. “We don’t ask, do we?”
“No.” Dory shook her head. “You don’t. And it’s not your fault. You have spent your life chasing after Rayne and now that you have him, he is your world, as it should be. Ari has been infatuated with Hugh for a year now and before that? She was too young to truly understand.”
Sarah grimaced. “And you had Harry. Or we assumed you did.”
“Only he never really asked after me either. I was a part of his life, but I was more like furniture than I was a person to him.” Dory paused, deciding it was time to confess a little of what she had been doing to occupy her time as of late, other than sneaking into Dionysus to meet Jeremy, of course. “Do you know that I have been keeping the household books since Mama took ill? Even long before that, actually. Mama was busy and she never had a good head for numbers anyway, so…so I took them over.”
“No.” Sarah seemed surprised. “I had no idea you had a head for business.”
Dory shrugged. “No one did. But I do. Because no one bothers to ask. Just as no one bothered to ask me about Harry either.”
“I know, and I am sorry, Dee. We shall try to be better. I promise. But still, are you certain Harry is in love with this Miss Marshwood?” Sarah pressed.
“I am.” Dory had never been more certain of anything. “And I am happy for them both. Though we aren’t really speaking at the moment, more than anything, Harry is my friend and I only wish him happy. I think Penny Marshwood makes him happy.”
“If you say so.” Sarah, who didn’t know Harry well enough to contradict Dory, looked more than a little glum at that pronouncement. “And, well, perhaps that is for the best. Mother will need more help unless she recovers, so I suppose that task would fall to you. But there still might be a chance for the two of you, if only…”
Dory held up her hand to stop whatever her sister would have said next. “There is no chance. Even if Miss Marshwood was not around, Harry and I would still be coming to an end. We are too different. Nor are we in love.”
“Love is not necessary for a marriage,” Sarah offered a bit too quietly for Dory’s liking. “While Rayne and I share that rare kind of love, that does not mean one cannot have a happy and successful marriage without it.”
Except that Dory not only wanted that kind of love, she was beginning to suspect she had already found it – with Jeremy.
True, there was only a temporary agreement and they had no real future together, but what Dory felt when she was with Jeremy was very similar to the bliss that her sisters had often described when they were with the men who had eventually become their husbands. According to her sisters, that feeling was love – plain and simple.
And Dory had found it. Except that she had found it with a man she could not have.
Only Sarah didn’t need to know that. No one did.
“Perhaps,” Dory replied, wiggling her hands free of Sarah’s grip so she could reach for her tea cup once again, sugar be damned.
“Well, as I said, Mama will likely need looking after and you do enjoy Hallowby Grange. There could be worse things, really, and perhaps that will finally settle you more than even marriage would have. You will have years to do so, after all. And as I said, you do enjoy the country.”
Once more, Dory’s cup clattered back into the saucer. “And you expect me to accompany her? For the rest of her life? Not just to see her settled but to remain there until she passes away?”
But of course Sarah did. After all, Dory was the only unwed sister left and now that she was no longer with Harry, what else was there for her to do? Dory had known that already. UP to a point. But hearing Sarah actually speak the words made them more real somehow.
“Well, why wouldn’t you?” Her sister’s face was a mask of pure confusion. “You know that Lavinia cannot oversee Mama’s care, what with the new baby. And Aurelia and I are only just wed ourselves.” She drew her spoon slowly through her tea. “And, well, not to be too blunt, but you…aren’t. And you have no prospects what with this Harry business. I’m sorry, Dee, but it’s true and we all know it. It’s nothing to be ashamed about. Not every lady finds success on the marriage mart and, well, there will be time for marriage later on, once you are settled at Hallowby and Mama is gone. I am told there are many eligible widowers in the area.”
Jeremy, Dory wanted to cry. I have Jeremy. I don’t need some old, used-up gentleman with a pack of brats that he expects me to care for while he does as he pleases! I have a lover! A man I care so very deeply about! And he is more – more of everything – than you will ever possibly know or understand!
Except that Dory didn’t have Jeremy. He was a part of her fantasy world and not her reality. Nor could she confess to her sister that she had been carrying on an affair with the so-called “Lord Raven of Dionysus” and that she just might be falling in love with him. No, that wasn’t something she could confess at all. To anyone.
“It seems as if you have it all planned out for me then.” Dory picked up her now-cold tea, a knot growing in her stomach.
Sarah cocked her head to the side. “Well, yes. Didn’t you? Didn’t you just tell me you have been running the household during Mama’s illness and liking it? This is a perfect fit for you, especially with the Season ending and Mama likely needing to be moved soon, before the heat of a London summer begins. Caring for Mama a
nd the dower house will also make you that much more attractive for some older man when the time comes.”
Icy claws of real fear began to grip at Dory. She had expected something like this yes, but being forced to give up her entire life in an instant? Without thought or discussion, just because her sister said so? No, she had certainly not expected that!
But with Frost away, Sarah and Rayne were acting heads of the family. And Sarah, so different than the loving sister Dory remembered, was in charge at the moment.
“How does Rayne feel about this idea of yours? To send me away until Mama passes?” Dory’s voice was thick.
Her sister trilled a laugh. “Oh, he objected, of course. Said it wasn’t fair to you, but I told him that you wouldn’t mind because it was Mama.”
This didn’t sound like the Sarah that had grown up with Dory. That Sarah would have at least paused to consider that Dory might have visions of marriage or at least give her another chance to find a husband of her own. This new version of Sarah? This Sarah was almost manic to have Dory gone from London.
“I would be gone for a very long time, Sarah. Perhaps five years or more.” At which point, Dory would be nearly thirty and well past merely “on the shelf.” She would be past marriageable age. Past the age when she could have a family of her own. Past the age when any man might want her, including Jeremy, who could have his pick of much younger, much prettier women.
“But it is our mother and surely you want the best for her?” Sarah’s eyes were glittering now. “There are only rogues and ill-bred men about these days, Dory.” She chuckled nervously. “And really, what with Rayne and I only just now mending our relationship…”
Ah, there it was. The real reason Sarah wanted Dory gone.
It had only been a few short weeks since it had come to light that Sarah was being blackmailed by the despicable Randall Witherson who was seeking a Society wife and fortune in exchange for his silence regarding how he had forced himself upon her many years ago. If Sarah could not convince Lady Miri Bexley to wed Witherson – which, of course, she had not been able to do – Witherson had vowed he would go to the papers and ruin both Sarah’s marriage and her standing in Society.
His Temporary Mistress Page 19
