Page 60 of The Rake's Bride
“If she wishes to have time to think, then allow her to do so,” snapped Rafe.
There was a grudging pause before Luke said, “I suppose it will not matter if I take her now or in two hours.”
Victoria suspected it took everything Rafe had not to punch her brother square in the nose. Instead, Rafe said to her gently, “You should eat something.”
The thought of food made her nauseous, but she nodded and Rafe slipped from the room to find a servant to scrounge up food in the kitchen.
Victoria dropped heavily onto the nearest chair and exhaled heavily.
“Why the hesitation?” Luke inquired cautiously.
“This is my marriage,” she croaked, looking up at her brother. “I am not simply walking away from a temporary commitment. We are bound together.”
“And arrangements can be dissolved. If you are truly unhappy, come home with me. Come home to Papa. We will care for you.”
Victoria’s throat began to burn. She thought she’d been wrung dry of tears, but they once more threatened to spill over. “He says I misunderstood what was said,” she whispered, her eyes gazing unfocused into the distance.
“What did you misunderstand?” For all his support, Luke still did not know what had transpired the prior evening.
She exhaled a shaky breath. “He says he loves me.” A confused silence followed her statement, so she supplied, “I overheard him telling someone he did not love me, could never love me, and had only married me for the money I brought.”
“We suspected as much,” Luke said through gritted teeth.
“Yoususpected as much.” She swiped at the first tear to trail down her cheek.
“And you are far too forgiving.”
“Because I’ve fallen in love with him.” This stunned Luke into silence.
The muscles of his jaw worked furiously before he finally asked, “And what will you do today?”
“I do not know,” Victoria croaked and dropped her head into her hands.
Two hours later,after Victoria had managed to choke down some of the biscuits from the spread the staff had prepared, she felt no closer to a decision. To their credit, the men left her to think, taking up seats on opposite sides of the room and glaring at one another. Each of them wanted so badly to sway her one way or the other, but Victoria refused to speak on it. She desired to keep her own counsel as she considered her choices. Her stomach roiled from the stress, her head pounded from her thoughts, and her heart ached from the torture it was experiencing. As if sensing the pall in the home, a distant rumble of thunder flitted through the grey clouds outside.
Suddenly, there was a frantic pounding of feet as Nan arrived in the doorway of the library, red-faced and panting. “Please,” she gasped, “please pardon the interruption. But…we cannot find…” She doubled over, breathing heavily.
Victoria went to her side and held her arm to steady her. “What has happened? What can’t you find?” Something must really be wrong to send the normally steady nursemaid so topsy-turvy.
“We cannot find Lord Dominic,” Nan said finally. A hint of color returned to her cheeks. “We’ve been searching the rooms and the gardens. We thought he was simply playing a game andhiding, so the staff didn’t want to worry you, but he is nowhere to be found.”
Rafe cursed beneath his breath and Victoria’s stomach dropped through the floor beneath her feet. It was a testament to how distracted and distraught all of them had been that none of them had realized this was going on in the rest of the house.
“Who is this lord who has gone missing?” Luke asked, clearly confused by the state of panic. “And why are we so concerned?”
“He is our nephew,” Victoria explained. “And he is only a boy.” More of the staff had collected in the hallway, every one of them with concern in their eyes and anxious stances.
Seeming to deflate, Nan collapsed at their feet and began to sob. “I only went to put the baby down for her morning nap after her feeding with the wet nurse. And he disappeared.”
“And we are certain he is nowhere in the house?” Rafe demanded in a tone that was somehow gentle and firm at once.
Another of the maids stepped forward to help Nan, who was too overcome by emotion and guilt to continue. “We found the back door ajar and some food was missing from the larder, including a fresh loaf of bread which had been left to cool on the table in the kitchen,” she explained.
Victoria went cold with dread. Dominic had run away—or at least he was trying to. There was no telling the kind of trouble or danger he might encounter. She was sure the expression of horror on her husband’s face mirrored her own.
It took two tries, but she was finally able to swallow the lump in her throat. “We will find him,” Victoria said to Rafe a little breathlessly. Though she’d meant to be reassuring, the words sounded frantic and uncertain to even her own ears.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
