Page 90 of The Runaway Duchess

“Aren’t they, though.” He said it slowly, letting his arms drop. A frown creased his brow. “Yes, in fact.” Her blisters had rubbed open. She shifted her weight miserably, panic lancing through her as she imagined walking back out into the night.

“Lavinia.” Anthony’s voice was soft. “Why are you really here?”

“Destiny.” She didn’t look at him, tried to sneer, but her chin puckered. “I read it in the stars as a girl that I’d end up in Weston Hall.”

“I don’t believe it.” Now his voice was flat. “I broke our engagement. But you won’t convince me I broke your heart.”

“Not you.” She drew a ragged breath. “Your brother.”

Perhaps Anthony, too, would call her a whore. She forced herself to meet his eyes. Their blaze almost frightened her.

“The stars were wrong,” she said. “Or maybe my reading was wrong. Maybe you’re meant to read the dark patches between the stars. The night before George died we met in the library at Lady Lytton’s ball.”

Anthony’s face had become a mask.

“I thought I might be with child,” she said, lifting her chin high, holding herself straight and tall against the shame of it. “He told me not to worry. We’d be married so soon the doctor himself wouldn’t look askance at the dates. The next day he stole that yacht and drowned.”

“Christ God.” Anthony swore. He hit the doorframe hard with his fist. If she wasn’t so light-headed, she would have jumped. She simply stared at him, motionless.

“The child?” he asked.

She shook her head, saw flashes at the corners of her vision. “A false alarm.”

Anthony’s look was dark, his beautiful mouth curving down sharply.

“Blind,” he murmured, pressing his knuckles into his brow. “Christ, I was blind.” She realized with a start that his disdain was for himself.

“What could you have seen?” She shrugged. “You were off rattling your saber.”

Anthony had spent years soldiering, a few of them in the East, far from the intrigues hatched in London’s ballrooms, the gnarled, clandestine goings-on that even the gossips nearest to hand inevitably got wrong.

“No one knew,” she added.

“Your husband?” Anthony was still frowning, searching her face.

A shudder went through her before she could steel herself. Anthony’s breath hissed.

She could see that he was already piecing the story together.

“Least of all him.” She lowered her voice, as though to speak of Cranbrook might be to summon him. “He knows nothing of me. He doesn’t even know where I am. I realized marriage doesn’t suit me halfway through the wedding breakfast.”

The muscles around Anthony’s eyes and nose had contracted.

“There was no . . .” She fisted her hands. “Consummation. I ran off. It turns out, I’m still running.” Her fingernails bit into the soft flesh of her palms. “Perhaps I can get an annulment.”

“Does he want to be quit of you?” Anthony’s tone was strained. “Badly enough that he would attest to his own permanent impotence?”

Lord, she was trembling. She could hear Cranbrook again, laughing away Lord Browning’s tonic.

No need.

The old goat prided himself on his virility.

“Because if not . . .” Anthony shook his head. “You’re the one in flagrant breach of your marriage contract. Your husband has his conjugal rights, and you have your conjugal duties. You can’t withdraw your consent on a whim. That’s how the court will see it.”

“Surely your lawyers are good for something besides jailing my father.” She summoned all her fear, all her dread, pushed with her eyes. “You will help me.”

Waiting for his response was agony.