“Even so…” She paused, thinking of herself as a little girl and of her father opening his arms to her, catching her up, spinning her around and laughing with her. Of all the times he’d read her bedtime stories, and taught her games like backgammon and chess, and dried her girlish tears. “However flawed his actions, I do believe he thought he was doing what was best. To him, marrying Giles was the best way to secure my future. Besides,” she added before he could argue the point, “you said the past doesn’t matter anymore.”
“No, except that one ought to learn from the past, don’t you think, and not keep making the same mistakes?”
Kay stiffened, suddenly wary. “I assume there is some specific mistake on my part that you’re referring to?”
“You assume correctly.” He took a step toward her, closing the distance between them. “Your father’s gone, Kay,” he said, his voice gentler than she’d heard it for a long time. “So why are you now deciding to let history repeat itself?”
“What?” She stepped back, staring at him, aghast. “Is that what you think I’m doing?”
“Isn’t it? Whether he loved you or not, whether his actions were motivated by that love for you or by his own self-interest, it doesn’t alter the fact that he was a bully, and you spent your entire life giving in to him. The one and only time you ever rebelled—by throwing in your lot with me—you lost your nerve because you were sick at the idea of losing his good will.”
“That wasn’t why I changed my mind about eloping with you. At least,” she amended when he raised a skeptical eyebrow, “that wasn’t the only reason.”
“I don’t know if you’re right about your father,” he went on as if she hadn’t spoken, “but even if you are, that fact made him no less determined to get his way. So do you really want to spend the future repeating the past? Do you really want to live your life letting a second man dictate to you where you’ll go and what you’ll do? Do you really want to marry a man who will decide for you what friends you’ll have and what parties you’ll go to?”
“Says the man who tried to spirit me off to Africa in a clandestine manner and was angry as hell when I changed my mind about letting him do it!”
“Of course I was angry. You were throwing away your chance at happiness and mine and running back to what was safe, familiar, and had never made you happy. What man wouldn’t be angry?”
“Thank you for proving my point. Only a man trying to controlme would conclude that he knows better than I do what I need to be happy. Deciding my happiness wasn’t your office then, and it certainly isn’t your office now.”
“But it’s Rycroft’s?”
The disdain in his voice was more than she could bear. She whirled around, stalked to her writing desk, and yanked open a drawer. “You want to know my reasons for giving in to Wilson’s request?”
“Request? Or command?”
She ignored that. “You want to know my reasons for being compliant and obedient?” she asked as she pulled out a fat sheaf of papers and retraced her steps. “Here are my reasons. All four thousand nine hundred and eighty-two of them.”
She slapped the sheaf of papers against his chest. When his hand came up to take them, she drew her own hand away.
“What’s all this?” he asked.
“Bills,” she told him. “Nearly five thousand pounds’ worth. And that’s only about half of what we owe,” she added as he glanced down at the papers in his grasp. “When Papa died, I learned the estate was bankrupt. Giles got anything that was entailed to the estate, of course, and creditors took the rest.”
“Wasn’t your cousin able to help you?”
“Not much. He had money, but his first obligation was to the estate, and that took nearly every cent of his fortune. He provides us with a small income of a hundred pounds a year and a dress allowance.”
“That’s all?”
“Creditors didn’t take our jewels, but only because Mama and I sold them before the creditors could get their hands on them. If you see me or Mama wearing any baubles this season, don’t look tooclosely, because the pearls are Roman pearls and the diamonds are zircons. Sadly, however, the money we got from selling our jewels is gone now, and as you can see, the debts are piling up. To put it bluntly, Devlin, we are destitute.”
“So, then, why—” He stopped, but his glance around told her what he hadn’t said.
“Why the Savoy?” she said, finishing his question for him. “Why stay at London’s most luxurious hotel when you’re broke? Is that what you were going to ask?”
“There are less expensive lodgings to be had in London, even at this time of year.”
“Of course. We could go live in a flat in Soho or Lambeth and save a few hundred pounds. But that’s a drop in the bucket, given what we owe. And when your little sister is finally going to make her come out after two years of waiting, and you’re hoping a successful season will enable her to find a worthy husband, you need a respectable address. After all, what gentleman is going to call on a young lady living in some dingy little flat above a store? And don’t tell me love would conquer all, because we both know it wouldn’t.”
“But surely you have relations somewhere who can help—”
“Most of them are distant cousins we hardly know and most are as strapped as we are. You know how hard things are for those who make their income from land rents. Anyway, Giles kindly offered to let us make our home with him, but somehow, I just couldn’t stomach the idea of living in the same house with the man who had once jilted me for being a slut.”
He grimaced.
“Giles’s wife,” she went on mercilessly, “didn’t seem to like the idea much, either.”
