ChapterEighteen
She got away with it. Somehow, miraculously, Priya got away with spending most of the night with Francis, then allowing him to drive her back to her house before dawn so that she could sneak back to her room before she was missed. It was wildly risky, and she never would have been able to accomplish the subterfuge, but the servants of the house were in the midst of a quiet battle between the English servants that had been hired with the house and the Bengali servants Priya’s father had brought with him. Both groups were so busy attempting to ignore or snub the other that none of them took note of Priya slipping in through the kitchen and hurrying through dark halls to her room.
Part of her couldn’t believe she’d been guilty of the ultimate indiscretion for a woman twice now. She wasn’t as certain she could get away with letting Francis take her to bed without dire consequences a second time, as the timing of things was entirely different. But that was a problem she would have to worry about in a few weeks’ time.
At the moment, her greatest concern was preventing her father from forcing her to submit to the marriage vows she personally had never made. Lucky for her, Jogendra didn’t seem to have a burning interest in holding her to those vows.
“And this is the institution of higher learning that is so wise that it sees the value of educating women?” he asked a few days after the musical event.
Jogendra had come with Jeetan to fetch her from her last class of the day—something her father had begun to insist on to, as he said, keep her out of trouble.
“This is the vile place,” Jeetan answered him glumly.
Jogendra laughed loud enough to draw the attention of several of Priya’s classmates and teachers. That was enough to make her face flare hot with embarrassment and to rush the two men through the hall and to the door.
She would have hurried them out entirely had Charlotte not stepped into the hall from one of the lecture rooms at that moment.
“Did you receive the invitation?” her friend asked, eyes bright, bubbling with excitement.
Charlotte rushed up to Priya, only noticing Jogendra and Jeetan a moment later. Her eyes went even wider.
Priya pulled in close, hugging Charlotte, but mostly so she could lean in and whisper, “We have not received our invitation to the ball yet. Or, if we have, Father has not mentioned it.”
That was what worried Priya. She knew the invitations had gone out. She even knew that Lady Vegas had already begun decorating Rathborne House for the ball and hiring extra staff—though Francis hinted they were struggling with the exorbitant expense. Apparently, Nanette D’Argent was offering to foot the bill—which seemed both outrageous and wonderful to Priya, since Nanette was a woman.
“I will see if I can discover what happened to our invitation when we return home,” she said, then pulled away from Charlotte.
“Come along, Priya,” Jeetan snapped at her from where he and Jogendra stood by the door. “Father specifically said that you are not to speak with Miss Sloane anymore.”
“What is this?” Charlotte yelped in offense.
Priya let out a breath and shook her head. “Father believes you to be a bad influence,” she said as she backed slowly toward her brother and Jogendra.
To her surprise, Charlotte smiled. “What a lovely thing to say.”
Priya laughed, even though, arguably, she shouldn’t have. But she was so tense over the way events in her life were unfolding that the paradoxical reaction was the best release of emotion she could manage in the moment.
“I do not know why your father believes Miss Sloane to be a nuisance, little Priya,” Jogendra commented as the three of them left the school and headed across the square toward their townhouse. “I find her to be an absolute delight. I enjoyed the entire Sloane family when we were in Brighton. Mr. Sloane promises me he will correspond once we all return to Hindustan.”
Priya’s throat squeezed nearly all the way closed. “Return to Hindustan?” she squeaked.
For once, Jogendra did not answer with some sort of merry comment or lighthearted joke. He merely exchanged a look with Jeetan. That was enough to put Priya into a panic.
“What do you know?” she demanded of her brother, picking up her pace once they reached the street where their townhouse stood. “Jeetan, what do you know?”
To his credit, Jeetan looked anxious and embarrassed. He was not a bad man, he was just painfully young and attempting to please their father by misplaced shows of authority.
“You need to speak with Father,” he said in a low voice, not looking at Priya.
She did indeed. As soon as the words were out of his mouth, she clutched her books tightly and ran the rest of the way to their townhouse door.
Her father’s servant must have seen her coming and opened the door for her right away. Priya’s heart was in her throat as she dashed into the house and straight to the parlor her father had claimed as his own. Sure enough, he was there sorting through the day’s correspondence. Priya spotted a gilded invitation to Lady Vegas’s ball sitting on the tabletop along with several other letters.
That invitation turned into the focal point of her panic.
“You are going to accept, are you not?” she asked without greeting her father properly, marching right up to the table he was using as a desk and picking up the invitation. The gilded card held all the information she and Francis and his brothers had discussed the other day.
Her father frowned flatly at her, staring silently for a few moments before saying, “No. We will not be in attendance at this ball. We will be on a ship, returning home.”
“Father, no!” Priya gasped. She was so horrified that she dropped her books and didn’t bother to react, let alone pick them up. “You cannot banish me to Koch Bihar when I have begun a life here.”
Her father leaned back in his chair, puffing out a vexed breath and running a hand over his face. As he did, Jogendra quietly walked up to retrieve Priya’s books from the floor and placed them on the table.
“This matter is not up for discussion, beti,” her father said. “You are a married woman. It is not appropriate for you to continue your association with any man other than your husband. Neither is it right for you to continue any sort of education. Your sole duty and responsibility is to be a good wife for Jogendra.”
“But that is not what I want,” Priya wailed, shocking herself with the vehemence of her words. “I never agreed to this marriage. I was a child when the two of you decided on my fate. It is barbaric that I should be given no choice at all. I was not even present for the ceremony.”