The Courtship Caper (Scandalous Miss Brightwells 6)

What a wonderful occasion it would be, too.

Sebastian would give Libby the bolstering she needed to assert her right to marry her beloved; and their father would simply have to accept that his children were grown-ups now, and he no longer held sway over their futures, as he once had.

“I’ve barely slept, it’s true, Sebastian,” Venetia said, clasping his lapels and looking up into his face. “I’m sorry we parted on bad terms last night. I wanted to come after you and, in fact, when Lady Indigo asked me to darn her stocking, I returned to the drawing room in the hopes that you’d be there.”

“My darling girl, if only I had been!” He stroked her face, happier than he could say that her feelings for him hadn’t changed.

“And then I heard Ladies Fenton and Quamby talking...about you. They didn’t know I was there.” She drew in a shaky breath, closed her eyes briefly, then burst out, “So now I know about the baby!”

Oh lord. A wave of shame enveloped him. Of course she’d take such a discovery hard, but he hadn’t thought she’d take quite such a dim view of it.

“Venetia...I don’t believe it’s mine.” It was the most direct way he felt he had of making it clear to Venetia that he would not let it come between them. And it was the truth. Initially, he’d accepted paternal responsibility after Compton had thrown his wife out of the house and threatened divorce proceedings. But the more he learned, as time went by, the more he suspected Barbara had framed Sebastian.

Why? Because the real father of Barbara’s child was her husband’s arch foe, and she’d been too afraid to name him.

Sebastian cupped Venetia’s beautiful, tearstained face and looked deeply into her eyes as he tried to convey the depth of his love for her. “Honestly, my darling! I can reassure you that this won’t stand in the way of our being together. I’ve told her that I don’t accept responsibility. I’ve made that quite clear. It’s just you and me, Venetia. You are the only woman I’ve ever loved.”

“And you are the only man I’ve ever loved, Sebastian, but honor requires us to live with our mistakes.” She stared balefully up at him before asking abruptly, “And you say you’ve severed all ties with her?”

“Would I lie to you, Venetia? Yes, I swear I’ve had nothing to do with her since she agreed—reluctantly, but with good grace—that my life was my own, to live as I chose; that she’d make no further claims on me.” He put his hands on her shoulders and gently tipped her face upward so she was forced to look into his eyes. “Does that satisfy you, Venetia? Would I lie to you? Please tell me that we can be married as soon as it can be arranged?”

Her mouth dropped open, and her hands dropped from his shoulders. To Sebastian’s horror, he saw tears gathered in her eyes as she shook her head.

To his even greater horror, he watched her step back as she whispered, “I’m sorry, Sebastian, but...I’ve changed my mind. I no longer wish to marry you.”

***

Prostrate with grief and disappointment, Venetia pleaded a megrim, earning dispensation for a couple of hours until Lady Indigo, herself, returned to their apartments. But, as she was so demanding, Venetia decided it would be less exhausting to take herself off to the library than be within earshot of Lady Indigo and her demands.

Returning to her position on the windowsill, half hidden by the curtain, she again found refuge within the pages of a book whose title she had not the energy to ascertain.

It was simply a relief to be alone in the large and lofty room, positioned so she could both read and glance out onto the snow-covered lawn in the hopes of seeing Sebastian with Miss Reeves, so she could then truly justify the seething hurt in her breast.

The loud stomping of someone slightly infirm as they made their way to the library to her right made her glance up. Expecting to see Lord Quamby or Lady Indigo, to Venetia’s horror, she beheld old Mr Wells himself.

Her late father’s employer. Sebastian’s father. The man who’d said that over his dead body he’d see his son waste himself over a mere nobody like Venetia.

She put her head down and kept very quiet, concentrating studiously on the page.

Until a peevish voice was directed at her, and she could not pretend she had not heard.

“Young lady, would you be so good as to climb the stepladder to retrieve a volume of Milton’s works I cannot reach?”

Obediently, Venetia rose from the windowsill to do as she was bid, ensuring that her cap shielded her face as much as possible. Stepping down from the ladder, she handed the volume of Milton to the man responsible for destroying her happiness.

No, Sebastian had done that last night.

“Very kind, very kind, young lady,” he muttered, peering at the embossed lettering on the front before raising his monocle to regard Venetia with a frown.

“I know you.”

Venetia said nothing. He’d aged since she’d last seen him. Perhaps his faculties had deserted him. He certainly no longer appeared the intimidating tyrant of her memory.

“It’s that dreadful cap that prevents me from seeing you properly in this dim light. But yes, it’s Venetia, isn’t it? How is your father?”

“He died three years ago, sir.” Did he even remember how angrily he’d railed at her father, threatening to dismiss him when Sebastian had declared he wished to marry Venetia?

“I’m sorry to hear that. He was a good man. Best bailiff I ever had.” He blinked a few times. “I’ve had my losses, too. My beautiful daughter-in-law. Perhaps you’d heard.” He looked at her a little more sharply. “And now my own daughter. She wants to throw herself away on a nobody, also, you know.”