Page 7 of Betting on a Duke
“I’m sorry for you too, Mother.” Her eyes lifted, and she let them roam over the gentlemen in the room. Mr. Lewis looked to be around forty years old. He was rotund and the ugliest man she had ever seen. His only redeeming quality was that he wore fine-quality riding clothes. When they were introduced, he’d leered at her and smiled, revealing crooked, stained teeth with food particles stuck between them. Dear God, where had her father found these men? And did Mr.Lewis never clean his teeth?
The Viscount Haddington was a tall, thin young man who looked no older than twenty. He had a charming way about him. Why was he here? Was his father or mother pushing him to marry and produce heirs already? The Earl of Banfield was a name she had heard before in passing. He was a widower with four daughters. Perhaps he was hoping to provide his daughters with a stepmother to raise them. Or perhaps he simply wanted male heirs.
The older gentleman, who was with her father at this moment, gave her the chills. When he’d looked at her, his mouth formed a tight grin, his eyes darkened, and she’d swear he’d drooled at one point. But it was his eyes that bothered her most. They showed no sign of compassion for her situation. They were only dark, cold, and calculating. He had the eyes of a sinner, someone who had secrets to hide. Her entire body vibrated, and her skin crawled. Please don’t let her father pick him.
If she had the option to choose, she would pick the earl. Could she hope her father would take her preference into account? A niggling inside her mind told her otherwise. Her father would grab the fattest purse strings and couldn’t care less who he married her off to as long as his coffers were full once again.
It wasn’t long before all four gentlemen bid their farewells, and her father sank into a chair facing the settee, already deep into his cups. “I’ve made my decision.”
All the air whooshed from her lungs, and her heart pounded as she clung tightly to her mother’s hand while she awaited her fate. A fate, no doubt, worse than death.
“In a sennight you will marry, by special license, the Marquess of Chesterfield.”
Clarice and her mother cried out at the same time, “No!”
“Yes,” her father bellowed. “Let me remind you, my dear daughter, that you agreed to do this to save your mother and me fromfinancial ruin. You will marry him and go to Chesterfield House to live. He needs an heir, and you will give him one.”
Clarice ran from the room, her hand over her mouth as she hurried up the stairs, tripping twice on her skirts in her rush to reach her chambers. When she arrived, she dove for the chamber pot and cast up her accounts. As she sat back on the floor, she wondered if something was wrong with her. Perhaps she was dying. It would be favorable to marrying the marquess.
A knock on the door startled her; she wrestled with her skirts as she stood up and, on wobbly legs, made her way to the foot of her bed and sat down.
“My lady,” Mrs. Shelley called out, “may I enter?”
“Yes.”
Mrs. Shelley, tears in her eyes and concern on her face, hurried to her. “I just heard the news.” Clarice couldn’t hold back her anguish any longer; she dropped her head into her hands and cried. The bed dipped, and comforting arms wrapped around her. “There, there, my lady, let your tears out. I’ve a good bosom to cry on.”
Clarice leaned against Mrs. Shelley’s warm body and let the tears flow until she had none left. Gasping several times, she murmured, “Will you attend me after I’m wed?”
“I’m sorry, my lady. According to your father, the Marquess of Chesterfield requests that no one from this household be allowed to travel or serve you. He will appoint your maid from among his loyal servants.”
Could things get any worse? Her only hope had been to have Mrs. Shelley with her every day to help her cope with being torn from her family home and forced to marry an old man. “I’d like to be alone.”
Clarice asked for a tray to be brought up for dinner and spent most of the night lying in bed, staring at the ceiling. Now that her father had found her soon-to-be husband, he refused to allow her out of her chambers for the week leading up to her wedding. She paced the floorand cried herself to sleep each night wondering where Samuel was. Why hadn’t he come for her?
When the morning of her wedding day arrived, she got up, feeling both mentally and physically drained. As she dressed in a pretty, cream-colored gown for her wedding, an invisible veil covered her mind and body, shielding everything inside from the outside world. The only way she could survive the years ahead was if she remained numb, hiding her true self deep inside to protect herself from the outside world and from the man she was about to marry. A man who, two hours later, stood beside her as they recited their vows with icy indifference in his eyes. Why was he marrying her? He didn’t look like he was happy about it. And if it weren’t for her agreeing to do this to save her parents financially, Clarice would’ve run out the door and never looked back. But her word was her word.
