She frowned. “I didn’t give up my position.”
He breathed a laugh. “And never would’ve, despite all your talk about a family of your own. Those brats had you wrapped around their little fingers. But now that you’ve been free of them for a while, you’re no doubt thanking me for seeing to that too.”
For a long moment she could only stare at him, mouth agape. What was he saying? That he wasn’t just the one who’d talked her into a situation she’d known better than to be in, but that—that he was the one who’d tipped off Lord Clifford? He was the reason they’d been discovered, so that she’d be sacked on the spot?
The horror of it was paralyzing.
Not that he suffered from the same blow. He eased closer again, that smile she’d always loved on his lips. “Come now, luv, you know it was for the best. And I’m willing to marry you, like I said. I just need to finish this business first, then you can show me about and introduce me. We can decide where we want to go—anywhere in the world.”
Her nostrils flared. “Here.”
He winced. “Anywhere in the world away from these blokes who will eventually know I’ve pulled the wool over their eyes.”
Ainsley stepped forward, making her aware yet again of his presence. Only now she saw the strangest thing in his eyes—a fire she’d never beheld in them before. “No. Miss Dawe, don’t let him convince you to leave with him. He won’t play you true.”
Rory spun on him. “Just stay out of it for once in your life, Henry.”
Ainsley glowered at him. “I watched you break enough other hearts at home. I’m not going to stand here while you do the same to her. What of all those other girls you bragged about at Christmas? And she wasn’t the one you mentioned in your last letter to your mother!”
The blow struck not high in her heart but low in her stomach, making it churn.
Rory waved it away. “Haven’t written to her since I fell in love with Nara, that’s all.”
So much for always fancied her. Her eyes slid shut. That was her answer, she supposed. And she should have known, shouldn’t she have? Who was she to gain the attention of someone like him? She ought to have known she was nothing but a diversion, one in a long string of girls—until she became useful to him.
Even so, he said he’d marry her. If she could convince him to honor that, wasn’t she obligated? She’d given him a part of herself she could never get back. He had to make it right. Otherwise, what did she have left?
Nothing.
Someone stepped to her side, but she knew before she opened her eyes that it wasn’t Rory. “You deserve better than what he’d give you, Miss Dawe. More than a husband who would always be entertaining others on the side.”
Rory’s snort of laughter agreed. “Oh, I see what this is. You fancy her. Well, Hank, you’ll want to look elsewhere. She doesn’t live up to your sterling standards. Did she mention why she was dismissed? Caught rolling in the hay—”
“Will you shut up, Rory?” Ainsley sounded more annoyed than she’d ever heard him.
But Rory wouldn’t have to say more. His implications were crystal clear, and they’d sink fast and deep into his cousin’s mind. Just as they sank straight to her dormant conscience.
Rory turned to her again and leaned close. “I’m your choice now. And if you want to keep it open, don’t drag your feet. I’m not hanging around here long. If you’re not ready to come with me next time I stop by, then you’re on your own. But if you do want to come”—he fastened a smile to his lips, but there was no charm in it now—“then come with information. Eyes and ears open, luv.”
She shook her head, though it still felt dazed. “I won’t betray them.”
“They’d betray you. Just like Clifford, ready to turn on you at the first sign of imperfection. They’re all the same, all the masters. You think they’d suffer your being around them if they knew the truth about you?” He shook his head. “Bet your parents wouldn’t be too pleased either. I’m it, Senara. So focus on us, not them.”
Ainsley remained standing, solid and straight, at her side. “Not everyone is as fickle as you, Rory. Don’t listen to him, Miss Dawe.”
Rory laughed and backed up a step. “She knows the truth.” His gaze arrowed into her, stripping her down to her hopes, to her shame. “Don’t you, luv?”
She couldn’t convince her lips to move.
It was his turn to shake his head, looking disgusted with her. “Think about it. I’ll give you two weeks to weigh your choices while I see about some other business, and then that’s it. If you don’t come with something useful, I’m gone. Then what will you have?”
She didn’t dare to answer. It didn’t bear thinking about.
He melted into the night, and Senara didn’t stay a moment longer to make sure he left the garden. She spun back toward the door, the horror of it all too heavy. And to think that Ainsley had witnessed it all! How could she ever hold her head up around him again, much less look him in the eye?
“Senara.” Ainsley stepped into her path, apology in every line of his posture. “Don’t let anything he says bother you. I know better than to believe a word that falls from Rory’s lips.”
Somehow hearing him so ready to dismiss the accusations undid her.
Because she didn’t deserve his high regard. Not in the least. She had trusted a man bent on using her. She had let love for him blind her to her own morals. She had given what she could never take back. And she’d lost everything.
“Excuse me.” The mutter came out halfway to a sob. She sidestepped him and flew through the door, ignoring her father, who was just stepping into the kitchen with questions on his lips.
Up the stairs, into the room that had always been hers. It was dim inside, but she didn’t need to see. She just needed to disappear. She closed the door behind her, fingers hovering for a moment. And then she did something she hadn’t done since she was fourteen and crying over the loss of her grandmother. She turned the skeleton key in the old iron lock.
It squeaked a protest at being shifted in its bed, but then a solid clunk assured her the bolt had moved.
She pulled it from its hole and then just stared at the dark outline of it against her pale palm, its details smudged by the rainy twilight coming through her window. Never in her life had she bothered taking the key from the lock. Because her door didn’t need to be bolted, certainly not from the inside. She’d never had any secrets to lock away. Never had any danger to keep out.
Now, she had both, and the truth of it was cold and rusty in her shaking hand.
Though she sat slowly, her old mattress still protested her weight, the springs rattling. She set the skeleton key on her knee for a moment, long enough to reach under her collar for the long silver chain she’d worn for the last seventeen years. She slipped it on every morning, off again every evening. Lifted it now, a familiar whisper. But then she undid the clasp. Fed one end through the loop end of the iron. Fastened it again.
The door’s key slid down, gravity pulling it until it clanked against the pendant key. The one so ornate, so lovely, so promising. “Your life,” Mamm-wynn F had said as she pressed it to her palm in her last moments, “is whatever you make of it. Just remember that family is the key to it all.”