Cora (Virtue & Vice #4)

Chapter 7

CHAPTER SEVEN

CORA

“I s he insane?”

Cora paced Lysander’s study. Titania had jumped onto his lap, been firmly removed, and was staring forlornly up at him waiting for an opportunity to repeat her mistake. Cora would be amused by her pet’s behavior if she weren’t in disbelief about Gideon Wentworth’s stipulations. She still couldn’t believe she’d said yes to his out-of-the-blue proposal.

“That’s what you’re upset about? The color of your wedding dress?” Lysander tented his fingers and stared at her. “Not the fidelity or the ladylike comportment bits? The dress.”

Under his breath, he muttered, “Women.”

“Those upset me too, but they are of less immediate importance.” They were meaningless. Once they were married, there wasn’t anything Gideon could do to enforce her fidelity or ladylike behavior, aside from, say, consigning her to a madhouse or divorcing her. She wasn’t worried about the first prospect, and she was liable to be the one petitioning for a divorce, not him. With her dowry intact and Lysander’s support—however reluctant—she felt certain enough of her ability to escape a bad marriage to take the risk of marrying Gideon.

She wasn’t best pleased about having to share a house with him, but clearly the man was concerned with appearances. Which made his condition of marriage a peculiar one indeed. She was no one’s idea of a trophy wife.

But the dress.

A white wedding gown, symbolizing purity? She didn’t deserve that dress. She’d given herself to the first viable prospect she’d met through the newspaper advertisements. It wasn’t that she’d been promiscuous in the years since. But she was not an untouched virgin and she didn’t like lying.

Wearing white felt like a lie.

Worse, it felt like celebrating a union that did not merit celebration. Their marriage was transactional. Nothing more.

She did not feel that her past affairs were Gideon Wentworth’s business, any more than his were hers. Cora had no intention of explaining herself to anyone, including Lysander, which made the ridiculousness of Wentworth’s demand difficult to explain. Before this morning, she’d planned to show up in her best blue silk poplin, which, to be honest, wasn’t all that good, being several years out of style. To her brothers’ annoyance, she favored rational dress, particularly when riding her bicycle. She hardly owned any proper gowns.

It wasn’t fair. Wentworth didn’t have to pretend to be an unsullied virgin. He simply had to show up at the predetermined date and time.

“You cannot have everything you want, Cora,” Lysander reminded her.

“I know that.”

They were negotiating from a position of weakness. Wentworth had given in on the issue of her dowry without protest, which surprised her, considering the way her father had attempted to bribe acceptance into the aristocracy. It was a lot of money to give up.

She had acquiesced to separate bedchambers over separate houses as a conciliatory gesture. Her only alternative lodging was with Lysander, anyway, until Eryx’s renovations were finished. She hardly enjoyed living here.

“Ladylike comportment must only be required in public,” she said. “In private, I am free to behave as I wish.”

She would not tolerate being ordered about in her own home. Wentworth was the worst kind of bully, but he was about to discover that she was not the same trembling miss he’d terrorized all those years ago.

“He says nothing about my dog?”

“I doubt he knows about Titania. If he did, I’m sure the heartless bastard wouldn’t hesitate to force you to get rid of her.”

Her brother was one to talk, speaking of heartless bastards. Cora whirled, and her eyes flared wide when she caught Lysander bent to one side, scratching Titi behind the ear. He yanked his hand away and glared at her, daring her to say anything. She bit back a smile.

“Put in something vague that ensures I can keep as many pets as I wish.”

“Cora. Be reasonable.”

“I am. I was thinking about getting a Dalmatian. Or possibly a Great Dane. Maybe even a cat or six.”

“Why not add a parrot to your menagerie while you’re at it,” Lysander grumbled. “Or a hyena.”

“Do you think I could get one?” she asked thoughtfully.

“Not if you want to keep Titi alive.”

“Lysander.”

He looked up.

“I was joking.”

“I am so glad you can find humor in this mess.” He bent his head and scribbled something. Cora ceased her nervous pacing and collapsed onto a sofa. Titi hopped into her lap, and she stroked her pet’s fur to calm her racing pulse.

“If you agree to this, and he accepts your final changes, then the happy event shall be held one week henceforth.”

“One week ? What about the banns?” A week was far too soon. Panic flooded her.

“Wentworth has secured a special license.” Lysander’s mouth curved into a smile, and for a moment, he didn’t look unhappy. “He seems unexpectedly eager to marry you, Cora.”

There was no possible reason for him to want to hasten this travesty of a wedding. Why, then, did her heart do an odd little flip, and that swooping sensation settle into her belly?

No. This was about the Wilder & Co.’s dire condition, not about desire.

A business transaction. Nothing more.

A grin tugged at her lips. “Mr. Wentworth might have to cave on the color of my dress. A week is nowhere near enough time to have one made.”

The blistering glare of disbelief Lysander gave her could have stripped paint off the wall.

* * *

Cora had forgotten that when one was in possession of enough money, anything was possible. Including the creation of the most extravagant and absurdly expensive white wedding gown by an army of beleaguered seamstresses ever created on short notice.

“How are we, on one hand ruined, and on the other able to afford this extravagance?” she demanded on their return trip from the modiste’s. A fancy one, of course. She assumed the lady who owned the shop dressed Lysander’s paramours, not that she was inclined to inquire.

“It’s a wedding gift. I’m a duke, in case you’d forgotten.”

“How could I possibly forget when you remind me at every opportunity?”

“I do not.”

“Do so.”

He heaved a sigh. “Do you have the slightest idea how glad I will be to have you out of my house and at long last properly married? Even if it is to a scoundrel?”

“Not nearly as glad as I will be to be gone.”

There was no heat in her tone. She was simply exhausted from living with Lysander and his moods and his pompous self-regard. They were family, and they loved each other, but no house in England was large enough for the two of them to share comfortably, which made her wonder how well she was going to get along with Gideon Wentworth. She did not have high hopes.

“Listen.”

Cora lifted her chin.

“I know I haven’t been easy company these past several weeks.”

“I don’t need your advice on every single detail of my wedding. When I ask for your advice, then I want your opinion.” He meant well, but Lysander had mortified them both over dinner last night when he attempted to explain what to expect on her wedding night. She appreciated his attempt to educate her about marital relations, but she already knew everything she needed to—which was a problem, one she could not share with him.

He cleared his throat. “I am not saying this as criticism. I would be derelict in my duty if I didn’t tell you that if you decided not to go through with this wedding, I’d support you. Even if you left him standing at the altar. You don’t have to sacrifice yourself for the sake of Eryx’s pride. I would see that the lot of you are taken care of.”

Moved, she reached across the leather seat and tucked her gloved hand into his. “That’s what family does, Lysander. We pull together when times are hard. We celebrate the good times together, too. Even when life is hard, there is always something to celebrate. Annalise and Eryx’s baby, for instance.”

He squeezed her hand and let go. The subject of babies made him squirm. “You’re always welcome to come back to Gryphon Manor. No matter why or when.”

“Thank you, Zander.” She kept her gaze fixed upon the city outside the carriage window. Shadowy figures hunched in doorways seeking shelter from the blustering February winter. The money he’d spent on a dress she would wear for a single day could have fed hundreds of people, and yet that princely sum would be a drop in the bucket of the unmet need.

“I need to do this,” she said softly. “I have been languishing at Eryx’s home for too long. Hiding from the world. It’s past time I found my own way.”

He looked at her askance and bounced his knee, an old childhood habit.

“Gideon Wentworth was the one who prevented me from joining Society properly. Now he will be the one to return me to it. I am of half a mind to find out what I’ve been missing all these years.”

“Not much.”

“Easy for you to say. You’ve never been an outsider.”

“You have no idea what you’re talking about, Cora.”

There was no heat in his words, either, only a note of resignation that made her heart ache.

“I am willing to marry him, Lysander, because I think I am owed an apology. One way or another, I intend to make him regret what he did to me.”

There it was. Her secret ambition given breath and life. She wanted to avenge herself. Swan back into Society like she’d never left it and shame those men who had shamed her by shining brightly. Free herself from the enduring guilt of her failure to succeed despite so many advantages.

If Gideon Wentworth was the opportunity fate had given her to fulfill her wildest dream, then she would grit her teeth and endure the man’s company for the next fifty years. It didn’t matter to her whether she ever had intimate relations with a man again. There had been nothing much to recommend the experience on the occasions she had tried it. If Wentworth wished to take care of his needs with another woman, she would not stand in his way as long as he kept his activities discreet.

It was the way of the world. There was very little she could do to remedy the situation. Part of her rebelled at the unfairness of it. Cora held no hope that becoming Mrs. Wentworth this morning would do anything to improve her lot. Another part of her couldn’t help but wonder whether Gideon Wentworth’s wolfish grin still lurked beneath that genteel exterior…and if so, what that meant for her future.