was, of course, abuzz with the happenings. His mother had caught him in the breakfast room that very morning and made her opinions quite clear.
‘From what I have heard you are well shot of Mrs Whitely, Daniel, and you can now concentrate on the search for a far more suitable match. The Earl of Denbeigh’s wife, Lady Denbeigh, has been most direct with her wishes for her daughter’s future. From all accounts the young lady appears to be a well brought-up, softly spoken girl with an admirable fashion sense. Trade needs to marry trade and those from the ton should find a partner within the same ranks. It is these unwritten laws of society that keeps it all working, you see, and if you seek to change it for whatever reason there are always complications and sordid ones at that.’
She twirled the end of a light-brown curl around her finger. ‘Your man said you no longer have the greys stabled here in London. Are they at Montcliffe?’
‘No. I sent them back to the Camerons. They were part of the wedding settlement.’
‘But I had heard that they were worth a fortune.’
‘They are.’
‘Then I should have kept them if I were you. It would have been some payment for all the humiliation we have suffered since.’
The loud shout of a street pedlar brought Daniel back into the moment, an unkempt fellow playing a wooden flute and touting for a few pennies as he finished. Digging into his pocket, he dropped in an offering.
How the hell could he rescue Montcliffe? The edges of his world were flattening out and he was in danger of falling off the end of it unless he could come up with something.
A pawnshop sign opposite caught his attention and, checking to see that no conveyance was bearing down upon him, he walked across the road towards it, pulling off the heavy gold signet ring from his little finger as he went.
* * *
‘I think you should send back the greys, Papa. Lord Montcliffe can’t wish for the agreements to continue as they were, not after...what has happened, but we do need to ensure his discretion.’
Amethyst finally felt better today and had dressed to come down to the dinner table with her father, who watched her with a growing frown upon his face.
‘You won’t fight for your reputation, then, or for Lord Montcliffe?’
‘He was never mine to fight for, Papa. Surely you can see that?’
‘The first man who has made you live again and smile again and you give him up on a sigh? Your mother would have been disappointed in you.’
‘Why? Because I can understand that in the distaste of the ton lies a way to complete devastation? Daniel Wylde wanted me as little as Whitely did. The pair of greys arrived from him before a new day had dawned properly. Even Gerald gave me a few months.’
‘A few months of hell.’ Robert stood, his voice louder than she had ever heard it, ‘and the scars to prove it. The worst thing about it all was that I could do nothing as Whitely systematically wore you down into a daughter I didn’t recognise any more. After him you looked over your shoulder with a fear of life, love and happiness.’
He held up his hand as she went to speak. ‘Montcliffe gave you back something whether you admit it or not, Amethyst. For the first time in a long while you have seemed...happy. You took risks, you lived.’
She began to laugh because anything else was too awful to contemplate. ‘I agreed to the terms because I thought that was what you wanted, Papa. The doctor said you needed to be relaxed and rested if you were to survive your failing health and you have looked more robust since.’
‘I do not think your agreement to marry him was all about me, my dear. You called for Daniel Wylde when you were sick, again and again, and you begged for him to come back.’
‘It was the laudanum.’
‘No, it was the truth.’
‘What are you trying to say, Papa?’
‘That the Earl was the best thing that has happened to you in a long time and if you don’t do anything to make him understand the situation as you know it you will never be accepted into polite society again. That really would kill me.’
A gathering dread made her feel cold.
‘We will introduce better conditions.’ Her father’s voice held no question as he continued on.
‘Conditions?’
‘A year of marriage and fifteen thousand pounds every four weeks and then a lump sum at the end.’
She shook her head. ‘No more, Papa. We’ll simply stay here at Dunstan House. I never need to return to London again.’
‘Hiding, then? Like your hands in the gloves and your hair beneath the wig. You’re twenty-six, Amethyst, soon to be twenty-seven, and there are not too many of the good years to go. Child-bearing years, the chance of a family and of happiness is dwindling with each and every successive month you tarry. Even now—’
She stopped him. ‘I am not an old maid yet.’
‘But you might be if you are not careful. Then what would Susannah have to say? Flourishing, she instructed. Make our daughter flourish, were the last words she ever said to me. If you have your way of things there will be no chance of that.’
‘So you are saying?’
‘That the marriage between you and Daniel Wylde, the Earl of Montcliffe, goes ahead.’
‘No.’
‘The marriage goes ahead and you show Montcliffe exactly who you are. You tell him the truth about Whitely and the way he used you and hurt you.’
‘No, I can’t do that.’
‘Then I will call in each and every debt his estate owes and ruin him. Is that what you want?’
‘I don’t believe you are saying these things, Papa.’ Horror stripped her words back to a whisper.
‘If you tell me you have absolutely no feelings for Lord Daniel Wylde, I will stop. All of this. We will simply leave England and head...anywhere. But you must also remember that there is every good chance according to the best of London’s specialists that you will soon be completely alone and without my support.’
She was silent. She tried to speak, she did, from the well of sense and logic and reason she knew was inside her, but the words just would not come.
Relief passed into the lines of her father’s face. ‘Very well. I shall send Montcliffe a message tomorrow outlining the new conditions, Amethyst. If I have not heard back from him by the end of the week, I will go down to London myself and visit him. I do not think he is a person who would break his word on keeping the silence of our demands and I also know that Goldsmith will be calling in his own debts, too.’
‘My God.’
‘Are we in agreement, then?’
She could imagine Daniel receiving both her father’s
