But this was for the best, she told herself firmly. They needed a clean break. Surely he would leave her in peace now.
She nearly let loose a bitter laugh.Peace.As if she would ever find peace with this.
“My lady? Excuse me, Lady Clara?”
Clara blinked, focusing on her maid in the looking glass. “I am so sorry, Anne. I’m afraid my mind has wandered.”
The other woman smiled in understanding, patting Clara’s shoulder. “What with Lady Phoebe’s marriage quickly approaching, and your own upcoming nuptials, there must be much preying on your mind. But which of the hair adornments did you want today? The silk flowers or the ribbons?”
Upcoming nuptials.Clara gave Anne a weak smile, not wanting her to see how affected she was by those innocent words. “The silk flowers I think, thank you,” she managed.
The woman prattled on as she worked, tucking small white blooms into Clara’s curls. Only now that her attention had been diverted from Quincy, Clara could not help but hear what Anne had been talking about minutes ago. And its subject was far from welcome.
“And that Duchess of Reigate’s maid is a maddening piece of work. Always questioning, sticking her nose where it doesn’t belong. I ask you, what business is it of hers where you might have gone off to when you were a girl? Or why you were so ill for so long when I first came on?”
Clara’s heart stalled in her chest. There was only one reason for the maid’s questions: the duchess was still after the truth of Clara’s past, and like a dog on the scent of blood she had sent her maid to infiltrate the people who knew the most in a household—the servants.
Forcing herself to breathe, Clara asked as casually as she could, “And what did you tell her?”
“That it was none of her business,” Anne scoffed, tucking a particularly unruly curl in place. “But she’s a persistent thing, kept badgering me and anyone else who would pay her the least mind. Finally I said to her, ‘I came on when Lady Clara was just sixteen, when her previous maid done ran off. If you want to know the details, find her.’”
How Clara kept from casting up her accounts right then and there she didn’t know. The maid in question, Flora, had stayed by Clara’s side throughout the whole ordeal of going into hiding and living through the hellacious pregnancy and stillbirth that had followed. Clara had thought their bond was unbreakable.
Until Flora had gone and offered the scandal up to the first man who waved money under her nose. It had taken Clara’s father everything in him, including a good chunk of the Dane fortune, to keep the whole thing quiet. No doubt if she could be found she would be more than willing to offer up that information again, especially if a duchess came to her door with the promise of more money.
In that moment she realized with devastating certainty that the fear would never end. Eventually the truth would out. And once it did, she would lose everything she held dear.
No, she reminded herself bitterly, she had already lost something that was infinitely precious to her. This would only complete the job.
Impotence washed over her. She was so damn tired of living this way. She clenched her hands in her lap, anger rearing up, replacing her helplessness. Well, no more. She’d lost enough to that one devastating mistake; she’d be damned if she lost anything else.
Anne finished then. With hardly a word to the startled maid, Clara bolted from the room. She was done being afraid.
Her sharp knock on the duchess’s door was answered with alacrity by a pinch-faced maid. “Yes?” the woman queried, her insolent tone accompanied by a haughty stare down her nose.
“Is Her Grace within?”
“Yes, but—”
“Thank you,” Clara said, pushing past the woman, leaving her sputtering behind her.
The duchess was sitting up in bed, a tray on her lap, a single steaming cup of chocolate clasped between her hands. Her eyes narrowed when she saw Clara. “Goodness,” she drawled, taking a slow sip, eyeing Clara with disdain, “one would think no one in this household has any sense of privacy, the way people continue to barge into my room without permission.”
“Enough,” Clara bit out. “I came here to tell you to stop sending your lapdog to do your bidding.”
“Pardon?”
“I know you’ve had your maid asking questions about me.”
The maid in question gasped. “Lapdog? Why, I never—”
The duchess held up a beringed hand. The maid’s jaw closed with a snap.
“Enough. Leave us.”
The woman did as she was bid. And then Clara was alone with the duchess.
A slow, cold smile lifted the woman’s lips as she considered Clara. “Frightened you with my inquiries, have I?”