I Sold the Cursed Duke One Hundred Nights, and He Never Counted Them novel · Chapter 19 of 24

Chapter 19: The Fiancée's Door

"May I come in?" said Lady Calanthe.

"No," Odalys said.

"I walked from Pear Street. I haven't a cab. My feet are quite ruined."

Odalys looked down.

Calanthe wore thin kid slippers that had once been white.

"Wipe them," Odalys said, and let her in.

Jorrin put the kettle on the stove without being asked and set three cups on the deal table.

He kept his eyes on the kettle with the studied indifference of a boy who has been taught that staring is rude.

Calanthe sat on the one chair.

She looked smaller than Odalys remembered, in the grey cloak, without her curls or her gloves.

She folded her hands.

"I broke the engagement," she said.

"You what?"

"Last night. I went into the Dowager's rooms and told her I would rather be a spinster in a cottage than the wife of a man who looks through me." She gave a short, startled laugh. "She was rather good about it. She threw a teacup at the wall and said she'd been waiting for me to find a spine."

"Why?"

"Because he wasn't going to look at me." She said it simply. "Not once. Not at the dinner, not in the corridor, not on the night I came to his door. I had a speech prepared about how a wife could ease his burden. He took my wrist as if I were a wasp. I looked at his face, and there was nobody in the room for me."

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