"Et tu, Brute?" William Shakespeare , Julius Caesar
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XXXV.
Perrie had been shut in the drawing room for the last thirty minutes confessing everything to her mother and grandmother. The words tumbled out of her mouth in blubbering form, and she watched as they were equally afflicted with stress and dismay.
Cecily was completely horrified, as was evidenced by the look on her face. Her mother appeared utterly disappointed, and her expression made Perrie feel wretched. She hated disappointing her mother. She knew that she had done so on many occasions before, but nothing she had ever done had been as bad as this. This made all of her silly antics with Joe, and at Mrs Liscombe's, seem like literal child's play.
"I am sorry for leaving the way I did," Perrie whispered. "I know it was wrong. I just could not stand to be ... so far. I needed to know that Joe was ..."
She had needed to know that Joe was not going to disappear. She had known somewhere deep inside of her that it was completely intolerable to even fathom never seeing Joe again. Her heart would not have been able to survive the grief.
But Grace did not reprimand Perrie. She did not state that these were the deserved consequences of her own foolishness. Grace rose from her chair and placed herself down beside Perrie and collected her into her arms. Just like her father had done. Perrie immediately began to cry as she felt her mother stroking her hair soothingly, and Grace hushed her quietly.
"What are we to do, Cecily?" Grace asked softly.
"Procure a gun," Cecily shot back sharply.
Grace tensed and Perrie's head snapped back toward's her grandmother on the opposite settee. "That is hardly helpful," Grace chastised.
Cecily laughed then, a facetious, displeased laugh. "The man should be thankful that I have not been educated in such hobbies as weaponry or else he'd already have a gullet full of lead. He is a disgrace to his name and title. How dare he walk into my house and start a rumour? He has no idea whom he has just crossed."
"Cecily," said Grace firmly.
But Cecily continued. "I'd wager this was all part of the plan. Lure us all in with whatever the sob story was about the younger one, make us weak to their true intentions. Distract us with the charming elder one, only to be throttled by the younger one when it counted. I will destroy the lot of them, I tell you. I have been crossed by scandal one too many times, and I have had enough of people trying to take advantage of my family."
Before Perrie could leap to Joe's defence, her grandmother was already marching from the drawing room, moving with the speed and grace of a much younger woman.
"Mama, Joe did not do anything," Perrie appealed to Grace. "It is all his father. The viscount is a wicked, wicked toad. Joe is innocent. He is good, I promise." Tears were still streaming down Perrie's face. "Joe does not deserve to have to be married to me. He doesn't want it. You know he hates me, really."
"Hate is the farthest thing from that boy's mind when it comes to you, Perrie," Grace murmured, as she leaned forward to kiss her on the forehead. She then shuffled Perrie a little so that she could stand up, before she held her hand out. "Come along. We must stop your grandmother from committing homicide."
"Do you hate me, Mama?"
Grace's eyes, which so mirrored Perrie's own, softened. "If I have ever done anything to lead you to believe that anything you could do would make me hate you, then I have failed as a mother. I am devastated for you, Perrie. I hate that your choice has been taken away, but I do not hate you. Grown or not, you are my baby, and I will do what I must to protect you, and I will help you as best as I can when I cannot protect you."
"You!"
Both Perrie and Grace heard Cecily's angered exclamation from out in the foyer, and they both stood bolt upright before hurrying out of the drawing room.
Just as Perrie feared that her grandmother had confronted the viscount, she was shocked to see both Joe and Ed at the top of the stairs. Joe, for she was certain it was him, locked eyes with Perrie immediately just as soon as she had reached her grandmother. She could only briefly see the two brothers united, with Ed's protective arm in front of Joe where it usually lay, before Cecily began her tirade.
"You fortune-hunting scoundrels, the pair of you!" Cecily bellowed, her furious voice booming up the stairs with not a care in the world about spectators.
"Your Grace –" Ed began to appeal, before Cecily interrupted him.
"Do not address me so informally," she spat. "'Your Grace' is reserved for those ranked lower than I. That system does not apply to rats and vermin."
"Grandmamma!" Perrie exclaimed. "You will stop this at once!"
Cecily's eyes shot to Perrie, and they flared widely. "Do you understand what they have done? Of course, you do, you have just been crying about it for the last half hour."
Out of the corner of her eye, Perrie saw Joe's shoulders stiffen.
"It is not their fault, Grandmamma!" Perrie insisted.
"Darling, you are too innocent, too naïve, and while it is customary for young ladies to be so, it is to your detriment in this instance. I assure you, however, that they two of them are well aware of what would have happened, and what has happened, when one is caught with a young woman unchaperoned!" Cecily seethed, pointing between Joe and Ed. "Though I am certain the pair of you saw the advantage of such a scandal! And look at what you have achieved, whichever of you is Joseph. Wed to the daughter of a duke. You had better pray I do not poison you at your wedding breakfast."
"I never wanted this to happen." Joe stepped forward then, descending down a few steps, and away from Ed. Ed remained on the landing, silent, but screaming. Joe's voice was broken and strained. One glance at him could tell anyone that he was wracked with guilt.
"Hogwash," snapped Cecily.
"I was foolish," Joe insisted. "I was careless with Perrie's reputation. Criminally so. If I could undo this all, I would. I don't want this."
Perrie resisted wincing rather obviously. It was made clear by everything about him, from his voice, to even the way he stood, that the last thing Joe Parish wanted was to be married to Perrie Beresford. And Perrie could not blame him. His choice had been taken from him, too.
"Do not insult my intelligence by suggesting that there was not some ploy in order to manipulate my granddaughter," rebuffed Cecily. "Certainly, some sweet words had to have been whispered into her ear in order for her to travel cross country to your aid, Mr Parish."
Perrie blushed scarlet, and she turned around into the safety of her mother's shoulder. And as she did so, she waited for Joe to tell Cecily that there was no ploy. There had been no plan. Neither one of them had plotted for any of this.
But a full minute passed in silence, and Perrie's stomach dropped to her knees.
"I see it confirmed on your faces," Cecily growled. "I should have suspected you both the minute you crossed Ashwood's threshold. And your father. Where is the good for nothing lout?"
Perrie dared to turn away from her mother, and she quickly saw the look on Joe's face. It was there in his eyes, the guilt, though it was different this time. He stared at her, his brown eyes burning her with angst.
"Perrie," he uttered.
"Tell her she is wrong," Perrie urged. The pleading in her voice was almost embarrassing.
"Joe was never a part of this, Your Grace," Ed insisted from the top of the stairs. "You must be assured that he was never a part of this. It is true that my father insisted that I pursue Lady Perrie. I was to charm her, and ultimately marry her if she would accept. My brother was adamantly against this plan from the beginning."
While it was clear that Ed was trying to clear his brother's name, all he had done was confirm to Perrie that Joe was privy to whatever his father's plot had been. Though, it could not have been hard to fathom what the viscount was after.
Was everything about the money? Was Joe at Ashwood learning from her father to secure his money? For how long had this been planned? Could it be traced back to their days in the church schoolroom?
Perrie's heart seized in her chest as an all-consuming pain began to take over her body. It was betrayal, but it felt like something so much more, and it cut entirely too deep. "I knew you always hated me, Joe Parish, but I never thought you would actually ruin my life."
***
Joe watched Perrie's heart break in agony, and he felt entirely powerless to stop it. Her innocence was slowly disappearing as Joe realised that there was another layer to his own inferiority. He had been a part of this deception, willing or not. He had stood by.
Joe had been confident that his father's schemes would not come to fruition, but he had not exposed them when he should have, and for that, Joe knew, he was guilty. He wanted to scream. He wanted to shout that he knew he was unworthy. He wanted to throw himself at Perrie's feet and beg her forgiveness.
But such a large part of Joe wanted to hold her, to bury his face into her hair, and to tell her that he loved her. The only thing that would end his anguish would have been Perrie returning his feelings.
But Joe didn't want that. He didn't want Perrie's heart. Her heart needed to belong to someone worthy, and Joe was not worthy enough to possess the heart of a toad, let along something so precious as Perrie's.
Joe wished with everything he had that he was worthy, that he was not undeserving. And it broke him to understand that his shortcomings were all entirely his own doing.
Perrie darted away from the entry foyer and her mother hurried after her, just as the sound of a commotion down the hallway became apparent. Joe craned his neck in that direction to see what the matter was, as did Ed, and they saw several footmen walking towards them carrying a number of bags, as well as a trunk, between them.
"What is the meaning of this?" barked John Parish from behind them. "Stop! Stop, I say! I demand that my things be returned."
Cecily stormed up the stairs just as the footmen reached the landing. Instead of carrying John's things down the stairs, they promptly threw them all over the balustrade, the trunks and bags spilling open all over the black and white marble floor. Books, clothing, and other trinkets covered the floor in a sudden, messy pile.
"The duke's orders, sir," one of the footmen told John.
"Set the lot on fire!" Cecily cried. "Courtesy of the dowager duchess." She stomped past Joe, nudging him with her shoulder, before she reached the landing, and the gathering of footmen, flanked by Joe's furious father.
"Your Grace!"
"No," seethed Cecily, "I have just had this conversation with one of your offspring. That address is only to be used by creatures with at least some modicum of intelligence. You, sir, are not fit to be squashed beneath my shoe."
John was quick to understand Cecily's ire, and his steely eyes narrowed. "It was not I who forced your granddaughter into my son's bedroom, Your Grace."
Cecily hissed like a cat. "Only a small man, with a small countenance, so gleefully revels in the plight of another. I did wonder at you never remarrying, but it is clear to me now that you possess no talent for pleasing women yourself. Instead, you needed to prostitute your sons."
John reacted to Cecily's cat-like hiss, with his own barred teeth as the duchess went for his pride, scratching at it with a vicious tongue. "I see now where that brat inherited her vulgar mouth."
"It is called 'wit', sir, though I can see that it has been a long while since you have encountered a woman's tongue." Cecily pursed her lips and tightened her jaw, before she added, "One, at least, that you did not have to pay for the privilege of."
Joe fell back against the railing of the staircase just as he lost the feeling in his legs. Perrie's hurt and betrayal, and Cecily's irate fury, only solidified Joe's hatred of himself. How could he have allowed any of this to happen? Why was he like this? Why was this man his family?
Why was he even born?
Joe wasn't necessary, he knew it. All he had done was cause pain. From the first moment he had taken a breath, he had caused pain. He wanted to fix everything, but he didn't know how. He wanted to undo all the pain he had inflicted. He wanted to right these wrongs.
"Come on." Ed was suddenly at Joe's side, an arm around him, and pulling him towards the front door, urging him to put one foot in front of the other down the stairs. Whispering in Joe's ear, Ed uttered, "We're leaving. Just for a little while. You need a moment. I know somewhere Father won't look for us."
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Hope you enjoyed it! Sorry I couldn't get this up last night - I was so tired! It's nearly midnight now, and I'm up in six hours for work, so I know I'll suffer for this in the morning lol.
Oh ... oh, I'm sorry? Was THIS the last bit of torture you thought I had planned? Oh ... oh dear ... dear sweet readers ... have you only just met me? This was child's play. I had to give you a Cecily tongue lashing, of course, but torture is my specialty. We're going out with a bang, friends :)
Alright, off the bed. Nighty night. Happy stressing for a week :)
Vote and comment xxx