Pinnacle (ONGOING)

Chapter Nine

     The door jarred as I swung it open, and I met Michael with an enraged stare.

     "What in the devil have you done?" I echoed, approaching the well dressed and reclined form that had the gall to look surprised.

     "You must believe me, Sophie-" Michael began. And I corrected it. "Ms. Windle."

     "I had made my intentions to court you known to your mother and my staff alone." He continued, rising from his seat.

     "I do not believe you." I retorted, taking a seat in the opposing kelly green settee. His face screwed up in frustration at my distrust.

     "You know my dislike of being tied down to something, Sophie." And I began to correct him once more. "It is your name, and I will call you it." He gritted out. This gave me pause.

     "So." He flattened his hands and gathered patience. "You of all people should know I would not purposefully hitch my wagon to yours. I intended to court you in private and see how we both felt in the situation before you bolted from the room. Diana and I had been too public, it rendered me sorely regretful when I discovered I had been locked into a marriage with a deceptive twit!" His rage was genuine. 

     "I did not want to ruin the lady's reputation, you know I am not so low, but do I also not get a say in my autonomy? You always go on about men being the problem as leaders of society, but are men not also enslaved by this society which abuses both our sexes?" He said the last bit more gently, and I pondered this. Though a few notable differences were present, the man was right.

     "I was 6 and 10, and she, 5 and 10. Our first season and the conniving witch had cornered me at a ball and asked to meet me in private. How was I to say no? She asked me some rubbish about you, and you know how young girls get when they are jealous, she told me of your affections, and I was only too eager to leave before someone discovered us, so I feigned forgetting you. She was over-joyed of course, and then, what to my surprise, an audience happened to grace us just in the nick of time." 

     I gasped. It all made sense; how their engagement seemed to come out of thin air, and bits of his story matched up with Diana's. 

     "I believe you," I said finally. It all made sense, Diana's guilt, her liar's spirit. She was responsible for her own downfall, not Michael.

     I rose, ordering my petticoats. "Would you like to take a walk with me then?"

     If Michael were trapping me, himself, there would be but one reason behind a plot: unpaid gambling debts. Michael's father was dead, and so was his mother, leaving him to manage the estate by himself. It would not have come as a surprise, therefore, if a mismanagement of funds had occurred. I looked at his countenance; well groomed, expensive clothing and his grounds were lavishly indulged enough to show he had kept his servants, I ruminated as we walked through the garden at Rhodes manner. Even the little broach I had always seen him wear that once belonged to his father and was worth a fortune, this too was present and would have been the first to go were there money issues present. 

     So, who had blabbed? I wondered. Mama? No, she had looked just as shocked as papa when he read the news in the paper. One of his servants? Entirely likely.

     "Why did you tell the servants if you do not mind my asking?" I ventured, striving to mask my annoyance at this grave mistake.

     "I thought that they should prepare to acquaint themselves with the new lady of the manner. I am new to managing an estate all by myself you see, papa had not been around long enough to teach me to hold my tongue around the servants."