Her Perfect Match

chapter Twenty-One


Vivien sat in the parlor of Mariah’s home, nervousness building inside her with every tick of the clock. Today was a regular meeting of the Charitable Fund for Young Ladies and her friends went about their discussions as normal. For the past hour, she had remained almost entirely silent, watching the two women interact, smile at each other, look over paperwork together as they discussed the best idea for this problem or a way to promote their cause to ladies of rank.

She would miss this terribly.

Suddenly Mariah turned on her. “Vivien, I cannot remain silent any longer.”

Vivien tensed. Her intelligent friend was about to comment on her distance, and then she would be forced to tell them something she dreaded.

“What in the world did you do to Lord Dersingham?” she finished with a laugh.

“You mean his sudden change of good fortune?” Vivien said, her lips twitching with laughter she could scarcely hold in.

That was one of the high moments as of late. Dersingham had been crushed under the weight of his scandal when the engagement to the American had failed and his creditors began to call in their debts. He was no longer invited to parties and had been holed up in his London estate for days without word.

“Change in forture is one way to put it,” Mariah said with an arched brow. “The man is utterly destroyed. They say he will never be invited back to polite Society again and now women are coming out of the woodwork to accuse him of impropriety. There may even be an investigation by the Crown about a recent duel and a stolen bit of gold… Since all these circumstances happened just a few days after you brought up his evil deeds, I must think you had a hand in it.”

“I have heard even his servants are fleeing the house, seeking and finding new employment in the best homes in all of London,” Lysandra continued with a wide smile. “Thanks to you?”

She shrugged with relief. The inevitable was put off for the time being.

“I suppose I had some hand in the fact that the American won’t marry his son as planned, which stole the funds right from the bastard’s coffers, but the rest is not my doing at all. It is only a fair recompense for years of evil deeds. And Benedict has ensured the safe placement of the servants from Dersingham’s home, not me.”

Lysandra held her gaze for a long moment. “Benedict is a good man.”

She couldn’t smile. It was too painful. “Indeed he is.”

“Isn’t there any way to be with him?” Lysandra pressed.

Vivien swallowed. She wasn’t even going to deny that was her heart’s desire. “No. Not with my reputation.”

“But Lysandra and I each came from similar backgrounds and our husbands—” Mariah began.

Vivien lifted a hand to stop her. “You did not come from anything like my background. Lysandra never had a lover beyond her husband and you married a rake with a terrible reputation who could be expected to do something so shocking. Neither of you were ever the most notorious woman in the city.”

Lysandra worried her lip. “When you say that, it is so unkind to yourself. You are far more than just a mistress or a woman of a certain reputation. Your work with the charitable fund proves that.”

“And I appreciate that you both see me as more than what I am,” Vivien sighed. “But it is to no end. I cannot be with Benedict. It would destroy him and I…I care too much about him to live with those kinds of consequences for him. There is nothing else to be said about it.”

“I disagree,” Mariah said with a shrug. “There is a great deal more to be said.”

Vivien drew in a breath. She could sit all day with her friends, debating this subject. But there was one way to cease their ramblings on her love for Benedict.

“Perhaps there is more to be said,” Vivien conceded as she pushed to her feet and walked to the window. She couldn’t look at them when she told them the truth. “There are plans to be made, you see.”

“Plans?” Lysandra repeated with confusion.

She nodded but couldn’t turn. Not until she had confessed. “I—I am leaving London.”

Silence greeted her statement and she finally pivoted on her heel and looked at them. They were staring at her, neither one completely understanding.

“On a holiday?” Mariah offered.

Vivien’s breath caught. The words caught in her throat far more than she ever imagined they would, especially when Lysandra’s hands had begun to shake and Mariah seemed so utterly perplexed by the very idea.

“No. I mean never to return. I am leaving London for good.”

Mariah shoved away from her chair, flipping it over in the process as she staggered to her feet. “What?”

Vivien bit her lip. Her friend, her best friend, was trembling, her eyes filling with sudden tears.

“Please don’t make me say it a third time.”

Mariah shook her head and Lysandra slowly joined both women on their feet. Normally she was the sweetest one, the most innocent and the most emotional. But at that moment, she seemed utterly calm.

“Why are you leaving?” she asked. She reached for Mariah and took her hand, squeezing it for comfort when the two women faced Vivien as a united front.

Vivien sighed. She’d created so many stories in her mind of how she would tell her friends this news…if she told them at all. But right now, only the truth could make them see why this was not just a choice, but an imperative.

“I am in love with Benedict Greystone,” she admitted, every word stinging like fire across her heart. “But we cannot be together.” Lysandra drew a breath to protest, but Vivien shook her head. “Please do not argue, my dear, you cannot understand how much more painful your attempts to change my mind make this.”

Lysandra snapped her lips shut, pink darkening her skin.

“But why not just part with him, then, and stay in London as you have for nearly a decade?” Mariah asked in a shaky voice.

She shook her head. “On the night of my birthday, I realized something I had been denying for years,” Vivien explained. “I am not happy in this life anymore. In fact, I am very empty.”

Lysandra drew back. “I had no idea.”

Vivien shrugged. “Your ignorance was of my design. But as there is no way I could ever start again here, where my face and name are so well-known, I realized that in order to make a new life for myself, I have no choice but to leave.”

“You made this decision the night of your birthday and you said nothing until now?” Mariah blinked in utter disbelief. “Not even to us?”

Vivien drew in a shaky breath. “I made a list of things I must do, loose ends I must settle before I could depart London. You and Lysandra were very high on that list, I assure you. Celebrating you, spending time with you, letting you both know how loved and cherished your friendship has been to me over the years.”

Lysandra gasped as the first tears began to fall. “But you denied us that same time. Here we have been taking the hours we spent for granted, believing there would be hundreds, thousands more in a lifetime to share.”

Vivien shook her head. She could see she had hurt them and that had never been her intention.

“I’m so sorry. It is not in my nature to be open, to share my thoughts or my pains. To be truthful, I was afraid of your reaction, afraid you would try to convince me to stay here.”

“Can we convince you?” Mariah pleaded, her tears now sliding down her cheeks in waterfalls.

Vivien considered the question. In this moment, with the two women sobbing at the thought of her loss, it was easy to imagine there was some way to work it out. To remain in London and forget her unhappiness, her emptiness, to ignore the loss of Benedict and watch him marry with a false smile on her face.

The very thought made her chest feel hollow and her stomach turn. And proved that even the love of her friends could not erase or change the love of this one man.

“No,” she whispered, blinking at her own tears. “I’m afraid this is a decision I must make. I’ll be destroyed if I stay.”

Lysandra nodded, but Vivien knew she would. She was too sweet of temper not to let someone she loved go if they felt it was best for them. Mariah was another story. Jaded like Vivien, though not as completely, the two women had been close for years. And Mariah was far more likely to hate her for her choices.

Her friend slowly crossed the room toward her, pale face unreadable even as she moved just inches from Vivien. For a moment, she only looked at her, then Mariah tugged her in for a fierce hug.

“I would never ask you to do something that would cause you pain. If you must leave, then I have no choice but to understand,” her friend whispered into her hair as the two women clung to each other.

Vivien motioned Lysandra to join them and for a moment, they stood, arms around each other, crying in unison. Until Vivien pulled away with a laugh.

“All right, you ninnies, that is enough,” she said, laughing through her tears. “I shall not ruin my reputation of being a cold, jaded woman by sobbing over you.”

Mariah chuckled. “No one would ever ask you to.”

“When will you leave?” Lysandra asked, retaking her seat and wiping her eyes with a handkerchief she produced from some mysterious fold of her gown.

Vivien took a seat and frowned. “I had planned to spend a final Season here, celebrating my life and leaving an impression no one could forget, but now…now I think it would be best for me to quietly disappear soon. I have already procured a home on the continent that my solicitor says can be ready in a week. My staff has begun to catalog my things so that I can arrange for the removal of what I wish to take with me.”

“And what of the house?” Mariah asked. “Will you sell it?”

“There is a reason I brought this subject up during our meeting,” Vivien said with a smile. “You see, one of my items on my list of things to do before I left the city was to give away that which I don’t need. And I do not need that house any longer.”

Lysandra shook her head. “I don’t understand.”

“I would like to donate it to the cause we have created together,” Vivien explained. “I think you two could make it a place where women in dire straits can come and live safely. Can you imagine if abused servants felt as if they had a safe alternative to staying in their situations? Or a woman carrying the shame of a child out of wedlock, forced upon her by a so-called gentleman, had a home she could run to? In short, turn my house of sin into a safe haven.”

Mariah shook her head, but her wide smile told Vivien she approved even before she spoke. “It is an amazing idea! But are you certain you won’t want to return to the house? Once it has been transformed, it can never go back.”

Vivien smiled. “That is the idea. For the house and for me.”

Lysandra let out a long sigh. “Then it is settled.”

“Yes.” Vivien said, but in the end the issue felt anything but. Telling her friends was a huge part, and lessened her guilt over keeping the secret even more.

But there was one person who was still in the dark about her plans. And she had no idea how to tell Benedict that it was time to let her go…this time permanently.