Chapter 37 - Thirty Seven
"Do you even love Eric?"
The question, sharp and direct, hung in the heavy silence of the elegant tea room. It was a weapon designed to deliver a final, killing blow. Delia didn’t know what to say. The honest answer was no, but saying so would mean her immediate defeat and will sabotage her whole plan. She couldn’t say the truth and she couldn’t even lie. She could feel Anne’s smug, triumphant smile on her that she wanted to smack it off her face so bad.
Duchess Lyra leaned forward slightly, pressing her advantage. "You want to marry my son so badly, and yet you cannot answer this one simple question?" She scoffed, letting the words sink in.
Delia took a slow, steadying breath, her mind racing. Answering with a simple yes or no was a trap. She had to change the question, reframe the entire conversation. She looked up, her eyes clear and direct, and a small, sad smile touched her lips.
"You asked me about my broken engagement a while ago. I know you must be curious about why I broke my engagement, Your Grace," she began, her voice quiet but firm. "It is because I was betrayed. I found out that the man I was to marry, the man I loved and was ready to give my all to, was only taking advantage of me for what he would gain from my family, and that wasn’t the only reason, he also held another woman in his heart." She did not look at Anne, but the accusation hung in the air between them.
Lyra’s expression softened almost immediately. She was listening now, her curiosity piqued.
"After that discovery," Delia continued, her voice gaining strength, "I swore to myself that I would never fall in love again. That I would never be that foolish, that vulnerable, ever again." She turned her head and looked at Eric, who was watching her with an expression of intense, unguarded admiration. A genuine smile bloomed on her face. "Then I met Eric."
She looked away from him, back towards his mother. "When I met him, I thought... I thought that at the very least, he is a man who would never betray a woman. He would never betray his own woman, in the way that I was betrayed." She paused, then delivered her final blow, her eyes locking with Lyra’s. "And I knew that if he ever did, he has a mother who would not approve of such dishonorable behavior. A mother who would not let him go scot-free for hurting someone he made a promise to."
Lyra just sat there, in stunned silence. Delia had not answered her question at all. Instead, she had paid her the highest possible compliment, framing her not as an obstacle, but as a pillar of moral strength, a guarantor of her own son’s honor.
Delia continued, " And I’m not like other women, I know how it feels when someone takes advantage of you, when some betrays you. I wouldn’t want Eric to go through what I went through, I wouldn’t want to put him in that heart breaking, heart wrenching situation." She exhaled softly as if she had been holding her breath the entire time.