The Duke Was Forced to Marry the “Ugliest” Somerset Sister, a Woman Hidden Behind Black Crepe for Ten Years — But When He Removed Her Veil Before the Entire Court, Everyone Finally Learned Why She Had Been Hidden

PART 2

Henrietta Somerset did not need to be in the room to know her fate had been decided. The servants’ gossip traveled faster than the London post, and by the time Arthur Pendleton’s footsteps faded across the marble foyer below, she was already turning back down the corridor toward her chamber, her right leg dragging its familiar, uneven rhythm against the floor.

Another gift from that carriage, ten years gone. The leg ached when the weather turned. It was, at least, a pain she understood.

Her room was spartan beside her sister’s — no gilt-edged mirrors, no bright silks. Only the one glass, and it stayed covered. She sat at the vanity and drew back the linen cloth herself.

The left side of her face was ordinary. Pale skin, a sharp jaw, an eye the color of wet earth — her mother’s eye. Then she turned her head, and the fire came back to her the way it always did, without warning, without mercy. The right side was ruined: tight, shining scar tissue in ridges of white and violet, pulling the corner of her mouth into a permanent, silent grimace. No lashes. Skin that had forgotten how to move.

She was not a monster. She had simply survived something monstrous. Polite society had never troubled itself to learn the difference.

The door banged open without a knock. Cecilia swept in, golden curls bouncing, a manic light in her blue eyes.

“He signed it,” she gasped. “Father just told me. Westford signed the contract, Hetti — you are to be a duchess.”

Henrietta lifted the linen and draped it back over the mirror, slow and deliberate.

“And you are to be spared marriage to the bear of Yorkshire. Congratulations.”

Cecilia had the grace to flinch — briefly.

“It isn’t like that. Father says the Duke is perfectly content, and it’s a brilliant match. You’ll have a massive estate. Servants. You’ll be her grace.”

“I will be a prisoner in a larger cage.”

Anger required energy Henrietta had stopped spending years ago. Cecilia was only what the world had shaped her to be — beautiful, shallow, and terrified of anything unpleasant.

“Don’t be grim,” Cecilia coaxed, careful not to look at the ruined side of her sister’s face. “He’s said to be very rich. Rough, yes. But he’ll provide for you.”

“When is the wedding?”

“Tuesday.”

Four days. Her father was leaving no window for the Duke to reconsider what he’d purchased.

“I’ll need to pack. Send my maid up.” She rose and crossed to the wardrobe. “And Cecilia — what does one wear to a wedding no one is meant to attend?”

Cecilia’s answer died in her throat.

The veil sat folded on the top shelf like something waiting.

“He did not ask to see me before he signed,” Henrietta said quietly, pulling out a heavy gray traveling dress. “He purchased a title to land. I am merely the ink on the contract.”

There was no need, she told herself, for a man like that to ever look at her at all.

But four days later, standing frozen in the vestibule of St. George’s with her father’s brandy-scented breath at her shoulder, Henrietta would learn precisely how wrong she was — because when Arthur Pendleton finally stepped from the shadows near the altar, dressed in severe black like a raven that had wandered inside by mistake, the first thing he did was not look away.