Apparently I'm just gonna write the same plot over and over.
Follow-up to this.
“Excuse me, my lord, I did not mean to intrude.”
Anthony has been laying on the floor of his study for hours now. He’d been told to come to dinner, and decided he wasn’t hungry, and now, he lays in the dark, staring at the ceiling.
He shoots up, though, at the sound of the unfamiliar voice. He looks to the door, and backlit by the lights in the hallway is a maid.
Short. Seemingly impossibly so. Dark hair.
Pretty, certainly.
“Sophie, yes?” Anthony asks.
She nods and curtsies. “My lord. Is there anything I can get you? Are you hungry?”
“No, thank you,” he tells her. “I-” he huffs out a breath and gets to his feet, searching around until he finds a match to light a few candles in the room. “It has been a trying day, if I am honest.”
“I understand,” she says in a quiet, almost sad voice.
Anthony looks at her in the new light now.
Yes, she is very pretty.
And yes, she is sad.
“I imagine you do,” he nods.
She shakes out her head and enters the room. “I can light the fire for you.”
“Thank you,” Anthony says, standing back to let her work. He watches her carefully, taking in her movements. “Sophie.”
“Yes?”
“I fear my brother loves you.”
She freezes, mid-reach for some kindling.
Anthony takes a breath. “It is so strange. Benedict is not…he is not one for love. Infatuation, certainly. Adoration, absolutely. Merriment. But love is an entirely new look on him.” He goes quiet for a moment. “I see the truth in it now, where I did not before.”
“It does not matter,” Sophie tells her quietly.
It’s an echo of Benedict’s words from earlier, and it feels a little like a slap in the face.
“He is…he is very sweet, you brother,” Sophie tells him, her voice wavering just a little. “He is-” she stops. “I have already given your mother my notice. I will be gone at the end of the week, and he will forget me. You all will.”
“The problem is that once you have his love, you are never without it,” Anthony tells her gently. “He will never let go, Sophie, he does not know how. You can run to the furthest reaches of the earth, and he will still love you.”
Sophie turns to him slowly, clear hurt in her eyes. “Are you not the one who wanted this ended?”
“I did not realize-”
“But you were right,” she cuts him off, her voice soft. “Love will never be enough to overcome what we are. What society has dictated our roles to be. Being with me will destroy his life. It will take him from all of you, and he will either wind up indifferent to me or resenting me, and I cannot-” she pauses. “I cannot.”
“Perhaps-”
“There is no perhaps, Lord Bridgerton,” Sophie snaps, and then stops again. “Forgive me. I forget myself. I shall light the fire and leave you to your evening.”
He watches her for a long time as she goes about lighting the fire. The room grows warmer, and brighter. “I am a very bad listener some days,” Anthony admits. “Some days, I am the Viscount, and this is my house, and my family and I know best, and to hell with anyone else’s opinion.”
Sophie doesn’t respond.
“But I can listen,” he assures her. “I can put away that part of me that is too authoritative and just be Anthony.” He pauses, looking into the fire. “Benedict is very good at drawing me out, actually.”
Sophie curtsies to him. “Good night, my lord.”
“Sophie,” Anthony says. “If he loses you, I fear I will lose him entirely.”
Sophie swallows and doesn’t meet his eyes.
“Help me understand,” he requests quietly. “Help me to understand what it is I am missing in all of this, because I know, from speaking with him earlier and talking to you now there are many things.”
“You are missing nothing,” she tells him. “I am a maid. Your brother is a gentleman. It was foolish to ever think a life together was possible.”
Anthony thinks of the sketches in his ledgers; of the details he gained from Hatch about their plans to away to My Cottage. How asinine it had all seemed then.
How very sad it all seems now.
“You are awfully well-spoken for a maid,” Anthony points out quietly.
“I was afforded the opportunity to take lessons at a previous home I worked for,” Sophie tells him quickly.
“A few lessons here and there would not have given you that vocabulary,” he argues. “Or the ability to speak three other languages. That takes dedicated study, and you would not have had time with your household duties. You had ample time, once upon a time.”
She looks him in the eyes finally.
“You were the child of someone of note,” he surmises. “And you were cast out.”
Sophie closes her mouth.
“Or cast downstairs,” Anthony guesses. “Languages. Literature. Art. Maths. Science. Who are you?”
“I am Sophie Baek,” she says firmly. “Your sisters’ lady’s maid, who will be leaving at the end of the week for-”
“You will not be going anywhere,” he snorts. “Not until I find out the truth. No, now you have me intrigued, not just for Benedict’s sake but for my own.”
Sophie swallows nervously. “Sir. Please. I cannot stay. Between Benedict, and- and-”
“And?” Anthony presses. “What are you running from? Other than a man who would shower you with affection so ardently you would not know your up from down?”
She doesn’t respond.
He shakes his head. “Miss Baek, I know we do not know each other well, but I assure you. I am quite adept at learning people’s secrets. Mostly through bullying. Which I am not above.”
After a long moment, Sophie curtsies again. “Goodnight, Lord Bridgerton.”
