Warning: This Chapter contains depictions of attempted sexual assault. Read at your own discretion. If anyone wants to skip this chapter, leave an inline comment so that I can add a quick summary at the start of the next chapter.

Cassius was living a nightmare.

He read through the letter again in horror, hoping somehow that he had read the words wrong.

I am sorry. I cannot do this. I do not love you.

No. 

No, no, no!

This couldn't possibly be happening.

He was supposed to get married in three days. Three days. It was all planned, the estate had been decorated, his clothes had been picked out, the furniture for the bridal suite had arrived. His mother and father had actually been getting along! He'd had their honeymoon planned out, they were meant to go to Amsterdam and then to the Alps, and then on to Italy. He had gotten a new library installed, filled with all the books that she had spoken to him of as a wedding present.

He was going to.....he was supposed to get married. He was supposed to have a wife he could respect and cherish and eventually love. Someone to spend holidays with. Someone to take away the monotony of his bachelorhood.

He had been so sure that his life was going to fall into place once his vows had been spoken. They'd had good, intelligent conversation. They had made each other laugh and they had shared their hopes for the future. So many things had aligned for them.

And then she had up and run away with her beau....three days before their wedding!

And to have sent him a note, as they typically did to discuss wedding plans, without even extending the courtesy of letting him down to his face? Not only did she jilt him, she would leave him to face the inevitable fallout by himself.

"Darling, is all well?" His mother's voice jolted him to the present where several eyes were peering at him. The breakfast table had fallen silent and all scrutiny was on him. He'd thought it would be a benign note, possibly inquiring about flower arrangements as their mothers had been in a rather serious debate about gardenias and tulips, and that was why he had opened it there without a thought. The Crenshaws and Willoughbys would be the first spectators to the Drury Lane production his life was about to become.

He stared unblinkingly at the offensive note. He had been eager to hear from his betrothed, a sense of affection budding in his heart at the elegant curve of her handwriting. He had grown so fond of her. He'd had so many plans for them, for their future.

But clearly she did not return his regard.

He felt so.....used. So worthless. So easily discarded as if his heart and honor meant nothing.

"There isn't going to be a wedding," he choked the words out somehow, astonished cries going up at the table from everyone gathered there. "Lady Lucille had eloped with another suitor."

A litany of gasps, disbelief, and outrage rose up from the table as Cassius got to his feet.

He needed to leave.

He felt suffocated with the weight of their concern. He wanted to vanish, to simply disappear and have someone else deal with the endless questions and empty condolences they would have to offer.

And Christ, the gossip. It would be a never ending nightmare of thinly veiled ridicule and scandal sheet articles making mocking innuendos.

His mother called out for him but he ignored her, striding out and away, away, away to the garden at the very back of his house. And only then did he let the despair take him. He yelled, punching the garden wall again and again, relishing the bite of pain as his fist collided with the unyielding stone. His blood roared in his ears so loudly that he did not hear her approach until she caught his fist from hitting the wall again.

"Please," Daphne said on a choked sob. "Don't cry, please."

It was only then did he notice the water streaking down his face. He swiped at his eyes hastily, his shame compounded.

"I need you to leave," he rasped out harshly.

"Perhaps it was for the best, perhaps you'll find someone even better-"

"No." He snapped. "I don't care. I don't want to hear it. Get out."

Her face turned pale for she had never heard him speak to her like this, she took one step toward him, reaching out a hand but he gave her a hard look that had her stopping in her tracks. The tears spilled from her eyes then, but Cassius couldn't find it in himself to give a damn while his own mind was such a mess.

"I am sorry. I am so, so sorry," she sobbed and then fled from the garden, leaving Cassius in blissful solitude at last.

Sleeplessness and anxiety saw Daphne sneaking into her library at nearly four in the morning just to have a moment's peace. It seemed all day she was beset by cousins and relatives who had come visiting for Christmas; including the Crenshaws. She barely had time to think or process the events of the last few days, and yet the second she closed her eyes she saw Cassius' haunted expression as he shed tears in his mother's garden. The guilt did not let her sleep.

What had she done?

He had wept! He had looked so hurt and so defeated, so ashamed. She had not once considered that his regard for Lady Lucille was anything significant. She had not once considered the hurt and ridicule that would follow him once she all but jilted him at the altar. A failed courtship was one thing. But this? Having one's fiancee run off with another man just days before one's wedding? It was like a singular drop of blood in a pool full of sharks; they would scent it immediately and descend into a frenzy. They would rip him apart.

And for a man like Cassius, who hated crowds or being in the center of attention, the scrutiny that would doubtlessly come from being the talk of the town would be doubly awful. He, who held himself to such high standards of behavior, he who guarded his privacy so jealously, who never acted in such a way that would warrant commenting.....he would despise every second of the inevitable whirlwind that would dominate his life for the foreseeable future. He had hated it so much even when there was a mention of his parents....how would he fare when it was him being ridiculed?

He would never forgive her.

A hard pit made of guilt and despair had logdged in her gut, stinging her relentlessly. Fear made her tremble, unable to eat or sleep. Sometimes she was seized with the mad urge to confess everything, she had come very close to it in his mother's garden indeed, but her good sense had prevailed. If she told him, she would doubtlessly lose him forever. She could bear any number of hardships, but not that. Never that.

How could she have been so blind? How could she have been so self-involved that she never even stopped to consider the consequences? How could she have been so unbelievably arrogant, so assured in herself that it hadn't even occurred to her that she would hurt him so terribly? He would undoubtedly see this as a betrayal of biblical proportions, and rightly so.

The thought haunted her over the next few days as the news of Cassius' jilting spread like wildfire. She had accompanied her parents to his house several times over, but he refused to even leave his rooms. She had snuck upstairs and knocked on his chambers but she had been met with silence. Lady Pembroke was anxious, but also furious at Lady Lucille for abandoning him. If only she knew that Lucille was not to be blamed at all.

The pit in her stomach grew and grew, her nights remained sleepless, her food remained untouched. When her mother had inquired why she was not partaking in her favorite dessert, she had just informed her that she had felt as though she had gained a few pounds and had put herself on a slimming regimen. Her mother had tutted and reassured her that she needed no such changes to her diet, but had otherwise accepted that explanation.

Because that is who everyone thought Daphne was; shallow and self-centered. And what had she done to prove them wrong? Naught. She was shallow and self-centered. She had just upended a man's life because of her own selfish reasons. She had caused him to be ridiculed and humiliated.

"I know what you did," the low, raspy voice jolted her out of her miserable spiral. Gooseflesh erupted all over her arms as she saw a dark figure looming in the doorway, face obscured by the shadow cast because of the singular lamp she had left burning.

"I am sure I don't know what you mean." She replied dismissively, though her hands trembled on the book she had been pretending to read.

"I know you're behind it. Lucille's little disappearing act," his triumphant smile reminded Daphne of an Indian Cobra she had once seen in the Royal Menagerie. Venomous. Predatory. Malignant. Daphne's blood turned to ice. He lurched forward, his gaze disgusting and lecherous, roaming over her figure. And even though she was covered in a robe, it felt as though he were ogling her nude body. The way he looked at her made her feel so....dirty. "I saw you talking to him. In the back garden like the little tart you are."

"W-what do you want, Robert?" She hated that her voice quivered, betraying her discomfort. She felt the lash of his crude words akin to a physical blow.

He was drunk, Daphne realized with an uncomfortable shudder of revulsion, the hair on the back of her neck standing up in wariness. He kept approaching her, forcing her to withdraw until the back of her legs hit the coffee table.

"What do I want?" He chuckled darkly as he raised a hand and caressed her neck. "You, of course."

"I refuse to marry you, Robert." She hissed, her temper somehow breaking through her fear. "Haven't I made it abundantly clear?"

"Marriage? No. Marriage is too good for a cock-teasing whore like you," he snarled at her, he launched forward as she tried to escape him. She let out a cry of pain as his hand grabbed a fistful of her hair and yanked her back. Before she could react he had crushed her mouth beneath his in a revolting kiss. He forced his tongue into her mouth, the taste of port still on his breath. Daphne wanted to vomit. She wanted to move, wanted to yell or to slap him but it seemed as though her body had shut down and frozen. He drew back, his hands tugging at the knot on her waist. "Take off your robe."

That was enough to jolt her into action. Her heart pumped so loudly she could barely hear anything over the roaring of blood in her ears. Her body was flailing, urging her to escape or fight.

"No!" She struggled madly against his bruising grip, tears threatening to spill from her eyes. He did not relent even one bit. Her hands flailed about, trying to find a weapon, closing around the book she had been pretending to read.

"If you don't spread your legs for me like the light skirt you are, I am going to tell everyone what you've done."

"I will never let you touch me!" She half yelled, half sobbed as she swung the book, its edge clubbing him on the side of the head. The impact was minimal but it had gotten him to loosen his grip on her enough that she lurched out of it.

"You bitch," Robert snarled, lunging for her again but she was already running as fast as her legs could carry her. Up the stairs and she did not stop running until she saw the familiar wallpaper of the family wing. She slammed the door to her room shut and then turned the key in the lock with shaking hands for good measure. 

And then she burst into tears.

Her skin crawled, bile rising in her throat as she relived the sensation of Robert thrusting his tongue into her mouth again and again. She wished she never had to see Robert's disgusting face ever again.....but if she told her parents about it, they may attempt to force Robert's hand into a proposal for attempting to compromise her, which was the last thing she wanted.

And to make matters worse, she had no doubt now that Robert would tell Cassius....and she would lose him forever.  She would be branded a liar, and who would believe her then?