Penelope hurried off her front stoop after Nicholas, but he was already heading back out in the street. Her chest ached at the damage she’d caused. He had deserved to know the truth, but she hadn’t meant to hurt him.
“Wait,” she called out. “Nicholas, please stop! Where are you going?”
“To fetch my belongings,” he said without turning around. “I’m done here.”
He did not slow down.
She forced herself not to chase him. She had no right to. Although she knew her own feelings were real, his interest had been caused by chemical compounds designed to manipulate him.
His affection was a mirage, no matter how much Penelope might wish otherwise. He had deserved to know the truth. She just hadn’t expected it to hurt this much.
In one single moment, Penelope had destroyed everything. The haunted look in his eyes when she’d told him it was all a farce…
Her heart had broken along with his. She swore under her breath. Duchess had caused nothing but damage.
No. Penelope had achieved it herself.
She loved Nicholas, yet she had used him and hurt him. She deserved to lose him.
Penelope trudged back out into the street, not to chase him to the castle, but to allow him free will. She turned her leaden feet in the opposite direction.
Gloria’s maid answered her door and allowed Penelope back inside without question. Less than an hour had passed. It felt as though she had spent it in a hell of her own making.
Penelope plodded into the observatory on heavy limbs and stood out of the way of the telescope. She hadn’t come to talk. She just didn’t want to be alone right now. Her home was too full of memory of Nicholas. Back when he thought he loved her.
Gloria was cleaning her telescope with a cotton rag. “I thought you were going to stay in your laboratory for the rest of your life.”
“My life is over,” Penelope said wearily. “Thanks to me.”
Gloria turned from the telescope and squinted in Penelope’s direction. “What are you carrying?”
“Turtledoves.” Penelope clutched them to her chest. “They stand alone but fit together.”
Gloria’s eyes widened. “May I see?”
Penelope forced herself to relinquish the precious figurines.
“These are incredible.” Gloria’s eyes lit with wonder. “What an ingenious way to interlock the two. Where did you buy them? I want a pair, too.”
Of course she would. The only thing Gloria loved more than the stars were mechanical puzzles. When the heavens were too cloudy for sky gazing, she spent long hours with her grand orrery, a mechanical device rotating a model of all eight planets. Gloria claimed she used it to unlock the mysteries in the sky.
Unfortunately, Penelope could offer no puzzle to solve. Everything was devastatingly, humiliatingly clear.
“The doves were a gift from Nicholas.” Right before she’d informed him he was an unwilling participant in a chemistry experiment. She was surprised he hadn’t taken them back and smashed them.
Gloria set down her cleaning rag. “If you still refuse to believe in love because ‘it’s not visible to the naked eye,’ I’d say these doves are indisputably tangible evidence.”
“I made a mistake.” Penelope’s shoulders slumped. “Duchess inflated my confidence, and I used misplaced pride to cause nothing but harm.”
“‘Misplaced’ is right.” Gloria put a hand on her hip. “Your perfume didn’t help your confidence at all. Your only faith was in chemical compounds, when you should have had it in yourself.”
“I am now incredibly confident in my ability to destroy the best thing that ever happened to me,” Penelope assured her. “I interrupted a declaration of love to tell him it wasn’t real. Now he’s gone.”
“Do you remember why you two argued when you first met?” Gloria asked after a moment. “What did you tell me?”
“That Saint Nick was on a mission to stop Duke,” Penelope said with a bitter smile. She’d been so sanctimonious. “That the gallant rake feared confused, hapless women would find themselves leg-shackled to all the wrong men.”
Gloria crossed her arms. “And what did you say to that argument?”
Penelope sighed. “I told him women aren’t hapless. Duke starts the conversation. Women decide where it goes.”
“Listen close,” Gloria said. “Men aren’t hapless either. He chose you. Not your scent. The whole package.”
Hope pricked Penelope’s heart. Might it be true? Could Duchess have worked as designed, yet not have manipulated the final outcome?
“You have to trust,” Gloria said softly. “Have faith that what you feel is right. All sorts of non-verifiable things exist. If a rake can choose love, surely a lady chemist is capable of the same.”
“I want to believe more than anything,” Penelope whispered. “But it would truly be a miracle. The chemical compounds used in Duchess—”
“Are you wearing it?” Gloria asked, coming closer.
Penelope took a step backward. “What?”
“Are you wearing it right now?” Gloria sniffed behind Penelope’s ears. “You don’t smell like anything but Penelope.”
Penelope pushed her away. “I washed it off as soon as I realized it had been a mistake. The trial is over. I’ll never wear perfume again.”
“When did you get rid of it?” Gloria insisted. “Did you pause to have a quick wash-up between accepting his gift and breaking his heart?”
“Of course not,” Penelope said, exasperated. “If you must have every detail, I scrubbed it off last night before curling into a ball and failing to sleep.”
Gloria grinned. “Then you weren’t wearing it.”
“What?” Penelope stammered.
“You weren’t contaminated with your evil perfume.” Gloria lifted her chin in triumph. “When he declared himself to you, Duchess was out of smell range. You were talking to the real Nicholas.”
Penelope sniffed both wrists, then stared at Gloria.
“Duchess started the conversation,” Gloria reminded her. “You had the power to finish it.”
The power to ruin it, rather.
“It happened too fast. This was my first kiss, my first sexual encounter, my first—”
“Your first time glancing up from your notes,” Gloria put in dryly. “You never came out of your laboratory. Not completely. Eligible gentlemen could leer at you all day long and you wouldn’t notice. Until Duchess gave you a reason to start.”
That… sounded uncomfortably accurate.
Penelope had done everything in her power to block herself off from the outside world. She hadn’t realized just how well she had succeeded.
“He said he doesn’t love me.” Penelope’s chest tightened with shame. “That he didn’t know me at all. He’s already gone.”
Her heart cracked. She’d managed to realize both her worst fears at once.
Love was real.
And she’d lost it.