“Can’t you see, aunt?” he called over his shoulder. “I’m getting betrothed!”
Satisfied to see the redoubtable lady suitably shocked, her jaw dropping as she thumped back down against her carriage cushions, Avers looked down at the woman in his arms.
Lutin had grown bored with their stationary position and began to pull on his lead, straining this way and that, and causing the leather strap to wrap around their legs and force Emilie and Avers closer together.
“Emilie,” Avers murmured, kissing her neck, his breath tickling her skin between ministrations and causing her to shiver again. “Lady Avers.” His lips curved into a satisfied smile. “Oh, yes, I like that very much,” he said, drawing up to look into her eyes for a moment. “My Lady Avers.” And then he lowered his face to kiss her once again.
The End
AUTHOR’S NOTE
Like most of my books, Duke of Disguise holds a special place in my heart. Often I write themes into my books—knowingly or unknowingly—that speak to me at different times in my life. The main theme of Duke of Disguise is forgiveness.
Unforgiveness is something that can end up binding us up in anger, resentment and bitterness. People unintentionally allow other's actions against them to shape their lives, sometimes for years.
Forgiveness is hard.
Yet, I often think that there is a misunderstanding of what exactly it is in our culture. Oftentimes people think that you forgive when you don’t feel so angry towards the other person. When you feel ‘okay’ about what’s happened. If that’s the case, some people will never forgive, and I think one of the saddest things I hear is when someone says to me, ‘I will never forgive them.’
When people do forgive, they often follow the old adage, ‘forgive and forget’. So if they don’t feel ready to forget about the wrong, they won’t forgive yet.
As someone who believes in Jesus, I believe forgiveness is very important—and some of the above is not quite right. There will be wrongs that people will do to us in life that will never be ‘okay’. Which means, if we follow our culture’s thinking, we’d never forgive. But I don’t believe you have to feel okay to forgive someone.
Forgiveness is a choice.
You can choose to forgive (I have many times before), and in doing so, you’re not saying, ‘what you’ve done is okay’. What you’re saying is, ‘I’m not your judge, God is, and I’ll defer to him.’
Neither does forgiveness require ‘forgetting’. After all, if someone repeatedly hurts you, though you may choose to forgive them, to forget would be unwise. Forgetting would lead to you being treated badly again and again. If that person asks for forgiveness and changes their behaviour, then you may allow them to slowly earn back your trust. But if they do not, you put in boundaries to protect yourself from further hurt.
There’s been lots of times over my life that I’ve needed to forgive—it’s the same for all of us. And there have been lots of times I’ve needed to ask for forgiveness too!
While I was writing Duke of Disguise I was facing a really painful period in my life where someone hurt me deeply. I knew when this happened, I did not want to become bitter. I also knew that, in order to avoid that, I would have to choose to forgive them. And it wasn’t a one time thing, I had to choose to forgive them over and over. I was able to do this not because of my own strength (I'm weak), but because I’ve been forgiven by Jesus, and in turn I have the strength to forgive.
I chose to write about this action of forgiving in Duke of Disguise because I really do believe that our culture has its understanding of forgiveness wrong.
My hero, Avers, has faced heartbreak. He’s lost a future he imagined and the certainty of the person he thought he’d share it with. The pain has left him with a wound that runs deep and a hurt he can’t seem to walk free from.
I wanted Avers to be challenged to forgive in the story. And I wanted him to choose to do it, to show what that looks like in the circumstances of betrayal and hurt.
I hope I’ve done it justice. And I hope you’ve been able to see the beauty of what forgiveness can do and the hope that there is beyond it.
So, along with the wit, the glitter, the danger and the drama of this romance, is a depth that I hope blessed you.
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GLOSSARY
Agamemnon - was a king of Mycenae who commanded the Achaeans during the Trojan War.
Cabinet Noir / Cabinet du Secretes des Postes - a government intelligence-gathering office in France that would intercept correspondence between people, open it, copy it out or read it, and then reseal the letters and send them on to their destination. The Cabinet Noir was real, running from the time of Louis XIII onwards and the idea was to do its work without the recipient knowing their correspondence had been read or interrupting the normal running and timings of the postal service.
Café Procope - this café still exists in Paris to this day. It was originally opened in 1686 by Sicilian chef Procopio Cutò and quickly became a hub of the Parisian artistic and literary community. It attracted many famous individuals from the Enlightenment who came to discuss thoughts and ideas of the day including Rousseau, Condorcet, Voltaire, Diderot, Benjamin Franklin, John Paul Jones and Thomas Jefferson.
Comédie-Française - founded in 1680, the Comédie-Française was a merger of two Parisian acting troupes and became a state theatre in France.
Comte - this is the French version of the title Count.
Cravat - usually a strip of linen that was tied around a gentleman’s neck, the equivalent of a tie for the 18th century gentleman.
Caron de Beaumarchais - Pierre-Augustin Caron de Beaumarchais (1732-1799) was a French polymath, watchmaker, inventor, playwright, diplomat, spy, arms dealer and financier of the American Revolution.
Duke - the highest hereditary title in the British peerage.
Ennui - a feeling of listlessness and dissatisfaction arising from a lack of occupation or excitement.
Enlightenment - a European intellectual movement of the late 17th and 18th centuries which relooked at traditional understandings of God, nature and humanity through the new lens of reason and rational thought. The Enlightenment was a complex and often contradictory movement of intellectual thought with some streams becoming the bedrock of modern thinking around such subjects as equality both of sex and race, freedom of speech and religious toleration.
Eau de Vie – a concoction of water and brandy sold by street sellers in Paris.
Flintlock pistol - a gun that used a flint striking ignition system.
Hérisson - French for hedgehog.
Hôtel - an 18th century town house in Paris, France.
