Chapter 29

“You should have had me come over much sooner than this,” Felicity said gently. “I can’t believe you’ve been on your own all week.”

“It’s not so terrible, being on one’s own,” Isabella replied. “Not as bad as I would have imagined it to be, anyway. There’s plenty to do. I have books to read, and I’m permitted to go anywhere I’d like in the house. I eat my meals whenever I want them. It’s all very nice to tell you the truth.”

“I can’t believe that,” Felicity said rather severely. “I see the look on your face, Isabella. That’s not the look of someone who’s happy. You’re upset about the fact that you’ve been left on your own. I know you are. You can tell me the truth about it.”

Isabella sighed. “It’s not the fact that I’m alone that upsets me,” she argued. “Though you’re not wrong to say that I’m unhappy, Felicity. I am. Of course, I am.”

“But why? If it’s not because of the fact that your husband left you here alone?”

“It’s not the loneliness,” Isabella said. “I told him I was feeling lonely. I suppose I thought that was the worst of my problems, and maybe it is a part of it. But what’s far worse is the lack of him. That’s something nobody else can ever make up for. I’m so glad to have you here, Felicity, you know I am, but…”

“But you miss your husband,” Felicity observed gently. “It’s understandable that you would feel that way, Isabella.”

“I can hardly bear to admit to these feelings,” Isabella said. “I suppose I always knew that I wanted him to care for me. But I didn’t expect that I would fall in love. And I think I have.”

“Falling in love with your husband is not such a bad thing,” Felicity considered.

“It is when he runs off to another estate and leaves you alone with no idea of when he’ll be back,” Isabella lamented. “He didn’t even tell me why he was going—but I think I know the answer to that question.”

“You do?”

“He kissed me,” Isabella explained. “The other night, right before he left, the two of us shared a kiss. There had been other moments of unexpected intimacy, but that was as close as we had ever been.”

“But that doesn’t make any sense,” Felicity said. “Why would he leave because of that? If anything, that ought to make him want to stay.”

“No. He didn’t want us to be close.” Isabella sighed. “I never told you this, but one of the first things he said to me when I came to this house was that our marriage wasn’t going to be a normal one. He doesn’t want an heir. He barely wants a wife. He married me for the sake of his reputation, nothing more. And now that he has what he wants, I think he would be just as happy to never speak to me again.”

“That can’t be true,” Felicity objected. “If that was how he felt about it, he wouldn’t have kissed you in the first place.”

“He might have. Who knows how the mind of a gentleman works? He did kiss me, at any rate, and I thought it might have meant that things were about to change between us, but nothing changed. It’s all the same as it ever was,” she sighed. “It’s worse than it was because before I had reason to hope, at least, that he would come to feel something for me. Now, I know that he never will. He doesn’t even want to look at me.”

“May I stay with you tonight?” Felicity asked. “I think you could use the company.”

“Will Father allow it?”

“I doubt he’ll come all the way here to fetch me,” Felicity replied. “We’ll send him a letter letting him know I mean to stay, and if he doesn’t like it, there will be nothing he can do until tomorrow when I go back home.”

“That’s true, but I wouldn’t like you to face his wrath.”

Felicity smiled. “I’m not afraid of Father,” she said. “What can he do to me, really?”

“You’ve become very brave,” Isabella observed. “I used to think that you needed me to take care of you, but you don’t need that, do you?”

“I’ve always needed you,” Felicity said. “But I don’t want you to think that I’ll lose my ability to tend to myself in your absence. Father can’t do anything to me that I can’t handle. Do you have someone on your staff who can carry a message?”

A footman was summoned, and a message drafted then the two ladies retired to Isabella’s bedroom. Isabella instructed Caroline to have their dinners sent up—there was no reason to eat at the dining room table when they were the only ones in the house. “I’ve been eating here most nights,” she confessed to her sister. “It’s so big and lonely in the dining room, and it just makes me think about who isn’t there with me.”

“I can understand that,” Felicity said. “And it’s sort of fun, isn’t it? It reminds me of when we were children, and we would take our dinners in our room. Remember how we used to share a room?”

“Of course, I remember that.” Isabella smiled fondly. “Those were good days. I think it was supposed to be some sort of punishment or a way of reminding us that we weren’t the favorites—that Rosalind was. But to me, it was always a privilege we enjoyed over her. I would much rather have spent time with you in our shared bedroom than have dinner with Father at the table. Secretly, I think Rosalind might have been envious of us rather than the other way around. I know I would have been, had I been in her shoes.”

“As would I,” Felicity said. “But, you know, you’ve always been skilled at finding happiness in any situation, Isabella. You were the one who showed me how to enjoy our lives when we were nothing but the least favored members of the staff, daughters of a household maid. You were the one who told me that everything would be all right when our father claimed us as his own and made us ladies in our own right. And you were the one who reassured me, over and over, that I would marry someday and escape his household, find happiness of my own. I believe in that dream because of you.”

“I’m finding it hard to believe in dreams these days,” Isabella confided.

“Will it help you if I tell you that I think one of our dreams might be coming true?” Felicity asked.

“What do you mean?”

A slow smile spread across Felicity’s face. “I can hardly believe it, but…I think I might have found a gentleman I have feelings for. Someone I could see myself marrying.”

“Have you really?” Isabella sat up straighter, her own troubles momentarily forgotten in the face of this good news. “But that’s wonderful, Felicity! Who is it?”

Felicity blushed. “I think I’d prefer not to say just yet,” she said. “I don’t know whether he feels the same way about me, you see.”

“Has he said anything?”

“No. He’s come calling a few times, and we always have a good time together. But I don’t know whether it means anything serious to him or not. I don’t know whether he’s visiting with other ladies as well. It might be nothing, and until I’m sure…I would be too embarrassed to say the name aloud in case I’m wrong.”

“You can tell me anything,” Isabella said. “I hope you know that. Even if you are wrong.”

“I know. I will tell you, just as soon as the time feels right,” Felicity assured her. “But in the meantime, I thought you might like to know that…there is someone. Someone I could see myself with if he can see himself with me. Something to hope for.”

“That is good news,” Isabella agreed with a smile. “That’s the best news I’ve heard in a very long time, Felicity. You’ve cheered me up immensely. You must tell me more as soon as there is more to tell. I’m sure he’ll return your feelings. I don’t see how anyone could do anything else.”

“You’re very sweet,” Felicity said. “Truly, the best sister anyone could hope to have. I’ll tell you more as soon as I can, I promise you that.”

Their meal was delivered, and the sisters ate together. Isabella felt better than she had in a long time, having heard Felicity’s news—incomplete though it was. After all, she reminded herself, the whole reason she had entered into this marriage had been out of a desire to secure a future for her sister. If that was happening now, then it meant that her plan had been a success. Did it matter, really, if things were amiss between Arthur and herself? The fact that she had developed feelings for him had never been a part of her plan. It could easily be set aside.

With that thought in her mind, she drifted off to sleep more relaxed than she had felt in a long time. Perhaps it helped, too, that her sister’s comforting presence weighed down the other side of the bed. Having Felicity close, sleeping next to each other as they had when they were children, made Isabella feel safe in a way that nothing else could.

She drifted in and out of dreams—dreams that took her back to her childhood days when things hadn’t been as lovely as they were now, but at least she had had more freedom. No one had taken her very seriously as a child—her father had never believed she would amount to anything much, so he’d given her plenty of liberty to run and play as she’d liked. It was only when she had grown older that he had begun to concern himself with treating her as a maid who still served Rosalind. Before that, she’d been nothing but a free-spirited child.

A part of her longed to return to those days. At least, back then, things had been simple. At least, she had known her place in the world and how to fit herself into it, and she had never longed for anything more than she’d had.

And then, without warning, the dream shifted and changed.

In her dream, a man stood before her in the darkness. She tried to ask him what he was doing there, what he wanted, but she couldn’t find her voice. She knew only that she was frightened of him. Whoever he was, he didn’t belong here.

He stepped toward her, reached out, and took hold of her arm—but it wasn’t until he pulled her from her bed and wrapped a hand around her mouth to muffle her scream that Isabella realized that she was no longer dreaming. She was awake, and whatever this was, it was really happening.

She fought with everything she had, struggling against his hold, but to no avail. He was much too big, much too strong. She tried to cry out to her sister, but her voice was silenced by her attacker’s hand over her mouth. She tried to kick his legs, to bite his hand—anything to force him to let her go—but it was hopeless. He picked her up as easily as if she weighed nothing.

Terror paralyzed her as they began to leave the room. Her mind went blank with it. She couldn’t even ask herself questions, couldn’t wonder about what was happening to her or why. All she knew was that it was bad, very bad, and that her fear was the most powerful thing she had ever felt in her life.

The one thought that broke through the haze was that it might be a very long time before Arthur discovered that she was gone—and he would never know what had become of her.

And she didn’t know whether he would even care.