20. Chapter 20

The crying next to Nemity didn't even register in her ears.

It was foggy, distanced, barely echoing in her head.

Probably because it was in rhythm with the tears she was sobbing deep in her chest where no one could see them or hear them.

To Georgette and Jacob, Nemity gave them nothing but smiles and as much cheer as she could muster.

Even though they'd been dreadfully sad the entire trip north.

Like they now realized it was real—their mother dying, never to be touched, to be seen again.

After she'd run from Callum at Vauxhall Gardens, she'd gathered the children and went straight to the Hedstrom townhouse to find Thomas. It had been dreadfully late, and he had been all sorts of furious at her intrusion with two children in tow, but she had somehow managed to convince Thomas to take her back north post haste when the sun rose.

She wasn't about to risk even a day where Callum could show up at her London doorstep.

For the hard truth of the matter was that she didn't know Callum.

Didn't even know if Callum was his real name.

Didn't know if anything about the man was real.

She'd hoped Charley would have appeared at the Hedstrom townhouse before they left so she could talk to him about Callum. So she could manage to at least set into her mind how someone so devious had made it that close to her.

But Charley hadn't appeared at the townhouse before they left. Most likely asleep in Lady Prosswan's bed, knowing Charley.

She'd just have to interrogate Charley about Callum the next time he made it north.

Thomas, for his part, hadn't questioned her too deeply on any of it. She'd told him she and Callum had grown close, but that he'd betrayed her most grievously.

That was all Thomas had needed to hear to get him to agree to take her and the children away from London. Like he already knew all the details and didn't want to hear them from her mouth.

He was the one that had sent Callum to her doorstep, after all. Forced him into her life. She didn't imagine her cousin capable of guilt, but in this, Thomas had looked sheepish, almost apologetic.

He'd trusted the wrong man just as she had.

Or maybe Thomas was just exhausted with her and this was the path of least resistance.

Day three of the journey north to Scotland was not going well.

None of them—she, Thomas, Georgette and Jacob—had gotten enough sleep at the coaching inns along the route. It had been hot—far too hot this far north, making the days in the carriage quite miserable. The windows had been open, but that had just made the dry dust of the road kick up and coat them in dirt.

And now both the children were arguing about which hand of hers they were holding—Jacob had dissolved into tears, which had made Georgette start wailing even louder.

She could only sit in the middle of the mess of everything around her, numb.

"Nemity. Nemity. Nemity!"

Jerking her out of her reverie, her look snapped to Thomas sitting across from her and the children in the carriage.

She blinked slowly at him, not sure how many times he'd barked out her name.

His face red in anger, his glare sliced into her. "You need to shut the mouths on these two brats. They've both been caterwauling for the last hour." His voice vicious, it made her breath catch in her throat.

An hour? Surely that was an exaggeration.

But she hadn't heard any of it. She'd just been sitting in a fog. A fog of her own making. Her own, stupid, foolish making.

Two times, she'd been duped by men nearly to the altar.

And just when she'd thought she'd found something different, something real with Callum, it was ripped away from her in the most brutal way. Because the cruel reality of it was that she was the problem. There was no other option. She was the one that set herself up for this heartache again and again and again.

So very stupid.

"Nemity! Shut them the hell up!"

She jerked, her eyes opening wide at Thomas, suddenly understanding the wrath that was aimed at them from across the carriage.

Thomas had been mean in the last years, yes—but mean to two innocent children?

This was a new low, even for him.

Her protective instincts surged and she threw an arm around each of the children. "You could find it in your heart to be kinder to them, Thomas."

"Could I? I just tramped all the way to London for you because Charley insisted. And now I am tramping all the way back north to Scotland with hardly a full twenty-four hours in London, and you're asking me to be kinder to children you have insisted on taking on as your own?"

Her grip on Jacob and Georgette tightened. "You don't get a say in that. I promised Susannah I would take them."

His fingers tore at his dark hair as his voice took on an even harder edge. "I should, if I was performing my duty as your guardian like I should be. They're not yours. They shouldn't be yours. I should have told you that three nights ago when you showed up at my door with them in tow."

Her jaw dropped, her words low. "If you feel this strongly about it why didn't you say anything?"

"Because I was tired and I was trying not to react to another one of your doltish ideas about how you should run your own life when it's quite clear you need someone to run it for you."

Her head snapped back, thudding against the hard shell of the carriage behind her. "I think I run my life perfectly fine."

"Of course you do. You're not responsible to anyone for anything, and now you think you can suddenly be responsible for these two." He waved his hand at Georgette and Jacob on either side of her. "You haven't ever been responsible enough to even catch a husband, so why in the world would I think you can do this?"

Her lip snarled. "Just because I did not marry does not mean I cannot be a mother to them."

"Doesn't it? You couldn't do the simplest thing, Nemity. It wasn't that hard—marry someone—anyone. My father did a shit job of marrying you off and of all the things I've had to clean up after him, you are the most troublesome. And now you're adding these brats into the mix."

"I never asked to have you in my life, Thomas. Do us both a favor and sign over the stewardship of my estate to Charley—to anyone else."

He scoffed a laugh. "Charley would blow through your entire fortune in a year."

Her eyes went wide in shock. "He couldn't do that—not with my money."

"You don't think he'd find a way? Don't tell me you're that ignorant, Nemity."

Her head felt as though it was about to explode for the rage pounding inside of it. She glared at him, no longer caring how or why he'd turned into this vile creature.

Words seethed in a scream from her tight lips. "How in the world did you become such a vicious viper?"

"A viper?"

Georgette gave a sudden scream at the yelling and tried to shrink herself back into the cushions.

Thomas leaned forward. "I told you to shut those brats up."

Her arms flung out, shielding both of the children from him the best she could. "Leave them be."

He leaned forward even farther, almost off his bench, his words pelting into her. "Here's the reality, Nemity—you can't take on these children."

"Why not?" She tried to control her voice, merely to not frighten the children any further.

"Because you cannot do whatever you damn well please. You've lived a bloody charmed life where everything has always gone your way and you know nothing of hardship or what it takes to actually survive. You'll never be married now—not with these two in tow."

"That is what you are worried about?" Her voice had started to shake for the rage blistering her words. "Still trying to marry me off? No—I don't care about that. This is what Susannah wanted. She wanted me to raise them."

"Why? You? What could have possibly possessed her to pick the likes of you?"

A blade right to her belly and she had to choke her words out. "Because I can love them like no one else can. I can take care of them."

"You spoiled little brat. You can't even take care of yourself." His hands gripping his knees tightened, his knuckles turning white. "Everyone around you, for your entire life has made everything right for you." His teeth gritted, baring in a tight line. "You are an ignorant twit that knows nothing of what the real world consists of."

She seethed out a breath, leaning forward, shoving her face into his to put all his attention on her instead of the children for she really didn't know what he would do next.

Hit them? Hit her?

She'd never seen him with this much rage and viciousness storming around him.

Still, whatever was happening to him, she was going to take the brunt of it—not the children.

"I know a hell of a lot more than you think I do." Her voice pitched high. "You talk about spoiled? You've become a bitter, vicious ass that no one wants to be around, when you once had the whole world at your fingertips. But now you choose this—you choose this wretched existence for yourself and now you're trying to make everyone around you just as miserable as you are because you are a small, poisonous, wicked man who I don't even recognize as my cousin."

"Is that so?" His words ground out, the veins in his forehead looking ready to pop. In the instant when she thought he was about to leap across the carriage and choke her, Thomas suddenly shoved himself backward, hitting the cushions hard.

His hand flew up, his fist pounding on the roof of the carriage, a roar filling the air. "Stop the coach."

The horses slowed and the carriage rolled to a stop.

Her breath thundering, she stared at him, not moving. Afraid to move.

His glare cleaved into her, his voice deadly low. "Nemity. Get out."

"What?" Her hands tightened on Georgette and Jacob, silently willing them to quiet their sobs even though she knew it was impossible for their young minds to comprehend what all this screaming was about.

His lip snarled. "Get out. Right now. Get out of the carriage. Get you and these two squealing brats out of the carriage."

She glanced out the open window. Having pulled off the main thoroughfare early this morning, they were now in the middle of the longest barren stretch of road.

Her look swung back to Thomas. "What? Thomas, you cannot be serious."

"Get out before I shove you out. Get out and find out exactly what sort of world you've been living in. Find out how you think you can survive, because you can't. You're worthless. Worthless to me. Worthless to those children. And the sooner you figure that out, the better."

Each word, a tiny dagger though her chest.

She knew Thomas was different now than he once was, but still, she couldn't help but remember him from when he was younger. A different person. Someone she liked. Admired. Respected. Loved like a big brother.

But this…this was hateful.

And it was real.

Thomas thought she was a steaming pile of rubbish.

A burden he didn't want to shoulder anymore.

For as vicious as his words were, she still had a shred of tattered dignity left beating within her.

She peeled her hand away from Georgette's grip and grabbed the door handle, opening it. Jumping down to the ground without the aid of the steps—Thomas's driver had been waiting for instructions, not thinking she was actually going to exit. She turned to the children and they quickly scrambled past Thomas and into her arms, and she set them on the road next to her.

She grabbed each of their hands, taking a step back away from the carriage so they weren't near the wheels.

Without looking at her, Thomas reached out and grabbed the door, slamming it closed. He banged on the roof of the carriage. "Go on."

His face in shock, Thomas's driver looked over his shoulder at her, not sure what to do in the moment.

Thomas knocked again, screaming at the man. The driver glanced down at the back of the carriage, looked at her, mouthed something at her that she didn't quite understand, then spun away from her. He clicked the horses onward.

She stood there at the side of the road, holding onto the children's hands, watching the carriage disappear.

Watching.

Watching.

Watching.

Watching until it was long gone from sight.

It didn't come back.

Fingers tugged at her fore and middle finger. "Auntie Nemmy?"

She looked down at the cherub face of Georgette. Confused. Not scared.

Not scared because she didn't know she should be.

Nemity knew this stretch of road. It was barren, not a farm or a village for miles. Thomas would have to come back, wouldn't he?

He didn't.

She waited for an hour, probably more, on the side of the road.

No Thomas, and no other passersby.

The sun beating down on them.

Georgette and Jacob moved onto the side of the road to sit in the grass where it was at least cool.

Her stomach started to rumble and the children asked for food. Again and again and again.

Until, finally, she looked around.

She'd spent the last three days wallowing in self-pity, and that had to stop. Now.

She had to figure out something.

Waiting here would do them no good.

Trees. Trees. Road. Trees. Field of stone and scrubby grasses that rolled up a craggy hill.

She knew this area. Sometimes there were sheep in that field.

Not now, but if sheep were sometimes in the area, they had to come from somewhere.

She rustled the children from the spot they had found on the side of the road and they traversed up the field onto the top of the hill.

Nemity spun about, looking in all directions. Nothing.

More fields. Trees. More fields of nothing.

Wait. Something brown sticking up from the landscape.

It would have to do.

She dropped down to her knees, pulling both of the children in front of her. "Do you two remember the beautiful tapestries we saw at the museum, the ones with knights and princesses and unicorns?"

Georgette's eyes lit up and she clapped her hands. "I do, Auntie Nemmy."

She smiled wide, forcing enthusiasm into her eyes. "Good, I do too. And do you remember how we talked about what grand adventures the knights must have had, travelling the land?"

Jacob grinned, nodding his head. He loved the wooden sword that was still sitting in his room at Susannah's townhouse—she hoped the staff packed it in the trunks for them they were to send to Springfell.

She squeezed him and he giggled. "Well, guess what? We get to go on our own knightly adventure, travelling the land for our next fair. Doesn't that sound fun?"

Both of the children laughed, nodding.

She stood up, determination in her voice as she pointed across the field. "Lucky for us, we have just become knights of old on a quest across the land. We need to get to that cottage by nightfall."

"Which one, Auntie Nemmy?" Georgette squinted, trying to find where she pointed to.

"Right there." Nemity dropped her arm to set it next to Georgette's temple, pointing. "Do you see it?"

"I do." Georgette nodded vigorously, her brown curls bobbing up and down atop her shoulders.

"Good. Off we go." She picked up Jacob, propping him on her hip, and she grabbed Georgette's hand. Her head down, she started to walk.

Two hours later, with dusk settling about them, and the muscles in her arms screaming from carrying both of the children, she kicked open the half askew door that had rotted on ancient hinges.

The brown structure wasn't a cottage, it was an abandoned barn.

But with darkness settling in, it would have to do.

She tiptoed into the stale air inside the barn, and birds on rafters above tweeted, their peace disturbed.

Dirty hay. But a mostly intact roof over their heads.

It would have to do.

She went to the far end of the barn where a pile of hay looked cleaner in the dim light.

Ignoring the stench, she shuffled the hay back and forth with the toe of her boot, trying to find a halfway clean patch.

Jacob didn't wait for her, and he crawled onto the pile of hay, clutching the stick he'd found along the way that he was using as a sword.

Exhausted, she realized the futility of looking for clean hay and she grabbed Georgette's hand, pulling her next to her as she sat down.

Lying down in the hay, she huddled the children close into her on either side.

They had stopped complaining of hunger an hour ago, their little bodies falling to sleep almost instantly.

It wasn't until their eyes closed, their breathing slow and even, that the tears came, streaming down her face. Panic and exhaustion whipping her into a silent frenzy.

What had she done?

She hadn't even thought to grab her reticule as she'd gotten out of the carriage.

Hadn't thought at all.

She had nothing. Nothing.

And she had two hungry mouths that she knew would wake up crying, waiting for her to feed them.

What in the hell had she done?