Chapter 1

1

June 1806

O f the two letters Phoebe held clenched within her shaking fists, it was difficult to say which one was worse. Her eyes darted between both pages—one covered with the tidy handwriting of a practiced clerk, the other filled with the overlarge, sloping scrawl of a man in his cups—while her stomach sank down to her half-boots. As different as the letters appeared, they each contained a shock of equal proportions. They each shattered the faint strands of hope she’d developed for the future and promised certain misery.

“ That settles it, then.” Aunt Harriet , sitting beside her on the under-stuffed sofa cushion, gave a decided nod. “ You were presented with a problem, followed by a solution. I’m not certain where the dilemma lies.”

Phoebe stared, open-mouthed, at her aunt’s sharp features, feeling her face go bloodless and cold. Did Harriet really not see? Not understand?

Of course she didn’t. Phoebe sagged against the sofa’s arm, fighting back the wretched sting of tears. Aunt Harriet and Uncle Martin had their own children to worry about. Schooling to pay for. Dowries to provide. If ever they’d felt the slightest bit of affection for the niece who’d been cast upon them, Phoebe had obliterated it years ago with her shameful misdeeds.

She threw aside the letter in her left hand, the neat rows of words beginning to mock her. Cousin Eugenia’s solicitor had penned a missive that proved nothing short of courteous. That didn’t change the fact that it delivered a crushing blow.

Mrs . Eugenia Colepeper’s will had been read, and she bequeathed onto her cousin and longtime companion, Miss Phoebe Windham , her harlequin brooch.

Not the sum at which she’d hinted as Phoebe toiled for a pittance, desperate to place herself back in someone’s good graces. You should be grateful I even took you in , Eugenia had been fond of reminding her during the months when she deferred Phoebe’s meager salary or decided not to give it at all. You have a long road of repentance, but if you can prove yourself obedient and modest, perhaps I’ll consider you worthy of a reward in the end .

Except Phoebe hadn’t received a monetary reward. She’d gotten a brooch. One she could hardly even sell, for she knew for a fact that the jewels were paste.

“ If I were you, I’d be thanking God for my good fortune.” Harriet gave a pointed glance at the letter still within Phoebe’s grasp, her tone acrid enough to pull Phoebe from her thoughts. “ Second chances such as the one Sir Ambrose is willing to give you do not come along every day. You were fool enough to turn him down the first time, and look where that got you. Now is your chance to set everything right.”

The paper started to prick Phoebe’s skin, the uncomfortable sensation seeping through her gloves, almost as if by touching his words, she was also touching a piece of Ambrose himself. She tossed the letter on the sofa with the other, trying not to shudder.

Harriet’s eyes narrowed, and she let out an impatient huff. “ Has Sir Ambrose done something to cause you offense?”

“ N -no.” Phoebe dragged out the word, struggling with how best to convey her sentiments. She could hardly fault Ambrose for inheriting her father’s baronetcy despite her father’s deepest wish that the title not fall to that unmitigated jackass . Such was the law of primogeniture.

There was no single event that caused her to recoil from the mere mention of Ambrose’s name. Rather , it was a combination of little things, which had started the moment he came to overtake her home at Birchby Park close to nine years prior. The way he’d leered at her from across the dinner table or brushed up against her—accidentally, of course, yet it wouldn’t stop happening—as she traversed the corridors. His marriage proposal had come soon after, delivered with a grandiose smile, as if he’d done such a favor to his unfortunate displaced cousin that she should be exalting at his feet. Yet Phoebe hadn’t considered it a favor or a privilege. Instead , she’d fled from Birchby Park , begging Harriet —her deceased mother’s sister in Kent —to take her in.

That decision had come with its own devastating consequences, and the arrangement had been short-lived. Even so, she couldn’t regret turning down Ambrose’s proposal. Not when, during the rare visits she and Eugenia had taken back to Birchby Park , she’d witnessed the woman he’d gone on to marry cowering in corners, silent and skittish. The servants, too, had seemed to walk on eggshells, while the later the hour grew, the rowdier Ambrose had become.

No , he’d never done anything specific to Phoebe that warranted censure. However , she always wedged a chair against the door when they slept under the same roof, for the possibility hung over her head, ready to come to fruition at any moment. It was a deep-rooted feeling she had, that she’d harbored for all these years and couldn’t shake. Ambrose meant trouble, and she needed to stay away.

“ No ,” she repeated, having none of the right words to explain what she so urgently needed her aunt to understand, “but I cannot …”

She closed her eyes, requiring a moment where the offending letter on the sofa wasn’t in plain view. Whoever could have predicted that such an unfortunate mix of circumstances would come to pass? That Ambrose’s poor, suffering wife would die. That six months later, his much older sister, Eugenia , would die. That he would take the two events as cause to reissue his past proposal.

“ Please , allow me to stay here, just until I make other arrangements.” Phoebe began to reach for Harriet’s hand before thinking better of it and pressing her palms into her lap. Twisting her skirt within her fingers. “ I’ll make myself useful in whatever way I can. I could assist with Margaret and Fanny’s schooling, or?—”

“ Absolutely not.” Harriet’s hand flew to her chest as if Phoebe had just uttered sacrilege. “ Margaret and Fanny are impressionable young girls. They require instruction from people of only the highest moral character.”

Phoebe bit her lip, trying to keep her cheeks from heating. Highest moral character . That’s what it always came back to, wasn’t it? Aunt Harriet and Uncle Martin had been willing—begrudgingly—to welcome her back to the vicarage when the promise of an inheritance had been involved. With that hope gone, she remained nothing but the sum of her sins. A source of shame. A burden. Specifically , a burden they could wash their hands of, again, if she would only take the opportunity presented to her.

She wouldn’t degrade herself by doing more pleading. The firm set of Harriet’s mouth told her it was useless. If she couldn’t stay here due to the stain she cast onto the household and the risk she posed to her cousins’ delicate young minds, she would have to think of another plan.

She dug her fingers into her temple, sensing the beginning of a headache. Could Clara possibly help her? They’d exchanged infrequent letters over the years, although her cousin had almost certainly been warned away from doing so, and Clara hadn’t forgotten her even after marrying Mr . Matthew Wilkinson and setting up a household in London . Phoebe didn’t want to be a burden on Clara , either, who was now the mother of two small children with a third on the way. Yet if there was any chance Clara would admit her into her home for a time, that Phoebe could help her cousin with the children, or anything else she required?—

“ Also , don’t you even think about bringing Clara into this.” Harriet snapped at her like a rabid dog, as if she’d somehow garnered the power to read Phoebe’s thoughts. “ She doesn’t need your influence around her children, either. Heed my words, Phoebe . If you seek to interfere with them, I will never forgive you, nor will I forgive her if she grows foolish enough to allow it.”

Phoebe swallowed, although she was unable to get rid of the lump that felt ready to choke her. Aunt Harriet was right; she couldn’t march into Clara’s life and risk bringing shame upon her cousin or estranging her from her mother. But what else was Phoebe to do? Who else could she turn to?

No one .

The weight of the truth came crashing down upon her shoulders, causing moisture to prick the corners of her eyes once more. “ I …” She locked eyes with Harriet , seeking some sort of guidance forward, but was met with only coldness. To her aunt, the sole problem in play was Phoebe’s stubbornness.

Phoebe dropped her gaze to the sofa so she wouldn’t betray herself by showing Harriet her tears. Yet the sofa was no better than her flint-faced aunt. Not when staring up at her were the two letters that obliterated everything she’d hoped for the future.

I have nothing .

She pushed herself off the sofa, her feet tangling awkwardly as she stumbled away. She didn’t have it in her to remain in the confines of the sitting room any longer, faced with Harriet and the letters. Her tears were about to spill over, for it was far too much to bear, this encounter that had proved fruitless, shattering …

“ I certainly hope your haste is on account of a need to fetch quill and paper so you can inform Sir Ambrose of your acceptance.” Harriet’s curt remark gave her the briefest pause as it sent another dagger into her chest. However , she shook it off, her legs finding a sudden rush of strength to carry her down the corridor and out the front door of the vicarage.

The glaring sunlight disoriented her the moment she burst into the open air. But what did it matter when there was no safe direction left to go? She ran blindly, over gravel and grass, beneath sunrays whose warmth couldn’t permeate her skin, with a single focus: to get away. Where was irrelevant, as long as she achieved distance.

Yet all the while, her pounding footfalls gave a crushing reminder. Her troubles were far too grave to outrun.