There was a synchronicity between them. It had been nearly a decade since he had last danced, but Desmond didn’t even have to think about the steps. They just were. And she fit right into them—into him—perfectly.
He didn’t know how much time passed. He didn’t need to know. He needn’t have any thoughts but her and the serene expression she bestowed upon him. He couldn’t pull away, couldn’t stop. All he could do was pull her closer, bit by bit, their lips so close they were nearly kissing.
Her hiccup broke him from his woolgathering, and her hand left his shoulder to cover her mouth.
Desmond stopped in his steps as she turned partly away, hiccupping again. “Are you all right?” he inquired, setting a gentle hand to her shoulder.
Isabelle nodded in response. “I’m merely feeling a bit unwell, is all. Perhaps it was the fish.”
Desmond felt fine himself, having eaten the fish as well, but he did not argue the point. “You should rest,” he murmured, moving a lock of hair off her shoulder. “I shall walk you up.”
But when they reached the foot of the stairs, he paused. “I should bid you goodnight here, my lady. It is true we are to be married, however, me escorting you to your bedchamber at night would be considered most scandalous.” As though all of this wasn’t scandalous enough as it was, he thought to himself, and he swore she must have thought the same if the quirk of her lips and glint in her eyes were any indication.
“Thank you, my lord,” she said curtsying. Then whispering, she added, “It has been a truly wonderful day with you, Desmond.” The crease between her brows and the depth of her eyes gave question to the words that sounded of such sincerity, as though it were a surprise that she had found pleasure in his company.
But instead of embracing this train of thought, his eyes continued to trail down her face, until they settled on her lips, full and wet. “Goodnight, Isabelle,” he said to her lips.
“Goodnight, Desmond,” they whispered back.
He didn’t close his eyes as he leaned in. He watched each and every slow second of it. He watched her lick her lips in anticipation. He watched her eyes cloud, her lids become heavy. It wasn’t until his lips settled warmly on hers that his eyes slid shut and enjoyed the kiss with, what could be argued as, the most important sense. Touch.
He caressed her gently, his lips barely moving against hers. He didn’t know when it deepened, when their arms tangled around each other, when a fire of need consumed him and he pushed her against the balustrade. Her soft moan against his lips urged him on, her body pressing seductively into his curves. He had half a mind to take her right there, but that thought alone stopped him, had him spinning his head around to see if any of his few servants had witnessed his recklessness. Seeing no one there, Desmond put distance between himself and Isabelle. Barely more than a few feet, hardly enough to lose the intoxicating scent of her.
Three gloved fingers rose to swollen lips as Isabelle looked at him direct. He couldn’t read the emotion in her eyes, which bothered him.
“Goodnight,” she breathed again.
Desmond barely had a chance to mumble farewell before she had drifted up the stairs and out of view. He could have stood there all night, staring, dumbfounded, at the place where she had disappeared, but the loud snap of thunder outside had him wandering back down the halls and to the library, where he could watch the lightning fracture across the room, the light piercing through the windows, staining his face, and every crevice, with the violent colors of the rainbow.
There was a time, not too long ago—just a few days ago, to be exact—that the loud crash of the thunder and the spark of the lightning would have frozen him, would have made him relive all of those painful memories of the past he’d finally escaped. But tonight, they weren’t revived. He wasn’t back on the battlefield in Portugal or locked up, treated like something inhumane. Instead, it felt as though this was the first time that he was able to breathe. He had spent years fighting in the war followed by years struggling to survive. He had outlived many of his friends, outlived the men he’d served beside and who had served him.
War was harsh and it had made him coarse, Desmond would be the first to admit such. But somehow, the war no longer seemed to define him. Now, he had let down his guard, let someone invade his heart, and it was almost like she had wiped the slate clean. It was funny, that. The curse he had struck her with she now provided him with as a blessing. Oh, he hadn’t forgotten the past and all those that he had lost, all those he had watched die, all those times he himself wanted to die. It was merely that the past no longer seemed so… present.
Isabelle gave him his life back when she became his life.
Another streak of lightning bathed the room, turning it into a kaleidoscope. Desmond could feel the charge of the storm, the electricity practically thrumming in the air. But he didn’t collapse into the past of exploding cannons. Instead, he was held sane by the drumming of his own heart, his heart that no longer beat solely for himself.
Chapter 23
Isabelle walked up the stairs.
Her eyes and heart were all but full of bliss, but her mind was confused. Her lips still tingled from the caress with Desmond—the second encounter with the man in one day—and her heart was ready to fall in love. But her head… it held back. As she kissed him, she’d been lost. But when he’d broken the seal of their lips, her mind came crashing to a halt and backpedaling. She didn’t know what to think, what to feel any longer.
She blinked, as though it could release the pressure building on her chest, but all it did was create a lump in her throat that felt like a barely contained sob.
The door to her bedchamber slipped shut behind her. Numbly, she registered the handle clicking into place as she crossed the room to the window.
And then it happened. Lightning struck, and everything turned white. And all she was left with was this, her reflection in the glass. A reflection so familiar it made her eyes mist.
The lightning struck again, somewhere far off, but it’s light still assailed the room. It was a horrifying sort of light, completely white and unnatural, and was followed by a thunderous clap that practically shook the house upon its foundation and Isabelle all the way to her soul.
She was standing before the picture window in her bedchamber, but she couldn’t see beyond her transparent reflection in the dark night. But in between the flashes, she could see herself. It wasn’t much more than her silhouette—most of her details being lost in the night glass—but it was undeniably her. The bruises weren’t quite so stark in the glass; their colors were muted, looking like nothing more than a trick of light, not a dark description of her troubles.
She took a step closer. And the more she approached, the more apparent she became.
With each step her hands trembled worse, until she had to clench them into fists at her side to keep the tremor from spreading all over as she saw herself for what felt like was the first time.
There was her pale skin, hair that shone gold in the candlelight, a straight nose. All features that, just days ago, she didn’t recognize. She’d looked at her reflection before and it could have been anyone. But tonight, she knew otherwise.
She blinked as the room froze amidst another burst of light. The growl of thunder following on its tail, shook her. Isabelle opened her eyes, and she knew.
She knew that each of those features on her face were tied undeniably to her mother. Her mother who had hardly spared her a second glance except to scold.
It should be hard to miss something you never had, but she found it was much too easy to long for a kind mother, an affectionate mother, a loving mother.
She’d never had that love that was supposed to be unconditional.
But she’d had love.
Isabelle felt a tremendous weight fall upon her, so hard and so fast it was as though she had been struck. But it was not something physical. It was worse. It was a force. It felt harder than the blow of the carriage that had loosed them from her brain.
Returning one’s memory was a great deal more difficult than losing it in the first place.
She couldn’t breathe. The truth stole her breath away. Her body tried to scream, tried to cry out, but all that broke out from between her lips was a pained squeak as she slid to the floor.
How had she forgotten who she was? And how had she so suddenly remembered?
And why, oh why, did she have to remember now of all moments? When the life she had created, carved out of nothing, was perfect. When she had a man she could love. Why now?
It was all there. Her life, her sisters, her parents. Andrew.
Her heart sunk deeper, though she no longer imagined it possible.
He’d died.
And she had forgotten him completely.
A single tear dropped from her eye.
How did that happen? How was it possible? How could she so easily forget him?
She thought of Desmond, the man she thought she had been falling in love with. He was so different from Andrew. They were dissimilar in almost every way. Where Andrew had youth; Desmond, maturity. Andrew had hair of the lightest shade of brown; Desmond, the darkest. Andrew had blue eyes; Desmond, brown. And their personalities… Well, those could hardly be compared. Andrew was such an amiable young gentleman. As the third son of a baron, he lacked a certain responsibility that might have weighed others down, but Isabelle didn’t think anything would ever have been heavy enough to dampen Andrew’s joviality.
But Desmond? She had seldom seen him smile. And she understood why—even if she didn’t know the details—he had reason to be so melancholy.
But it didn’t matter.
It didn’t matter that Desmond didn’t smile or that she barely knew him. She knew him enough.
Just like she had known Andrew enough…
She had known Sir Andrew Carver for only a very short while, but had she not loved him? Had she not loved him enough to remember that she had lost him? It seemed unfathomable.
Especially now that the crushing pain of it returned.
How could she ever have forgotten? And how could she put it all aside and marry Desmond? Hadn’t he a right to know? To know that she had loved another, that she had conceived a child with another?
She thought about Lord Brighton, and the reason why she had been away from home, alone, how she had ended up in Pinehaven and on to Hollyfield. She had planned to marry him, for it solved all her problems. But she’d been unable to go through with her ill-conceived plan.
She had a child, and she couldn’t get rid of it. And now, she couldn’t lie to Desmond, but he wouldn’t marry her if he knew. And she needed to marry.
Desmond was a good man and undeserving of the treatment of passing off a bastard child as his own. But what other option did she have? Face ruination? It was impossible. Such would leave her alone in the world, kicked out of her home by her family, left entirely to her own devices. She didn’t know the first thing about caring for herself, much less an infant. She needed a protector and, as Lord Brighton was certainly now out of the picture, Desmond was her only option.
And it was a lie.
Or if not a lie, then at least not anywhere close to being the truth.
Isabelle didn’t know what Desmond thought of her as he rarely remarked on his feelings. Rarely, as in never. But he thought enough of her to think her worthy of marriage, right? And the way he’d been looking at her today, the way he’d touched her… Well, it made her heart quiver. At the very least, she knew that he held her in some esteem. The truth would make him see the error in his assumption and cause him to alter course. Drop her.
Isabelle tore her hands through her hair, digging her nails into her scalp.
What was she to do?
She wished the sky would open up and that God would speak to her from Heaven and give her the answers, tell her what she was meant to do because, for the life of her, she could not figure it out for herself.
Isabelle crawled into bed, shivering from the cold that was inside, turning her soul to ice.
She was embarking on a journey that would destroy her, just as surely as it would destroy him. She wished she didn’t need to be so selfish, didn’t have to think of herself, her needs, and those of her child. She wished that she were stronger, strong enough to stand on her own two feet and accept the consequences of her actions.
And maybe she should. Maybe that was what this was all about. Maybe this was an opportunity for her to grow, to mature, to finally take responsibility. Maybe this was her first lesson in motherhood. Perhaps she was supposed to do what was right, not merely what was easiest. Maybe that was why she’d met this man, this man who was so readily willing to marry her.
Maybe she was supposed to say no, pack her bags and make it on her own.
That was what was right. And shouldn’t she want to teach her child to do what was right in every circumstance, despite the difficulties in doing so? But what kind of life would her child have if she didn’t do this, didn’t stay here and marry Desmond?
One painful sob escaped between her lips.
Motherhood. It wasn’t as though she had a good example to look up to. She didn’t want to be like her mother, but that was the only model she had to live by. And what if she couldn’t help it? What if it was in her blood?
She eyed the bureau, its contents tempting.
And then she slammed closed her eyes, willing the dark night to swallow her.
It was all too much to think about. All too much to consider.
What was she to do? She had no idea, and it didn’t seem as though the Heavens were going to open with an answer either.
The Isabelle she’d known for the entirety of her life dealt in facts. And the fact was that she was with child and the man she loved was dead. She was with child and the father could not protect her in marriage. She was engaged, to a man that was good and guarded and didn’t deserve such treatment.
But he needed her, whether he yet knew it or not. From the state of his house and skeleton volume of his staff, it was apparent that he needed her dowry, which was excessive indeed. And he needed someone like her who knew to allow him to be who he needed to be.
As she cried silent tears into her pillow, Isabelle didn’t know if she would ever stop loving Andrew. She didn’t know if it would ever be possible think about him and not feel like she was dying inside.
But she didn’t have a choice. He was gone, and she was here, and so was his child.
She couldn’t do this on her own. She couldn’t leave Desmond. Nor could she deceive him.
She could mourn Andrew’s loss forever, but today she needed a plan.
She had two choices, as she saw it.
She thought about the package of tea she’d stuffed in the back of her bureau.
And she thought about telling Desmond about the predicament she was in.
She could be selfish or responsible, though, the truth was, she didn’t know which was which.
Tomorrow she would decide.
Tonight she would sleep—or try to.
And tomorrow she would deal with reality.
Chapter 24
“Oh, no.” The exclamation was breathless and forced.
She would have fallen to her knees, but she couldn’t move, she was stuck. Stuck with a dreadful sense of what she was about to witness.
She thought she was going to be sick.
“No,” she gasped.
There was a young man riding upon a white horse. His back was to her, but she could tell who he was. It was Andrew, looking just as he did on the day he’d left Whitefield Abbey to go in search of her father.
She wanted to smile at the sight of him, but she couldn’t. Because she knew what was to come next.
She blinked, and that was all the time necessary for her life to change. All the time in the world was reduced down to that nanosecond that it took for her to blink.
Around the bend appeared a carriage traveling opposite and, when it hit a hole in the ill-maintained road, wha
t happened next was almost textbook.
Isabelle blinked again, unable to breathe.
One of the wheels snapped, lurching the carriage to the right.
That was all it took. An entire life could be summed up in a second. Ended.
The carriage struck him, throwing him from the horse, and pinning him to the ground.
She was beside him then, her tears dropping down onto his cheeks like rain. There was a ghastly amount of blood that quickly covered her hands, and a lifeless expression in his green eyes. There was no gurgling, no pleading, no struggle.
One moment he was riding for London, in a rush to ask for her hand. And the next, he was gone, dead. He didn’t see it coming. Not until it was too late.
She finally released the little breath she still held painfully in her lungs, and with it she expelled an animal cry as she ran to him.
“No. No!” she repeated again and again, dropping to her knees and flinging herself over his prone body. “No! No! Come back! Please, come back! I love you!”
But he wasn’t coming back. Andrew was dead.
Isabelle stood, covered in the blood of the man that she loved, unable to change what had happened.
She squeezed her eyes shut and stood in the middle of the road, crying. She couldn’t do anything else. She couldn’t collapse, couldn’t walk away, couldn’t look at him. It was too much. It was all too real.
She squeezed her eyes shut and prayed. Though she wasn’t certain if she pleaded to wake up from her nightmare to her darkened room in Hamilton Hall or to die alongside him.
Chapter 25
She didn’t want to open her eyes, didn’t want consciousness to return her to reality. But the fact of the matter was that life could not be ignored. If anything, it demanded attention. And if it did not receive it, it did things like restoring one’s painful past during a thunderstorm for the books.
The tears that had seeped into her pillow during the night had dried, leaving her feeling numb and empty and, once more, alone. Her eyes, she felt, were swollen and red and very raw. Yet, she couldn’t help but rub them with her fisted hands, the dried salt scratching her sensitive skin.
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