Myrna glanced at her altered reflection, wishing but doubting the answer would be so uncomplicated. Her life had never been simple, and despite her employer’s encouragement, Myrna doubted that would change.
Chapter 12
Playing the congenial host, Dalton remained beside his hostess mother in her black taffeta that rustled with every movement as they revolved about the room and received their guests. All of the upper and middle class in Hillsdale and the surrounding county were annually invited for the event, and the turnout was always strong. Smiling and engaging in conversation, with the musicians playing softly in the background, his mother was in her element, and he could easily see how she’d once been the belle of the ball. Yet she had endured much in the past year alone, and the strain was soon evident at the corners of her mouth.
After speaking to a professor at Hillsdale about her desire to provide financial aid for worthy nurses with academic merit and low income to be trained at the college, her latest pet project since the train disaster, she was escorted by Dalton to a chair on the sidelines.
“My dear boy, whatever are you doing?” she asked, but took a seat, seeming grateful for it.
“Taking care that you don’t overextend yourself as you are wont to do at these affairs.”
She waved her black lace fan and smiled. “Oh, very well. I shall be content to sit here and watch as I planned to do all along. But you must mingle with the guests.”
“Would you care for some refreshment first?”
“Go, Dalton. If I’m in need of punch, I’ll ask someone to come to my aid.” Even as she spoke, he noticed the bank owner and his wife move toward her, old friends of the family.
Being sociable among the multitudes was never his strong suit, but with a gracious nod to the arriving guests, Dalton set his jaw and moved through the throngs, hoping to see only one face.
In the semi-crowded foyer, his desire was at last rewarded as he lifted his eyes to the staircase and watched beauty descend the steps in green silk. He held his breath at the sight. The gown brought out the vivid green of her eyes, making them shimmer like emeralds, full of mystique. Her hair had been swept upward, a waterfall of bright auburn curls rippling down one side. Even the spray of faint freckles across her nose and dotting the apples of her cheeks he found enchanting.
“Miss McBride.” He approached as she moved down the last steps and spoke so only she could hear. “You are a vision. I am pleased that you didn’t change your mind.”
She gave him a nervous smile. “It took me a while to persuade Sisi to go to sleep. She wanted to be here.”
He grinned. “Ah, yes. It is the dream of young children prohibited from such social events. I remember peeking through the balcony rails with Alyssa to watch the guests.”
On recent walks together he told her about memories of his little sister. Visiting her bedchamber, where the girls had been hiding, and later seeing Myrna in the abandoned playroom had left him shaken and distressed. Later it resurrected the need to speak of Alyssa, with Myrna, who cared so much about her own sister. But his last memory of Alyssa was still too painful to recall. He had never yet been able to speak of her death, though Myrna had asked.
“I can picture it.” She flicked her eyes to the second landing. “And I wouldn’t be at all surprised if two small girls get it into their heads to do the same. I shall have to keep an eye out for such mischief.”
“Oh, let them be. It can cause no harm. Would you care to dance?”
Her smile faded and she nervously looked toward the open doors of the crowded ballroom. “I couldn’t. I don’t know the steps, and I don’t wish to learn them among so many.”
He nodded in understanding. “Would you care for some punch, then? Cake, perhaps?”
“Yes, please.” Her eyes sparkled as she took his proffered arm. “I couldn’t help notice the delicious aromas wafting from the kitchen all morning. Though I don’t wish to keep you from your guests....”
“Myrna, there you are.” Jeremy’s voice accosted them from the corridor.
Dalton tensed, his hand closing more tightly over Myrna’s gloved fingers that rested on his arm.
The persistent clockmaker approached. “Quite the affair,” he enthused, nodding to Dalton then looking at Myrna. “Glad you convinced me to stay. Never been to anything like it. I found another of my trade and want you to meet him, my dear.”
Dalton sharply looked at her, noting the heightened flush of her cheeks. She had convinced her cousin to stay and wait? Meaning she had come closer to a decision to leave them?
Jeremy grabbed her arm and bustled her away, leaving Dalton to stare after the pair.
Grimacing, he turned, coming face-to-face with someone he thought never to see again.
“Dalton,” Giselle said quietly, closing the short distance. “You look well.”
He stared with grim shock into the laughing brown eyes of his former fiancée. “Giselle. I didn’t know you would be here.”
“You sent the invitation,” she said coyly.
“My mother did. To your family, which included all of its members. I didn’t know you were in town.”
“Well, here I am.” She gave a gay flourish with her satin-gloved hands.
“And your new beau?” he said frostily. “Did he come as well?”
She sighed. “Can we not let bygones be bygones?”
“A flippant reply for one who manipulated my humiliation in front of the entire town. But what more should I expect? You haven’t changed.”
Her eyes clouded with what looked like remorse.
“But I have. I’m so very sorry for what I did. I made a mistake, Dalton. I was foolish and selfish.”
He didn’t deny it.
“I came back to Hillsdale to see you.”
He narrowed his eyes in suspicion. “Why?”
“In the hope that you’ll let me back into your life.”
* * *
If Myrna had to hear about another clock, she would smash the next one that gonged the hour. Jeremy had introduced her to Franz Schmidt, a clockmaker who boasted of his rare possession of a 17th century cuckoo clock from the Black Forest region of Germany. Her cousin expressed eagerness to see the antique, which led to an invitation to his shop and another rousing conversation of the clock in its years before the pendulum.
Myrna stifled a yawn with her gloved hand and wondered what was so interesting about the workings of a clock. Certainly she was grateful for their ability to display time, but she failed to understand how their housings could lead to such extensive discussions. Clocks were all her cousin talked about—when he wasn’t urging her to make a decision.
“I must soon return to my shop,” Jeremy stated to Herr Schmidt, capturing Myrna’s attention. “I leave on Monday.”
She blinked in surprise to hear the news.
“If you’re ever in Brighton, you must drop in to see us.” To her quiet outrage, Jeremy slipped his hand at the small of her back in a blatant sign of possession. “I have a few collectibles from the former century that might interest you.”
Mr. Schmidt toothlessly smiled. “Ja, I should like to see them.”
Myrna stared at Jeremy in disbelief, that he would publicly allude to her leaving with him as if it were fact. Her cousin kept his attention focused on the German clockmaker, avoiding her blistering stare. In the company of so many, she could hardly argue the point and excused herself, smiling politely at Herr Schmidt and noting Jeremy’s displeased frown now that he did glance her way.
How dare he make such an overt claim on her when he had no right!
Angry fire singed her face. She needed a cool breeze to relieve her senses, and moved through the stifling room and scattered throngs toward the quiet sanctuary of the garden. Off to the side, a couple stood close, near the bal
ustrade, the moment appearing intimate. Recognizing the vibrant woman, Liberty, standing with her sweetheart, two of many guests she’d met within the past hour, Myrna furtively took the path deeper into the garden so as not to disturb the absorbed pair.
Twinges of envy, to know such happiness, made her dwell on her wretched situation while her rapid stride took her farther from the festivities. Soon she became surrounded by tall boxwoods. She wasn’t in want of a suitor to marry, but try as she might, she couldn’t come up with a plausible excuse to refuse him, save for one.
Her heart belonged to another.
She had not sought it, certainly had not wished for it, had struggled to avoid it—but her feelings had crept up on her, to engulf sound logic and dissolve all reason. Now she was trapped in a bleak situation of her own making that she had no idea how to resolve.
The approach of footsteps had her whirl around, her heart both calming in relief and skipping a beat with nervous anticipation to see his tall figure outlined in the glow of the moon.
“I saw you leave the ballroom,” Dalton explained quietly. “You seemed upset.”
“I’m fine, thank you.” Her steady words belied the fluttering of her pulse.
“It’s chilly out here without a wrap. I wouldn’t wish you to grow ill.”
“I needed some fresh air. I won’t stay out long.”
He remained immobile. “Are you not enjoying your first ball?”
“It is...an experience. The music is lovely.” Strains from the violins drifted to them in the cool night air, even while the silence between them thickened.
“We have not yet had our waltz...”
“What?” she asked in mild alarm as he moved closer.
“...and with our shared distaste for crowded floors, I find this an opportune moment to teach you,” he continued as if she’d not spoken.
His hand wrapped softly around her gloved one. Slowly, he pulled her toward him, keeping a decorous amount of space in between, his other hand dropping gently to clasp her waist. His eyes held a shine, though the night stole their color, and Myrna held her breath as he began to move with her along the moonlit path with the lithe elegance she had expected from watching him daily.
The hem of her gown brushed tall hedges as he whirled her about on a walkway designed for two people to stroll side by side. Taken aback by his swift advance, her ability to follow at first came awkward, then more fluid as her body learned the glide of his, and she moved through the simple steps without thought, the night air a silken caress against her skin. She experienced the unladylike urge to press herself against his velvet-trimmed waistcoat, wishing to be wrapped up in his warm strength and forget the rest of the world existed. To forget that demands awaited an answer she dreaded and must soon give. An answer that would dissatisfy one man and shatter her heart that had come so near healing.
Dalton had been nothing but a gentleman, his tender kisses never stolen from her lips but tentatively shared, a silent expression of her hidden attraction to him that only matured with time. As much as she wished to be his, how could she possibly remain at Eagle’s Landing?
Is this what happened to her mother? Had that awful man she worked for swept her off her feet and lured her into betrayal, later to bear embittered regrets and a life of ruin? Myrna had suffered fiercely from that scandal and wished it on no one.
And with Dalton, there could be nothing more.
Her cousin was right. A man of his stature would never stoop so low to offer marriage to a simple governess, one soiled by her family’s past. Somehow, if she allowed her heart free rein, to do as she wished, he would discover her secret. Just as someone else had not so long ago, destroying what little peace she and Sisi had finally found.
Desperate to escape both Dalton and her punishing thoughts, Myrna moved her fist from clutching her skirts and pressed her palm to his chest. Her fingers trembled to make such bold contact, and she pushed him away.
“Please,” she said breathlessly. “No more. I cannot...” The waltz was a custom of the day, a tradition at these extravagant affairs. But to her it had become a moment too bittersweet, his closeness a reminder of what she could never have.
He released her in concern. “Are you all right?”
“My cousin is leaving in two days.” She said what she must. “And I’ve decided to go with him.”
* * *
Her quiet, cool words fell like shards of ice, slicing through his soul.
“Surely you jest?” Dalton’s question came hoarse. “That cannot be your decision.”
“It’s best for Sisi.”
“Notwithstanding the fact that I don’t agree with your assessment, have you taken into consideration what that will entail? Chained to a stifling clockmaker’s shop, time will become your imprisonment. With nowhere to roam, that is if you do have a few minutes to spare for a walk. Cities are crowded and filthy and often rampant with crime.”
She blinked at his fierce words. “Jeremy is family. It’s what Father would have wanted.”
“You hardly know the man!” His heart beat out a staccato of distress at her stubbornness. He had not expected this, had been sure she would stay and come to see Jeremy McBride for the opportunistic wretch that he was.
“Time will change that.”
He shook his head. “This isn’t like you. The Myrna I met on the train and have come to know would never so meekly enter into a situation that promises more misery than good.”
“Perhaps then, you don’t know me at all.”
Instead of waylaying him, her soft answer propelled Dalton forward. He gripped her upper arms, giving her a little shake and hoping to impart sense.
“You cannot marry him!”
It was not fear that sparked in her eyes at his violent whisper but wistfulness, an almost dreamlike quality that made his heart quicken.
“Tell me then, Dalton. Tell me why not?”
The shock of hearing his name spoken so softly on her lips, a first for her and something of which he supposed she wasn’t aware, made him wish to draw her into his arms and kiss her senseless. He barely curbed the urge.
“You have a place with us. An excellent position. Rebecca loves you.” He let out a breath through clenched teeth and released her in frustration. “It’s more than that.”
“Yes?” she breathed.
“You’re much more than a governess, Myrna. You’ve become part of this family.”
Her eyes clouded, and he wondered if he imagined the change. Did she not wish to have close ties with them?
“I have a family. In Jeremy.”
“Jeremy is not your family in any way that counts! You didn’t even know of his existence until two years ago.” At her surprise, he explained, “He told me. He was quick to fill me in on all the details.”
He knew he didn’t imagine the alarm that widened her eyes.
“What did he tell you?”
At her fearful whisper, he wondered at the cause. “About the letter your father sent, about how you contacted him after his death.”
“Exactly.” She seemed to wilt in relief. “I must do this. It’s what Father wanted.”
“Your father’s sole desire was to see that you and your sister were well cared for. You have that here, with us.”
“And what of the future?” Her words came leaden. “Rebecca won’t always need a governess. I have to consider that, for myself and for my sister. Please respect my decision.”
Her skirts brushed him as she walked past. Dalton closed his eyes, feeling as though his heart bled, but did nothing to prevent her retreat.
Once before he had known such helpless anguish. That terrible experience was part of what kept him silent when his mind screamed words he wished to express but could not say. And the stakes were much higher now. No woman had ever cap
tured his heart in such a bewildering manner. From the moment he helped Myrna off the train, she had tested him and tried him and infuriated him—and he’d never felt closer to anyone, never more alive than when in her company.
It wasn’t status that kept Dalton silent. He held no shared prejudice or desire to maintain the wretched social standards after all he once suffered at the altar of what was deemed proper. He was a Freed, and in that respect like his father, who did as he pleased, as long as it didn’t break moral conventions. The entirety of what restrained Dalton from professing to Myrna the truth of his feelings was what he’d been striving to conquer since his return home. The malady from which she also suffered.
The fear to trust.
He had prayed for wisdom and the ability to break through that wall, and little by little he was accomplishing it. In giving her a chance to prove herself, in accepting her at Eagle’s Landing. Later, in offering friendship. A friendship which had blossomed into more on his part...and once again left him in a pit of miserable reflection.
She wished to go. She had made her choice.
Dalton had no hold over her or her heart. And no choice but to stand back and allow her to leave him.
Chapter 13
Flustered by her encounter with Dalton, Myrna thought about leaving the ball and taking refuge in her room. Yet it would be rude to disappear, and she did not wish to offend her hostess. She couldn’t speak to his mother, not yet, not after what had just occurred, and spotting an empty seat by the wall next to a young woman intently watching the festivities, she moved toward it.
“Do you mind?” Myrna asked, motioning to the chair.
The woman smiled. “Not at all. The seat’s not taken. I’m Olive Wittingham.”
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