Chapter 5
Chapter Five
“What is taking so long?” Felix huffed and folded his arms across his chest. “This is absurd!”
“It’s Winnie,” Alison said, smiling softly because she could not find it in herself to be mad with her little stepsister. “Despite all efforts, she has failed to pack on time.”
“Unbelievable! I have half a mind to ride out myself and have the rest of you follow on later.”
“In this weather?” Alison snorted. “Good luck with that.”
Felix scrunched his face with contempt and then shifted across the carriage to look out the window. As he did, he muttered darkly under his breath, his mood sour.
If this does not bode well for the trip, I don’t know what else will…
Alison watched her half-brother glower, able to feel his anger as if it was a fire setting the inside of the carriage aflame.
Where it might have been easy to say that his mood was caused by the lateness of today’s departure, Alison had noticed the way he’d been acting the last few days.
Grumpy and short tempered, snappy and even more mulish than usual.
She might have asked what was bothering him… but she wasn’t much in the mood to have her head bitten off.
She had Pickle on her lap and patted him gently as she shuffled to the other side of the carriage and looked out the window, willing the time to move faster than it was.
She could see Lord Pemberton pacing across the drive, his patience wearing thin.
Nerissa stood by the second carriage, arms folded and rolling her eyes.
And she could hear her mother crying after Winnie to hurry up from inside the manor, the tone of her voice suggesting that it would be some time until Winnie was ready.
Alison exhaled, her patience getting the best of her.
On most occasions, she would simply wait it out. But Felix’s mood had turned the inside of the carriage into a most unbearable place, and from where she was sitting, looking out the window, her eyes kept drifting to the neighboring estate and with it her mind wandered toward the inevitable…
Lord Grayhill was undoubtedly home. Somewhere within those walls.
Strange that for so long Alison had hardly noticed the home next door, nor had she given a thought to the man who owned it.
Now that she had met him, now that she had come face to face with him, a quick glance at the home and his domineering presence could be felt even this far away.
A warmth rippled up Alison’s body so that she was shuddering and her thighs were burning and despite her best efforts she could not stop thinking about what happened just two days ago.
I just do not understand it. By all accounts, the man hates me. As I hate him. But when he is snarling at me, I feel a burning energy that pulls me toward him so that all I want is to feel his body and his hands and his lips…
She gave her head a shake and yanked her mind back to much more mundane matters.
“Fetch me when we are leaving,” she told Felix as she climbed from the carriage, Pickle held to her chest.
“What? Where are you going?”
“Someplace warm,” she said without looking back.
She kept her head down, refusing to look at Lord Grayhill’s estate, as she hurried inside. Out the corner of her eye she saw Lord Pemberton speaking with Nerissa and neither noticed her entering the manor.
The inside of the home was silent at first, as Lord Pemberton had given the staff the holidays off, allowing them to spend time with their own family and friends.
But this silence was soon broken when she heard her mother barking at Winnie to hurry up.
As the staff had all left, it was up to Winnie to do a final check of her things, and clearly the little girl was making it as difficult as was possible.
Another smile flitted across Alison’s face as she hurried across the foyer and toward the library.
By her estimate, she had a good hour to kill, so she might as well do it by a fire and with a book in hand.
It was a short time later that this desire became fulfilled.
Curled up on a thick rug by the fire, Alison started to read the first book she found. It was terribly boring, a history of Wales – a book Felix would enjoy – but she turned the pages, let her mind wander, let the fire warm her, let her body sink into the soft rug as Pickle snuggled in beside her.
She did not mean for it to happen, but soon her eyelids felt heavy. Soon her body turned number. And just as soon, she drifted off to sleep…
“Oh!” Alison startled awake suddenly.
Her eyes sprang open, and she sat up as the room turned around her. She was cold, shaking because the fire had dimmed, and she pulled Pickle into her chest for warmth.
“Well, that was unexpected…” she said to her puppy. “And now I won’t sleep on the trip. Fun, having to listen to Felix complaining.” She laughed as she kissed Pickle’s head and then climbed to her feet and left the library.
As she went, she listened for her mother and Winnie, surprised to hear that their cries did not echo through the manor. She supposed that meant Winnie had finally finished packing, which meant…
Oh no!
Her eyes widened as she hurried through the manor, cursing herself because her family were waiting for her and they were sure to be angry. But then why didn’t they just come and wake her? Perhaps they could not find her… Oh, they are going to be furious.
She was still disoriented, which is why she did not notice how dark and silent the manor was. And when she reached the front door, taking the handles to throw them open, she started because the doors were locked.
“What on earth…” she said, noting the key sticking out from the keyhole.
She took the key and turned it, unlocking the front door from inside. It took but a few seconds, but it was enough time for her confusion to grow. A state of being which compounded when she stepped outside.
The first thing she noticed was how late in the day it was, after midday, several hours from when she had walked inside. The second thing she noticed was the complete absence of the two carriages set to take her family north. And the absence of her family, for that matter.
Still waking up, Alison frowned as she placed Pickle on the drive and took cautious steps. She looked about as if expecting the carriages to appear. Of course they did not, and when she glanced beyond the drive all she saw were dark storm clouds buffeted by heavy winds so cold she started to shake.
“Oh no…”
Pickle bounded down the drive, yapping happily. Alison’s knees started to shake, and a stone dropped into her stomach. The realization of it all struck her like lightning hitting a tree and when it did, she stumbled back and nearly collapsed.
Her family had left her behind.
“Maybe it won’t be so bad,” Alison said.
“You know… things could certainly be worse.” She sat alone at the dining room table, speaking half to herself and half to Pickle who sat on the table and looked mighty pleased with himself.
“Although it’s not as if you were the one who they forgot…
who they did not even realize was not with them…
who they think so little of that they did not even bother to realize was left behind because why would they? ”
Pickle barked happily, tongue lolling from its mouth.
Alison felt that familiar stirring in the pit of her stomach. That which came whenever she was forced to concede that in this little family which she had only recently become a part of, that she was so often ignored and forgotten and treated as an outsider.
The storm blew through in its course. It snowed heavily and the winds battered at the walls. It felt to her that the tempest was building inside of her also, mocking her, laughing at her misery and misfortune.
No… I cannot let this get to me. In fact, what am I even worried about? Once they notice I am not with them, they will surely return. Any hour now, without a doubt. Yes… if anything, I should be thrilled for a few hours to myself. Damn eager for it!
Alison tried to remain positive. And as Pickle yapped and started to pee on the table, she found herself smiling.
“Yes, you are right, Pickle.” She stood and scooped up the dog. “This is a good thing. A wonderful happenstance, in fact!” She beamed and then laughed. “The house is ours for now. And you know what that means?” She looked at Pickle as if expecting an answer.
It means that I can do whatever I want!
And that was exactly what she did.
She started by hurrying to Nerissa’s bedroom and throwing open her wardrobe. Nerissa was undoubtedly spoiled, and she’d always possessed an enviable collection of gowns. What was more, she rarely let Alison wear them. But seeing as she was not here…
Alison spent the following hour trying on every gown in that wardrobe, laughing to herself as she pictured the look of pure horror that Nerissa would wear if she found out. And when she was done with each gown? She tossed it on the bed, caring not for how the garment would crease.
Once she was finished with all that, rather than redressing, Alison simply strolled about the manor in nothing more than her chemise. Why not? It wasn’t as if there was anyone to stop her.
She grew chilly quite quickly, however, so she ducked into Felix’s room and stole one of his rich coats. It was too large on her and dragged along the floor as she walked, but she giggled to imagine what he would say when he found the hems torn.
“Feel free to urinate on them, if need be,” she told Pickle with a wicked grin. “I am sure the smell will be gone by the time he returns.”
By that point it was early in the evening, so she made her way to the kitchens and rifled through the cupboards. Not much of a chef, she was forced to eat toast and cut her own cold meat, making a darn mess of things but not worrying because why would she?
This house was her own and she could do as she pleased.
After all that, she next went to the drawing room and poured a glass of Lord Pemberton’s most expensive and prized whiskey.
It was a little tart for her taste, but it went well with the cigar that she lit from his personal collection.
Frustratingly, Alison had no idea how to build a fire, forcing her to light as many candles throughout the room as possible, perhaps not the best option, but the only one that she had.
And there she sat, the candles flickering dully as she drank her whiskey, smoked her cigar, and felt like a queen in her very own castle.
And all the while the storm continued to rage beyond the walls.
But the good times could only last so long. It was as she finished her glass and as the cigar went out, about the time that night fell to its darkest point, that Alison began to consider the reality of her situation.
They should have returned by now. Surely, they noticed I was gone and turned the carriage around. There is just no way that even now, hours later, and they have still not realized…
She listened beyond the storm to how silent and empty the manor was, and she recognized how alone she suddenly felt. It was all well and good to play at not caring, but deep down she could not escape the inevitable truth of her situation and how horrid it was.
Alison had never felt like she belonged to this family, and they had never much cared to change her mind about this. And where she had been able to convince herself for a time that it was all in her own head, the proof now stared at her dead in the face so she could not avoid it.
“They really forgot me,” she said in a whisper, pulling Pickle into her body and holding him tight. “And not just Lord Pemberton, but my own mother. Worse than that…” She sniffed as she felt tears begin to form in her eyes. “I doubt they even care.”
And it was this realization, this truth, that hurt most of all.