Chapter 25
Chapter Twenty-Five
“Do you enjoy being back in your townhouse, sister?” Sibyl asked several days later.
“I do, but I always miss the countryside,” Hermia told her, glancing around at where the four sisters had gathered, along with Mary.
Isabella knew it was all for her, but she had been silent during their dinner so far.
The effort touched her, for Hermia had relocated her family to the townhouse for her convenience for this gathering, but Isabella had been falling into that hollowness.
She hated the distance between herself and Oscar. It made everything that had happened much worse. Yet, the proximity within Rochdale Castle had almost brought her to her knees, but somehow this felt even worse. She had thought distance would help, but she was so, so wrong.
It was terribly empty, but sometimes it was better than the pain.
“You should return,” Isabella found herself saying, her voice as hollow as her insides. “You should not have come back to London just for me.”
“Oh, Isabella,” Mary said, reaching out to take her hand from the seat beside her at the dinner table. “When Hermia wrote to me with the invitation, I jumped at the chance. You are surrounded here by people who would do a great deal to support you.”
“Indeed,” Sibyl chipped in. “We love you, Isabella, and doing my part in being here for you pleases me greatly, so just let us do that. Let us be here for you.”
Across the table, Alicia nodded, agreeing.
She sighed heavily and shook her head a little.
“I do not like that a man has caused you so much pain, and this is why I am dreading my debut more than ever, but I am also here for you. If anything, let me remind you that you are most powerful. A woman can stand strongly alone without a man at her side.”
“Alicia,” Sibyl laughed. “The sentiment is lovely, but life can be so beautiful when filled with love. Isabella, that is not something you lack.”
“I agree,” Mary said.
“Yes, but what if the person I want to love me does not?” Isabella asked miserably.
In her mind’s eye, she saw the sparkling green of her husband’s gaze.
As empty as it had been the last time he looked at her, she still recalled how startled she had been the first time she saw them in the full light of Edmund’s ballroom.
They were beautiful. He was beautiful, and she missed him so terribly.
“I think he does,” Sibyl told her. “I am sorry if that sounds a little cruel to say in such circumstances, but I saw how he looked at you at the ball last week. That is not a man who wants his life devoid of you, sister.”
“Sibyl,” Hermia said gently, shaking her head slightly. But Isabella both wanted and did not want to hear her romantic sister’s words.
“Please,” Isabella managed to get out, “please tell me.”
“Well, when you told our mother that you are not in a loveless marriage…” Sibyl sighed, her mouth twitching as if she fought a smile.
“His face changed. It was as though the sun had come out, and he looked at you so intensely that it was almost unbearable to see. I just… I have looked at enough romantic paintings and read enough books to know that a look like that is not nothing.”
“And yet he let me leave.” Isabella frowned. She stabbed her fork into a potato and peered at it when she raised it to her eye level. “So where is the love? Where is the realization in those moments?”
“Buried in fear?” Mary suggested. “What happened at the ball was terrible, and I imagine he is not happy with himself for his behavior.”
“Men always drive themselves into a hardened position of protection,” Hermia sighed. “His judgment is clouded, but it is not a reflection on you.”
Isabella suddenly felt too exposed, and she fought not to shrink into herself. Her eyes stung with tears, and she forced herself to eat a bit of the food on her fork if only to do something other than think and feel things she could not untangle.
“Our mother forced me to speak and dance with an endless stream of suitors,” she whispered, “and yet I somehow found the one man who saw beneath my diamond facade. He saw through that, and he opened me up, let me into his own past, and yet he has now torn that away. I cannot stand it.”
She shook her head vigorously, shaking off the tears, falling back into that hollow ache.
She wanted to rise above it all, for the four sisters had not gathered together in so long.
She wanted to savor this, as well as her friend’s presence, but she could not.
She was a prisoner of too much pain, and she couldn’t break free.
Was that how Oscar was when his anger consumed him?
“Then, in that case,” Alicia spoke up, sighing, “we shall storm his townhouse and destroy it. We could buy something sticky—like honey! We can take honey and throw it at the house.”
Isabella wanted to laugh, for the concept was humorous, but she could only muster a weak smile. “Thank you, Alicia.”
“I think it is a marvelous idea,” Mary chimed in. “We shall consider it, should you want it, Isabella.”
Again, she gave a weak smile, nodding. “We will not destroy the townhouse. Somebody else ought to speak about something else. Sibyl, what are you reading?”
“Oh, do not use me for a distraction!” Sibyl laughed. “But if you are asking, then I am reading a beautiful tale…”
And as she launched into her recount of her book, Isabella forced herself to listen intently, desperate to distract her vacant heart and ruminating thoughts.
The following day, Isabella braved London’s center only because Hermia needed to go to the modiste, and Phoebe was enticed on the trip with the promise of going to one of the sweet shops.
However, when the carriage pulled up outside the townhouse, it was not one of Hermia’s own, but Mary’s, grinning brightly.
“I could not turn down another chance to see you,” she explained to Isabella as they all climbed into the carriage.
“When the Duchess mentioned needing new dresses due to…” She laughed and nodded at Hermia’s considerably heavy, pregnant stomach.
“I could not pass up the chance to go with you. But I hear there are sweets to be bought.”
“Indeed, there are,” Isabella said, trying to sound chirpier than she had in days. That morning, the pain had still been unbearable, buried in her chest, but it was easier to breathe through. “Is that not right, Phoebe?”
“It is! We are buying all the sweets available. Papa said I can.”
Hermia laughed, and behind Phoebe’s head, shook her head to say no. It made Isabella smile a little easier. Soon, their carriage pulled off toward the center of London, and they immersed themselves in the busy street.
“How about this?” Isabella said to Phoebe. “You go and help Hermia pick out a beautiful gown alongside Lady Mary, and I shall run my own errands. I do love my candles, so I must visit the chandler. When I return, I will show you the ones I bought. How about that?”
“Oh, I can come with you,” Mary said eagerly, already moving forward.
But being there, being around the ton, and feeling eyes on her, Isabella knew her mind was slipping, and she didn’t have the energy to pretend to be all right or speak. Mustering a smile, she waved her friend off.
“I will be fine,” she assured her. “I just crave a moment alone, but I will return quickly to help you choose some dresses.”
“Are you certain?” Mary frowned, her mouth turning downwards.
Isabella was already nodding, urging them on.
Secretly, she also did not want to keep being the miserable lady bringing down their excitement. Hermia was welcoming new life, and Mary was on the cusp of her own match with an admirer she had not named or spoken greatly about, likely out of respect for Isabella’s heartbreak.
The two of them deserved their joy, and Isabella didn’t want to get in the way of that.
Parting ways, Isabella instead ducked into the sweet shop several buildings down from the modiste’s and began browsing the array of jars filled with colors of every kind of sweet.
She didn’t know why she went there instead of the chandlers, but soon, she had her eye on a rhubarb-flavored treat, trying not to think about her sweet-toothed husband and how delighted he would be in the shop when the bell chimed above the door.
Isabella didn’t look up, not caring to know who had entered, and hoping it was not somebody who would recognize her, but then a voice cut through the shop, and her body froze.
“Your Grace.” Slowly, she turned to face Lord Stanton, her eyes wide. “Heaven, I am ever so glad to bump into you here! I did think it was you I saw coming in here, so I just had to cross the street to speak with you.”
“Lord Stanton—”
“Do call me David, Isabella; we are well acquainted enough.” His smile was smooth, pristine, a charm she had long learned to overlook.
“I shall continue calling you Lord Stanton, as is proper,” she insisted.
“I heard about that nasty business with your beastly Duke of a husband,” Lord Stanton said, cutting off her next words that would have been to excuse herself from his company. “You must be feeling ever so frightened.”
“I am not.”
“And yet rumor has it throughout the ton that you are currently staying with your sister at the Branmere townhouse, and not your own. Something must have happened.” Before Isabella could tell him to stop pushing, Lord Stanton stepped back and flicked his hand dismissively.
“Anyway, I have learned my lesson about speaking ill of your husband, and after what happened with Lord Henry, I shall not dare. I am here to speak about us.”
“Us?” Isabella echoed weakly. “There is no us.”
“I know,” he sighed, shaking his head, and the regret on his face, for a moment, almost fooled her in an empathetic way rather than one of longing.
“Isabella, I was a fool. I truly was. I feared love when it was in my grasp. I feared commitment when you were standing right there, waiting for me at the altar. I feared too much and did not trust my cards to fall where I hoped they would, so I ran before I gave us a true chance.”
Isabella could only stare back at him, unimpressed and unfazed.
The last time he had attempted such a thing, she had fought back with words, but she could not find them now.
Now, she simply didn’t care enough. Not to retort, and not to dismiss him or excuse herself.
She only turned her back on him, outright ignoring him.
“You must be hurting,” Lord Stanton continued. “First my rejection, and now your husband’s, and—”
He stopped as soon as the bell above the shop chimed once more, and this time, Isabella did look up. Mary entered, her eyes narrowed on Lord Stanton as she made a quick beeline for Isabella. Slipping her arm through hers, Mary pulled her close.
“I do believe your acquaintances were looking for you, Lord Stanton,” Mary said, her dismissal clear. She did what Isabella did not have the energy to do, and Isabella was grateful. “I suggest you meet with them once more before they crowd this lovely, sweet shop.”
Lord Stanton only curled his lip at the push of dismissal before he turned on his heel and slunk out of the shop, leaving Isabella slumping against Mary.
“Thank you,” she murmured.
“Anytime,” Mary promised. “Now, come back to the modiste’s with me, for Hermia has found some very beautiful gowns and wishes for your opinion.”
Continuing her path of supporting Isabella, Mary came to collect her the day after, insisting they ought to walk through Hyde Park. After all, it was a lovely day, and lovely days could not be wasted in Mary’s eyes.
Isabella did not really feel up to it, but she had to try to keep picking herself back up, so she agreed, and soon they were strolling down one of the paths. But they were scarcely halfway when Lord Stanton approached.
Isabella’s stomach dropped, and Mary groaned at the sight of him coming closer.
“Heavens, not again,” she muttered. “That man is like a rash that will not be treated.”
“I agree,” Isabella sighed. “Let us turn around before he—”
“Your Grace!” Lord Stanton called out, and, to her horror, he pulled out a bouquet of wildflowers from behind his back.
“Do forgive the lack of quality, but I did not realize I would be graced with your wonderful company again. Otherwise, I would have brought a proper bouquet. When I saw you up ahead, I thought fast. Do you recall the first bouquet I gifted you the morning after we met when I called upon you? I stated my intentions to court you over a bunch of…”
He trailed off, his face hopeful, as if he expected her to fill in the gap and reminisce as he did.
“She does not recall,” Mary said flatly, turning them both around. “And your wildflowers are wilting, Lord Stanton. Deliver them to another lady who will actually want them, and not one who is married and most uninterested.”
With that, she tugged Isabella down another pathway, and this time, Lord Stanton did not follow.
The unwanted appearances of Lord Stanton continued. He interrupted her later that day when Isabella took time out of her wallowing to go to a tearoom with Hermia and Phoebe, the latter of whom claimed this particular place had the best cake ever.
Isabella only ordered herself tea, but she watched as Phoebe excitedly clapped over her large slice of cake—only to peer up at Lord Stanton’s arrival.
“Lord Stanton,” Hermia spoke up, having already been told about the previous appearances.
“If you continue to pester my sister, I shall have my husband intervene, and I am certain you recall who he is. Nevertheless, I am the Duchess of Branmere and am more than capable of intervening as well, so this is your last warning. Do leave my sister alone. She does not want your company. If she did, she would speak with you, so I believe her silence says quite enough.”
“Your Grace, you are not being very respectful—”
“No, Lord Stanton, what was not respectful is how you left my sister on your wedding day and now think you can slip back into her life and entice her with pitiful compliments when she herself is the Duchess of Rochdale. You ruined your chance, and whether you wish to reconcile your affections or simply gain company or favor, it does not matter. Leave my sister be. Leave all of us be.”
Hermia’s eyes flashed warningly, and Isabella waited with bated breath for Lord Stanton to leave. After a few contemplative moments, he did, and Isabella exhaled deeply. She was exhausted and shook her head.
“I think I will order some cake after all,” she muttered.
“Yes,” Hermia agreed. “I think that is the best idea.”