As Margaret hugged her, Roselyn suddenly felt an overwhelming desire to tell the older woman everything, to relieve herself of this burden of Thornton. But if he was a spy, how could she put the Heywoods at risk?
So she bestowed a bright, forced smile on Charlotte, who often spent hours in the village with Roselyn helping her to sell her pastries and bread. Thomas, Charlotte’s elder by a few years, also smiled back as his face turned red.
“Where is John?” Roselyn asked.
Francis and Margaret exchanged smiles, as if she had just asked when she could marry him.
“John had carpentry work in Shanklin today,” Margaret said.
Roselyn concentrated on her porridge. “Tell him I said good day.”
“We will!” Charlotte bubbled with so much amusement that Roselyn gave her a narrow-eyed look of warning.
The girl only grinned back, and Roselyn couldn’t stop her own reluctant smile. Was her own sister like Charlotte? The girls were close in age, but Roselyn hadn’t seen her sister in two years.
Francis sat down opposite her and pulled a piece of bread from the loaf. “We missed you at supper Sunday, Lady Roselyn. You should not keep to yourself so much. A year has passed now; you must go on with your life. I had thought you were doing better when I didn’t see you at the graveyard Sunday afternoon.”
For the first time she had missed her weekly visit. The sorrow struck her hard, and tears came to her eyes.
Charlotte touched her hand. “John wanted you to know that he put flowers on the grave for you.”
Roselyn could have groaned. John even acted the part of her husband.
And now she was lying to them all, risking her place among them.
~oOo~
The Wakesfield chapel graveyard was empty when Roselyn arrived, and she wound her way through the well-worn paths between the headstones. At her husband’s grave, there was only a simple stone, carved with his name—and their baby’s.
She dropped to her knees and put her palm on the grass and earth that covered their bodies. Of Philip, she thought little—he had made her miserable in repayment for her parents disowning her.
But Mary, their daughter, had been only two months old when the plague took her, too. Though Roselyn had protested, the Heywoods had buried father and daughter together, as if Philip had ever held the baby while he was alive.
She laid the wildflowers she’d brought across the grave, beside the dying flowers John had left. The misery she had suffered as Philip’s wife had been worth the joy of carrying her daughter inside her body and in her arms, though it had been for only months instead of a lifetime. She realized that her grief was no longer so overwhelming, but had become a part of her.
If she had married Spencer Thornton, she’d never have known the warmth and peace of holding Mary. A rational part of her knew that she would have had other children—but in her heart, another child couldn’t replace Mary.
~oOo~
Spencer had never lain abed for so many days. His frustration and weakness infuriated him—and sent him one step closer to despair. He knew he could not leave within the next week, but surely a fortnight would be enough time…
Then he looked down at his broken leg, which flared to painful life along with his ribs even when he sneezed. How could he mount a horse? How would he defend himself?
The door opened and he tensed, though it was only Rose, carrying an empty basket. He would be dead if Shaw had come for him.
She seemed almost…relieved.
“Did you think I would flee?” he asked.
“I had hoped you would not be so foolish again.” She leaned over him to check the splint on his leg.
He inhaled the natural perfume that was all hers. When she raised his shirt to look at his bandages, he imagined pulling the plain cap from her head and watching her hair fall down around them. He must be bored, to find a country girl so fascinating, but there was something about her honesty, her serenity, that intrigued him.
She rubbed salve into his wound, her touch firm but gentle. He found even the chapped skin of her hands fascinating.
After Rose finished bandaging his chest, she pulled his shirt down again, and he suddenly noticed that she had a lush, full mouth.
Disgusted with himself, Spencer concentrated on sliding the knife she’d used beneath the pallet as she stood up. “Rose,” he said, propping himself up on his elbow. “I am going to walk today.”
