Even as a child, she had thought it a kind of exchange. She had thought you paid for the beauty with the risk. You paid for the pleasure of speed and spin by strapping blades to your soles and weakening the agent of its delivery.
She wished it were winter just now, in fact. She wished it were cold and frigid and brittle all around her, instead of this heady heat and the warmth of a breeze that continually tried to pull her back to the riverbank. It tugged on her skirt. It pulled her hair. It pinched and tickled at her waist.
It failed, she thought with satisfaction. It failed to move her.
She danced twice more. She smiled. She curtseyed. All the while, the phantom cuts to the surface of her inner ice rink dug deeper, flashing and swirling her body in movements she could not replicate despite the pull of equilibrium.
Eventually, she gave up.
There was no harm in giving up.
It was late, anyhow, and she should sleep. They shouldallsleep, except perhaps the bride and groom, who had better things to do after exchanging their vows.
She clicked her teeth. What a coarse thought to have! She ought to be swooning over their romance, not envying its outcome, letting her thoughts crackle with wantonness.
She threw herself into the first carriage in the line, likely dragging plenty of that hem-sticking mud in with her. She had intended to fall onto her back and try to doze for the rambling ride back to Crooked Nook, but the instant her head hit the cushion, her sister climbed in after her.
“Oh,” said Claire, frowning. “I didn’t see you behind me.”
“Abe’s not following; you can keep flailing about if you wish,” Millie said briskly, pulling the door shut behind her and settling into the opposite bench.
“I am not flailing,” Claire answered with a hint of venom. “I am in repose.”
“Of course you are.” Millie brought one of her own legs up, draping her ankle over her knee and sighing as she leaned back into the embrace of the seat. “You know, I have spent half a decade wondering about something, agonizing over it at times, and tonight, I think I finally got an answer.”
“What were you wondering?” Claire asked warily, knowing that this was a trap and falling into it anyway because of Millie’s damned talent for setting up irresistible questions.
“I could not figure out why everyone loves Freddy Hightower so much,” Millie answered with a little curve of her lips. “Dot. You. Abe! Even Joe and Ember. I thought something must be very wrong with me, or that perhaps I lacked an aptitude for basic perception.”
“Oh, God,” Claire snapped, petty on purpose, “are you in love with him now too? I suppose you’re entitled to a turn.”
It was supposed to silence her sister. To insult her. Instead, it made her laugh.
“Heavens, no.” Millie made a little humming sound, shaking her head. “No.”
The rest of her thought went unsaid between them, perhaps because it was obvious, or perhaps because Millie was too tired after a long day to properly complete her assault. She didn’t need to say it. Claire could hear it anyway.
I’m not, but you obviously are.
She crossed her arms over her reclining body and turned her face up to stare at the ceiling as they bumped and jostled down the road.
Millie was not deterred. “It isn’t that I haven’t grown somewhat fond of him in my own way, because despite thinking such a thing was well beyond possibility, I actually have. I’ve watched him try. Watched him grow. And, of course, I’ve watched him with my husband. It is hard to not care for someone who loves the same people you do.”
“Does he not waltz as elegantly with Abe?” Claire intoned, attempting to feign boredom. “That is a pity.”
“Claire, we all saw you go after him,” Millie said with something that sounded infuriatingly like fondness. “Not a single person missed the fact.”
Claire pressed her lips together. She did not want to beg her sister to say it wasn’t true. She knew it likely was.
But what else was she meant to do?! He’d stalked off into the wilderness like a madman, like dancing with her was so distressing to him that he was prone to keep walking and never return. She had thought he’d be at her elbow still, that when she turned, they could banter again, flirt, even, keep the fire stoked in a way that was pleasantly warm without risking a burn.
She’d tried to follow at a distance. It was just to see what the devil he was up to, or at least that’s what she had told herself. When he’d started tearing his clothes off and pacing around and shining in the moonlight, it had become so completely impossible to look away from that she’d just sort of settled into watching, wondering if it was her own power that had done this to him, that had made him pace and simmer and tear his cravat apart.
Oh, God.
She grunted, slapping her hands over her face.
“So,” Millie said softly, “do you want to tell me what happened?”
