Yet hard as she thought, nothing came to her. She was about to give up and let herself dissolve into the tears that had been threatening for hours when there was a knock on the door.
“Isolde? It’s Thomas.”
Isolde jumped up from the bed, checking to make sure she didn’t look too distressed. She was thankful she hadn’t started to cry yet, as that would have surely upset Thomas. She hurried to the door and opened it for her brother.
Thomas looked nearly as stressed as she felt as he came in and gestured for her to shut the door behind him.
“What is it, Thomas?” she asked, ushering him to sit down.
“I’ve just been speaking with Lord Hartington,” he replied.
Isolde’s heart flip-flopped.
“You saw him? How is he? Will he be all right?”
Thomas gave her a curious look.
“Did you not see him yourself?”
Isolde winced, remembering how she’d fled from the hunting lodge.
“Only briefly. It was … difficult to find a moment. But I’m glad you did. Tell me how he is.”
“He’s …” Her brother hesitated. “Well, he fainted again –”
Isolde gasped and jumped up from her chair, ready to run to Thaddeus immediately.
“No, calm down, it’s all right,” Thomas said, grabbing her arm and gently pulling her back into her chair. “The doctor checked him again, he’ll be fine. He just got a bit overexcited.”
Isolde frowned.
“Overexcited? Why?”
Again, Thomas looked at Isolde curiously.
“He was rather insistent that he come to speak to you.”
“Me?” Isolde blinked, stunned.Could he really have wanted to see me?
“Yes,” Thomas replied. “He wanted to speak to you about … your situation. We had a very interesting discussion, and I … Well, I don’t wish to betray his confidence when he was so insistent that he speak to you himself. But I feel we don’t have much time, and I think it is rather obvious to anyone who is paying attention. Isolde, he practically admitted he is in love with you.”
Her heart fluttered fiercely in her chest even as she struggled to fully comprehend Thomas’s words.
“In love? With me?”
“Yes, Isolde. And I’m sorry to ask it of you, but if you think that you could in any way be happy with him, I beg you to accept his feelings. Do you not think that you could?”
Isolde blinked at her brother, too overwhelmed to speak, and Thomas continued.
“It’s just that I’m so worried about Cornelia. Crowley and Father are so chummy. You haven’t seen it, but I have. If they haven’t settled on a price for Cornelia’s hand, they will soon. I don’t know all that’s gone on between you and the marquess, but if there’s any way at all that the two of you can fix things, if you could see your way to accepting him as a husband – if it’s possible, Isolde, you must do it, please. I fear you’re our only hope to help Cornelia before it’s too late.”
The desperation in Thomas’s voice struck Isolde deeply. She felt a flush of shame. For most of the day, she’d been consumed by her own affairs and had kept forgetting how her sister was in an even more dire predicament than her own. Thomas was right, that was their priority.
Yet how could she trust that what Thaddeus had said to Thomas was the truth? She herself could barely get Thaddeus to speak to her about his feelings, or anything else for that matter. Why would he have been so honest with Thomas, whom he knew even less?
She looked at Thomas’s pleading face and took his hand.
“Don’t worry,” she said, squeezing his hand. “Whatever happens between Lord Hartington and me, I will find a way to stop this marriage with Crowley from going forward. If what you say is true, then of course, I will do my best to salvage my relationship with Lord Hartington.”
