“Violet, you’re here!”Liza raced across the room and flung her arms around her.
Violet laughed and returned her youngest sister’s exuberant hug.Then she pulled back and rolled her eyes.“It hasn’t been that long since I visited.”
“It’s been more than a month since we last saw your face,” Millie said from where she sat across the room.She studied Violet with her usual focus, a frown pulling her lips down in disapproval.
Violet winced.Had it been that long?She crossed their mother’s drawing room to sit next to Millie on the settee.“I’m sorry.The social season has been busy.”There, that wasn’t a lie.
“I have seen her plenty, at parties and balls, and when Sommerset took us to the theater.”Jane flitted over and stuck out her tongue.“You two are still babies.That’s why you haven’t seen her.”
“Don’t be a brat, Jane,” Violet admonished her sister.Jane was nineteen, out in her first season, which she lorded over their two younger sisters, who were only fifteen and twelve.Of Violet’s four sisters, Jane was the biggest flirt.The middle child, and the most impetuous, their mother had kept her off the marriage mart for as long as she could, hoping Jane would mature a bit.She had used the excuse that having two older daughters to marry off was plenty to manage in one season.But after Violet’s younger sister, Mary, had married last summer, just a few months after Violet’s own wedding, there hadn’t been any way to keep Jane from debuting this year.
With five daughters, her mother was always on the lookout for eligible gentlemen.She constantly reminded Violet that her successful marriage to the Marquess of Sommerset, future Duke of Lavensham, was the key that unlocked endless connections for good matches for her four younger sisters.Hopefully, her mother would be happy with the news that Violet had arrived with today.Mother always said that birthing an heir would be the best way to secure her marriage.
“Violet, did you see my new scarf?”Jane twirled around with an embroidered silk scarf in the palest pink.“Isn’t it divine?I think I shall wear it with my pink evening gown to the next ball.”
“It’s lovely, dear.”Violet sighed inwardly.She wished she could muster any enthusiasm for frivolities these days.It seemed like a hundred years since life had been so simple that she could sigh over a pretty piece of silk.Her stomach let out a warning rumble, and she breathed through her nose in an attempt to calm the resulting wave of nausea.
“You look positively peaked, Vi.Do you want a cup of tea?”Millie scooted forward and poured a cup of steaming tea from the pot set on the low table in front of them.She put in three spoons of sugar and gave a quick stir before handing it to Violet.
Violet accepted the cup and lifted it to breathe in the scent of orange blossom, her mother’s signature tea.She didn’t dare take a sip.An empty stomach was the only way to survive the mornings these days.“I haven’t been feeling well lately.That is why I am here today.To announce that I am with child.”
“What?!”Jane squealed.“How exciting!Have you told Mama and Papa?”
Violet shook her head.
“Liza, go get Mama,” Jane ordered.
Their youngest sister rushed out of the room, her ringlets bouncing.
Jane turned back to Violet with a wide smile.“Oh, Vi, congratulations.”
Violet tried to smile back, but unbidden tears pooled in her eyes.
Millie reached for Violet’s teacup, pulled it gently from her shaking hands, and set it down.“Aren’t you happy?”she asked.
Violet sucked in a deep breath.It wouldn’t do to lose control of her emotions.A baby was happy news; of course it was.“Yes, I am absolutely happy.”But the words got stuck in her throat, and as though she couldn’t stomach one more lie, bile from her stomach rose.Violet twisted around and cast up her accounts into a large urn that flanked the left side of the settee.Her stomach heaving, tears ran down her face.
Millie scrambled up to stand next to her, petting the back of her neck as Violet breathed in and out slowly through her nose.Millie gasped, and her hand stilled.Violet closed her eyes as she realized what her sister must have seen.She straightened to sit back on the settee, fixing the fichu that had become dislodged.“It’s nothing,” she muttered.
Millie’s eyes flashed with anger.“It’s not nothing.”She grabbed at the fichu.
“What’s nothing?”Jane asked.
“Look at these bruises.”Millie pointed.She gently tugged the shoulder of Violet’s dress to the side.Violet was too tired to push Millie’s hand away.When both of her sisters gasped at the bruises that marred her skin, Violet closed her eyes.
“Did you fall?”Jane stared at her.
“Those are clearly fingerprints, you twit,” Millie spat out.“Is Sommerset hurting you?”
Violet nodded.“Sometimes.”
“What?”Jane said.“But he is so charming.”
Millie sent Jane another angry stare before turning her gaze back to Violet.“Violet, have you told Mama?I bet she would straighten him out.Everyone is afraid of Mama.”
Her sister’s eyes were filled with such certainty that their mother could fix any ill.She cupped Millie’s cheek.“Darling, she knows.She told me not to provoke him and to watch my mouth.I try.I really do.”She sighed.Her fifteen-year-old sister didn’t need to know details about what marriage was like.“There is nothing to be done.I’ll be fine.He has promised to be gentler now that I am pregnant.”
Jane sat beside her and wrapped her arm around her shoulders.“I’m sorry, Vi.”
