“Are you certain?” her mother spoke up, ignoring her youngest daughter.
“As certain as I can be,” her father said. “A friend wrote me last evening, but I only had a chance to open his letter just now. He saw them with his own two eyes, and according to him, they looked very comfortable together.” His lip curled. “Well? What do you have to say for yourself?”
Sophia struggled to find the words.
What did she have to say? That this news broke her? That it was a knife plunging through her chest? That it was a hand squeezing her heart so that it might burst? That for the first time in three days she was forced to truly consider that her marriage was over? Is that what they wanted to hear?
“I… Gabriel is free to do as he wishes,” she somehow managed.
“Excuse me?” her father balked.
“As I explained when I returned…” Sophia forced herself to stand straight, even as the room wobbled around her. “My marriage to His Grace is over. I expect soon that he will send papers of annulment, as is his right. So, who he spends his free time with his not my concern.” Each word literally hurt to speak, and it was all she could do to not burst into tears.
Was it anyone other than Lady Clarissa… maybe it would not be so bad. Why did it have to be her?
“His right? His right!” her father screeched, only to catch himself and take a deep breath. Her father was not one to let his emotions get the better of him. “What are we doing to do about this? What are you going to do?”
“Nothing,” she said.
Her father balked again. “I will remind you that your actions reflect on this family, Sophia. The perception of you as a woman, as a member of our class, is borne from this family and howyou were raised. This…” He waved the letter in the air. “This is not about you and your marriage, but us! This family. And as a member of this family, we must –”
“No, Father,” she cut him off. Not sharply, and not with anger. It was apathetic the way that she did, because she was done. “You must do as you wish, and I will not stop you. But as for me? I do not care.”
Her sister gasped.
“Sophia!” her mother cried. “How dare you!”
“You will care,” her father growled. “I will make it so that you do.”
“Do as you must…” She started forward, the last vestiges of her once-freedom forcing each step. “And let me know the result. I will be in my room.”
“Sophia! You are not excused,” her mother cried.
“Get back her, girl,” her father demanded. “We are not done with you!”
There was a time not so long ago when Sophia would not have dared to ignore her parents like she had just done. The very thought… it was like imagining what it might be like to breathe fire instead of air. Impossible to even consider! And where Sophia was slowly transforming back into this same woman whoshe had once been, there was still a small part of the new her which existed deep within her conscience.
She focused on that part of herself, letting it drag her from the room. She would pay for this later, she knew. One did not defy her parents and get away with it.
Images of Gabriel with Lady Clarissa swirled through her mind, played havoc with her senses, and made it so that she could hardly breathe or stand or do much of anything. She stumbled to her room, slammed the door closed, and collapsed on her bed in a pitiful heap.
Then she wept. She wept for the woman who she nearly was. She wept for the marriage that she nearly had. And she wept for the man who she loved but did not love her back. At times like this one, that’s really all there was to do.
CHAPTER 28
“Gabriel?” the call came from somewhere inside the manor.
It echoed softly, suggesting that its maker was far away. In reality, it might have been one room over and still Gabriel would have hardly registered it. Such was his state of mind.
“Gabriel? Where are you, man?” Again, the call rang out, and again Gabriel hardly paid it any notice.
He stood in the music room, his attention fixed on the pianoforte. The lid was closed. Dust sat on its frame. And while the morning sun shone through the window and throughout the room, it somehow managed to avoid the pianoforte entirely, as if a magic barrier was keeping it at bay.
This had the effect of isolating the pianoforte, casting it in darkness, providing it with a sense of foreboding and distance that Gabriel felt in the pit of his soul.
It was the first time that he’d entered this room since Sophia left him. Done on purpose, because he figured it was best not to remind himself of his wife until her memory left him completely. But five days later and still he could not stop thinking about her, and he knew now that he likely never would.
I have made a terrible mistake, the type that is easy enough to fix, was I not such a coward. A shame really, as that is exactly what I am.
