And something about debts…
“How did I end up marrying Henry?” she asked abruptly, keeping her voice low. “I know I was going to see him when the first accident happened. I know that I did not want to be forced into it and was probably going there to negotiate an alternative conclusion. So, how did it come to be?”
Dorothy leaned in. “It was the strangest thing. You?—”
“Came back on a horse with your mind changed,” Kenneth’s voice interrupted, as he appeared beside his sisters. They had been so engrossed in their thoughts and conversation that neither had heard him approach.
Dorothy rolled her eyes at him. “I was just getting to that.”
“Not quick enough,” Kenneth replied, his eyebrow raised. “You departed with the intent of breaking the betrothal, and you returned with a bruise on your head and acceptance on your tongue.Itried to argue against it, but Father would not heed me.”
Dorothy dipped her chin to her chest. “You did not seem to mind marrying him then. It was only afterward that you seemed… dismayed.” She paused. “Then again, I was not there for what came before you departed on that fateful night. I was waiting in my chambers to read our evening chapter.”
“But… you were not there either,” Thalia said, squinting as her head began to ache. “How do you know I changed my mind if you were not there when my opinion was different?”
A grimace tensed Kenneth’s face. “I overheard. I was coming to ask when Father’s guests would be leaving, as I was tired of the noise, and… I heard everything.” He paused. “I attempted to go after you, to support you, but I took too long to pursue. By the time I had saddled a horse, I reasoned you would be rather far ahead of me, so I took a shorter path through the fields. I arrived at the Maybrook crossroads and… I waited. I knew you could not be ahead of me, so I kept on waiting. But, of course…”
“The accident.” Thalia shuddered as a chill ran down her spine.
“The accident,” Kenneth parroted with a nod. “Only, I did not know of it until I rode back along the route you should have taken and saw the overturned carriage and the lack of driver andhorses. I raced here to Farhampton and arrived not two minutes after you.”
Thalia gulped. “Did I seem… well?”
“Aside from your sudden willingness to marry the duke, yes,” Kenneth replied. “There were some cuts and bruises and scrapes, too, but you did not seem bothered by them. I maintain, to this day, that you hit your head harder than any of us knew. I tried to tell Father that, at the time, but he would not listen. Why would he, when he had gained what he wanted?”
“No one toldmeany of this,” Dorothy muttered, her arms folded across her chest. “Icould have helped argue with Father too. I am told I can be rather ferocious when I want to be.”
Kenneth mustered a soft chuckle. “You were thirteen then, Dorothy. You could not have said anything to change Father’s mind. No one could.” He paused. “And you, Thalia, did not try to after you returned from the scene of the accident. It was the strangest thing.”
Grounds for an annulment?The thought popped into Thalia’s mind for a moment, as her gaze moved back toward her husband. Her heart jumped as she saw him fold the newspaper with slow care and begin to rise from the armchair by the fireplace, evidently unwilling to allow the siblings to speak among themselves any longer.
“You should stay here with us,” Kenneth said in a hurry as if he, too, had noticed Henry’s movements. “We can take care of youproperly. We can remind you of what you have forgotten, and you know that we will be unbiased and honest.”
“Honest?” Henry scoffed, striding over. “There is not an honest thing about you, Mr. Carter.You, more than anyone, would be more inclined to take advantage of my wife’s condition. She may not be able to remember certain things, but I have not forgotten.”
Thalia blinked, taken aback by the edge of bitterness in Henry’s voice, the frost in his blue eyes. “What?”
“Do not listen to him,” Kenneth urged, shooting a dark look back at Henry. “Whatever quarrel you and I had, Thalia, I am not who I was two years ago.”
“What?” Thalia repeated, her head pounding with the confusion of it all, frustration beating out a relentless rhythm on the inside of her skull.
Henry stopped. “The last time you saw him, Thalia, he swore he would have vengeance on you. You have not seen him for two years, for good reason.”
“Do not,” Kenneth warned. “She ismysister. Letmeexplain.”
“I do not trust you to tell the truth,” Henry retorted sharply. “Indeed, I do not trust you at all, but my wife insisted on seeing her siblings and I hoped it might help. I see now that I was mistaken.”
Kenneth’s lip curled. “How dare you!”
“I dare because I suspect one of you was behind the attack upon my wife,” Henry seethed, the cords straining in his throat. “Both you and your father have enough motive. You, certainly. And you did promise you would make her suffer.”
“I was desperate!” Kenneth snapped. “I was not thinking clearly! I spoke from anger, but there was no true threat in my words! She is my sister; I would not do a thing to harm her, and if you continue to say otherwise, I shall?—”
“What? Seek vengeance upon me too?” Henry interrupted, both men oblivious to the fact that Thalia was on the brink of collapse.
Her head hurt, a vicious bolt of pain slicing through her brain, her eyes now possessed of their own violent heartbeats, her stomach churning with the pressure of so much dizzying confusion.
“Will you cease!” Dorothy yelped, hurrying to her sister’s side, putting a comforting arm around her shoulders. “Can you not see what this is doing to her?”
