And therefore, she would own up to the consequences.
“I don’t expect you to face them alone.” Chloe shook her head, her hair nearly as soaked as Priscilla’s. “I neglected you. I got too caught up in…” She squeezed her eyes shut.
“But I was the one pretending. You were simply my chaperone.”
They stared at one another in silence, both reeling at the events that had just taken place outside.
Chloe shook her head. “I never imagined Mr. Meadowbrook would come here. We’d barely been inside a few minutes, back from the village, when I saw another coach drive up, his company name on the door, I nearly died. I nearly died, Priscilla.”
Priscilla covered her mouth with one hand. Chloe had known it was coming while Priscilla and Emerson climbed out of the cove—his unwavering strength behind her, his arms holding her.
And before that, they’d had relations.
What had she done? She inhaled, but rather than air, pain filled her lungs. She hurt too much to cry. This was the pain of a broken heart.
“The tide overran the cove.” Priscilla had been tucked beside him, basking in the miracle of love, when the water stole in.
“You were in the cave?” Chloe asked.
“Have you seen it?”
“I… yes. Oh, Priscilla! That must have been terrifying! And then to make it out safely only to be greeted with our worst nightmare.”
“It’s not the worst that can happen. No one died.” Priscilla knew full well the makings of a true nightmare. She inhaled another breath, braced for more pain.
She would spend the next several years berating herself for the lie and for failing. She had betrayed him in the worst possible way.
He’d have to find some other funds to invest in his endeavors. And now, it was doubtful Meadowbrook would be any help.
But Emerson had believed he’d found a wife—a wife that he cared about.
She’d told him she loved him. Likely, he’d think she’d lied about that as well.
Lucky for him, perhaps, that he hadn’t loved her back. He would have told her if he had, wouldn’t he?
He’d lose Allison’s father’s money, but at least his heart was intact.
Priscilla stared at her hands, wrinkled and white from the cold rain. “We need to pack up our belongings in case Lady Hardwood demands we leave tonight.”
Oh, but Emerson’s sisters likely knew the truth by now as well.
This pretending was not a game. It had bordered on criminal.
It had seemed harmless at the outset. A simple answer to a delicate problem.
“We’ll keep to our original plan?” Chloe stared at the carpet.
Before even leaving Miss Primm’s, Priscilla, Chloe, and Primm had discussed what would be revealed in case, heaven forbid, their deception was discovered.
They were the adults, and although Allison was somewhat of a villain in all this, she was also a student in their care. Therefore, it was their duty to protect her.
“Allison was afraid to come, so we offered to do it for her,” Priscilla said.
As desperately as Priscilla wished to plead her case with Emerson, to tell him about the scandal and the blackmail and that she never wanted to do it in the first place, the fact remained that she’d had a choice.
She was the adult. Allison was the child.
“I want to disappear. I can’t face….” Chloe turned her head. “They were so very good to us. Lady Hardwood and the girls. Mary Grace was even going to visit the school…”
