‘You know it, don’t you? That is why you always hide from your father’s calls.’
My frown fades. It softens. I feel the slackness washing down my damp face as I watch her leave. And she does.
‘You know your father only tolerates you…’
Without a word of comfort, no offers to help me, she just brushes by me and closes the door behind her.
‘His greatest shame.’
My mouth tilts.
I stare at the door, as if I can will her back to my room, back to her warmth, and she’ll tell me all the things I want to hear, that she will end the engagement, order Father to protect me.
‘How difficult it must be for him to love you—for the sake of your mother.’
She doesn’t return.
4
The problem with Abigail is that she’s always around.
I’m trying to waste away on the chesterfield in my bedchamber, which is so not the settee for that, it’s too firm and creaky—but it doesn’t matter, because Abigail just keeps disturbing my peace.
This morning, she took too long tidying up mess that she should’ve left for the imps, then she stripped my bed the moment I was out of it. Around noon, she had me sign a bunch ofthank youcards in preparation for New Year gift exchanges.
Now she’s back again.
Snubbing the toes of her boots that encroach on the rug, I watch the flames flicker in the hearth.
If I ignore her long enough, she might disappear.
So far, it isn’t working.
For as long as I ignore her, she stands there, hands clasped at her midsection, shoulders back, boots planted—and I’m stubborn, too, so I watch the flames dance.
The fireplace has been swelling heat into my bedchamber all day, working hard against the cold and moody winter. The winds out there rattles the windows in the panes, and I listen to the whistling of the draughts.
It almost lulls me to my umpteenth nap before Abigail finally decides to bulldoze through my silent boundaries—
“Miss Olivia.”
It’s all she says, but it’s all she has to. That alone is the announcement, the ‘I am here, pay attention to me, I will not leave.’
Her boot shifts on the rug.
One step further from the edge, closer to me, and my gaze latches onto the threat of her advance.
“Miss Olivia, the gifts are being asked after.”
I drag my gaze over her, from her laced boots, up plain breeches and the waistcoat, to the tight bun of crimson above her lightly freckled face.
“The New Year gifts,” she says, as if to remind me. “They are all to be sorted tonight for dispatch in the morning.”
The hoarseness of my voice is as sleepy as my puffy face, “Later.”
Her smile is tight. “Mrs Younge insists the deadline is tonight.”
The golden mantel clock on the fireplace lures in my dull gaze. It’s only four in the afternoon. Dinner is in an hour or two, then supper before bed, but I have a lot of wrapping to do, and so I know if I start now, I’ll be going ‘til late.
