“Well. I’ll be damned.”
“No, I think that’s me,” Lily said. And then to her horror, she began to cry.
Esme wrapped an arm around her shoulders and for a little while she just held her like that, silently comforting and allowing Lily to finally fully pour out all the emotion she’d been trying to keep inside in order to protect her sister and herself. Once she could collect herself, itdidfeel better to have finally released it all. To have someone other than Lockhart who knew the truth. Someone who was only on her side about it.
Esme wiped some of the tears from Lily’s face gently and then she asked the question Lily had been trying to avoid in herself since her arrival. “Are you in love with Lockhart?”
Love. That word should have been soft and gentle and kind. It wasn’t. It was hot and harsh and painful in every nerve ending, in every vein. She bent her head and whispered, “I am…I’m falling in love with him, I fear. Yes.”
Esme’s littleohricocheted through her. “I’m so sorry, dearest. And does he also have feelings for you?”
She looked up toward the house. Somewhere up there, Lockhart was having tea and smiling politely and she also knew, like she knew her own hand, that he was wondering where she was. Wondering if she was well.
“We were both shaken by the power of what happened at the Donville Masquerade,” she said. “That night we talked about it, as we lay together, er…after. There was no denying the connection from the moment we met, the second we touched. He made me feel so safe. So alive. And not just because he bedded me. And later…later after he discovered the truth, we talked again. We couldn’t deny that night meant something to both of us.”
Her breath was short now. Harsher. She stopped talking and shifted in the seat, trying to find some modicum of calm and decorum. There was none left. She whispered, “If he—if he were free?—”
She broke off. She couldn’t finish that sentence. It would be further opening a Pandora’s box of her heart when the demons were already flying out of it. When her world was already being torn apart by them.
There was a long pause, and Esme didn’t break her gaze from Lily’s face for a moment of it. Finally, she said, “Is there no way around it? No way that hecouldbe free?”
“Not without breaking my sister. Alice doesn’t love him, I know it, I can see it. But to have the engagement broken so close to the marriage? To have it bemewho caused that? I’m sure it would hurt her, both materially on the marriage mart and also down to her soul.”
“And you love her almost as your own.”
“She practically was. Prudence is no mother to her. Or at least she wasn’t until Alice reached the age my stepmother could use her for her benefit.” Lily sighed. “She’s kept me away from her almost all of the last six months.”
“Why?” Esme asked. “I’ve never understood that, but I didn’t want to pry and make things worse.”
“Since I arrived and have seen the situation for myself? I think she did it to keep me from intervening on my sister’s behalf,” Lily said. “From questioning the prudence of the match before the contracts were signed and the announcements made.” She hesitated and shook her head. “And likely Prudence did it for her own cruel entertainment. She’s has always despised me.”
“Because she’s a wretched cow who deserves a right cross,” Esme muttered. When Lily’s eyes widened, she shrugged. “I don’t punch people anymore. Something about it not being very countess-y. I’d be willing to break that rule for you, but I think you’d say no.”
Lily smiled at the joke, or at least shethoughtit was a joke. It felt so good to be able to do so after how fraught this conversation had been. “It’s tempting, but better not, it would only lead to even more trouble for all of us. At any rate, whatever Prudence’s reasons, the fact is I’ve felt the sting of that separation. And if I did this to Alice, if Lockhart and I moved forward with this thing between us, I’m certain I’d be parted from my sister again. Probably permanently. I couldn’t bear it.”
There was no playful teasing in Esme anymore when she took Lily’s hand gently. “So what will you do?”
Lily swallowed past the lump in her throat. The one that hadn’t really gone away, that she feared would always be there, a reminder that devastation was also right there. That loss would be permanent the moment Lockhart stared into her sister’s eyes and pledged his life to hers.
“I’ll pretend,” she whispered. “And I’ll do my best to separate myself from him and from this. For both our sakes.”
Esme squeezed the hand she held gently. “I hate this. I want to see you have the love you deserve. It breaks my heart that you’re going through this.Butif this is what you feel must happen, I’m here now. I’ll do everything I can to help you.”
“But you…you won’t say anything to anyone, will you?” Lily asked, glancing again at the house. “Delacourt is such good friends to Lockhart, and the men are all so close to each other. I wouldn’t want them all to know what I said, what I did.”
Esme’s brow wrinkled. “It isn’t my secret to tell. I wouldn’t reveal your confidence. Not to my husband, not to anyone else.”
“Thank you,” Lily said, and then sighed as she got up. “And now we must join the others. And you can watch me pretend.”
“I’ve had a lot of practice pretending,” Esme said as she took her arm and they walked together back to the house. “I could even give you advice on it.”
“I’ll take all I can get, and all the support you’re so kindly offering,” Lily said as they headed up the stairs. Back to the others, back to the countdown to the moment all this would be irrevocable.
* * *
Now that the closest friends had joined the party, George and his parents hosted the first ball of the wedding gathering. Because the lion’s share of the important guests who would arrive in the next week for the final days before the service weren’t there yet, they had invited in their tenants and local gentry. It was a way to celebrate with those in Pembrooke Hills, to specially include them in the joy.
A wonderful sentiment, and yet George felt very little joy as he stood to the side of the dancefloor, watching Lily as she took a turn with Sir William Walters, their kindly neighbor just one estate over. The older man was clearly taken by her, laughing at something she said as they danced a lively jig. Of course, that bright wonder had been the reaction of every single person she had interacted with all night. She had such an easy way of drawing people to her, giving them the remarkable gift of her full attention, putting them at ease with a smile or a laugh or a gentle touch.
