Chapter
Forty-Eight
As soon as Lachlan dropped his revelation, one of the new lady’s maids came to fetch me to dress for dinner.
Given our timeline, I almost bowed out of the whole thing, but Lachlan informed me that his mysterious tree wouldn’t reveal itself until dawn anyway. Which meant both more time with him and a final meal with my human family.
Maybe a goodbye seems a worthless thing—Aunt Teddy has always been a bit cruel, and my Uncle Edward indifferent. But I have at least a few good memories of Lizzie and William and his wife, Imogene.
And besides, we do need to eat.
Lachlan and I approach the dining room together, lilting conversation, tinkling glassware, and a child’s screeching laughter bouncing off the walls. I halt outside the arched entranceway.
I think of everything I used to worry about before entering a room like this. What if no one acknowledges me? What if theyjudge my hair or my dress? What if I call someone by the wrong name or, heaven forbid, the right name, but then cannot think of how to start a conversation?
But I’ve fought for my confidence over the past months in the Otherworld. And given the stakes, worrying about what anyone in there thinks of me just feels so … trivial.
Lachlan sweeps his palm down the bare skin of my back, exposed by the modern dress Lizzie lent me for dinner, then whispers against my temple, “Formidable.”
I square my shoulders, take his arm, and stride into the room.
“Charlotte!” William bounds over with all the energy of a curly-coated retriever and sweeps me into a hug. “Christ, we were all so worried about you.” He pulls back, frowning. “Why didn’t you write?”
Imogene, an elegant contrast to her energetic husband, saunters up holding a sweet little boy with dark hair and a runny nose. “Leave the poor woman alone, Will.” Her eyes sweep approvingly up Lachlan, who towers absurdly over the group. “She was otherwise occupied.” She leans in closer to me. “Welldone, Charlotte.”
She introduces me to their son, another Edward, but discourages me from hugging the child due to his cold. She hands him off to his nursemaid as the adults take their seats for dinner.
Aunt Teddy has changed up the seating arrangements and instead of a single long table, there are several round ones scattered throughout the room.
At our table of eight are Lizzie and her husband Charles, a rugged man with a deep tan, a broad white smile, and a mop of sun-kissed hair. He looks as if he’d rather be hunting game in the North Umberton hills instead of trussed up in a tailcoat, but he’s so attentive to Lizzie and so obviously infatuated—holding herhand, playing with her hair, buttering her bread—that it’s hard to find him anything but charming.
William and Imogene are here as well, and shortly after we take our seats, the first course is served: pumpkin soup topped with spiced seeds and a swirl of cream. It’s divine, even compared to the Otherworld’s wonderful dishes; Lachlan eats every drop, murmuring his incredulity.
After the soup course, the two seats between Imogene and me remain unoccupied, and I am wondering how long they?—
“Hello, chickadee.”
My stomach drops as my gaze lifts to … God, George looks terrible.
His nose is blotchy, his eyes bloodshot, and his hair limp and greasy. He darts for the chair next to me before Jane—wearing a tight-lipped expression no one would ever mistake for a smile—can get to it first. There is a very awkward moment where they whisper-fight over who should take the seat.
George wins, and I am stuck sitting between my first love and my current …
It feels disingenuous to call Lachlan anything other than my love. But we’ve never talked about any of it. Not how we’re feeling, not what comes after.
Because there is no after for us, I suppose.
The next course—fillet of turbot in a herbed béchamel sauce—is served, and as the group digs in, George leans around me to address Lachlan. “I don’t think we’ve been properly introduced. Who are you?”
An aggressive introduction for someone with George’s bland Bretonnic manners.
Lachlan, bless him, appears supremely unbothered. He offers George a warm, polite smile. At least, I’m sure that’s how it looks to the rest of the table. I know what lurks beneath his glamour; those fangs are bared. “Lachlan Cathal.” He extendsa hand over my plate, shaking George’s much harder than necessary. George winces, and I inwardly cheer. “Charlotte’s husband. And you are?”
George sputters a laugh. “Charlotte’s never mentioned me? We were quite close, you know.”
William lobs a “Get a hold of yourself, man,” which George ignores before slugging back half a glass of gin. Jane grabs his forearm, hissing something too low for the rest of us to hear. He tears his arm away, and his face is so cruel that I feel sorry for her.
Thisis the man I thought I wanted?
