Page 69 of Forgotten No More

“Where is he?” she screamed. The words echoed through the empty corridor, bouncing off the walls.

With eyes opened wide in shock, the girl pointed further down the hall.

Ruby grasped the folds of the pearly white evening dress and ran in the direction the servant had pointed. All she could think was that she was too late. She wouldn’t make it in time. Her opportunity to know her father was gone. The chance to learn more about him, and herself, had been taken from her forever.

And all by a girl she’d come to love…her very own sister.

Emotions flooded her: love, guilt, hate, betrayal, distrust, jealousy, confusion—the feelings just kept assaulting her, threatening to drag her down.

She passed closed door after closed door, not trying a single one. She knew her father did not rest behind any of them. Instead she continued on to the oversized double doors at the end of the hall, one door cracked. A small pool of light escaped, the kind nothing more than a few candles would produce.

Had he lain alone in his last hours? No one there to comfort him in his time of need…?

Or would she find his doctor, his close friends, and his servants gathered to say goodbye?

She prayed she wasn’t too late.

When Alex had found her, enjoying a turn about the dance floor at Lord Somerset’s ball, she’d instantly felt guilty. While she’d been prancing about in fancy garb, her father had been sick, possibly struggling to stay conscious through enormous amounts of pain.

She laughed…he lay wasting away.

She danced…he writhed in pain.

She dreamed of a better life, and he’d possibly been alone, fearing for his own.

Now, she stood, almost lifeless herself, in front of her father’s massive bedroom doors. Scared to proceed, knowing what she found beyond that door would change her forever—emotionally and physically. There was no possibility of her returning to a quiet existence in the country; she knew that now. She was not meant to be forgotten, left unnoticed to a lowly life of nothingness.

No, she deserved more. Craved more.

Yet, she did not know how to accept the Marquis of Drake as anything other than the horrible man he was. Despite all his ugly words and abusive treatment of Ellie, he was their father. Ruby had wanted to meet the man, regardless of his attitude and scorn for her and her mother. He owed her an explanation for his actions, why he’d tossed them aside as if they meant nothing. It was her right.

She raised her hand to her hair, knotted and windblown from her hurried travel across town, patting it into place to gain some semblance of order. One does not meet their father for the very first time very often, she reflected, and should appear proper for the occasion.

She would meet her father. Get the answers she deserved. And move on. If that included the marquis and Ellington in her life, she didn’t know. But move on—move forward—she would.

She had no other choice.

Ruby squared her shoulders and smoothed her gown.

Placing her hand flat on the solid wood door, she pushed.

As she expected of a house so grand, the door swung open on well-oiled hinges, revealing an empty room with a bed, shrouded in thick, midnight-blue curtains. The air was stale, the temperature so warm that the smell of sickness surrounded them.

She stepped past the threshold, taking in all that was her father’s most private domain. The masculinity of the space was overpowering—just as Ruby suspected he had been in life. He lived life on his own terms, even though he had clearly hurt many in the process. Drake was not afraid to take what he wanted, discarding the broken shell of a woman when he was done… When the allure of the moment no longer held him.

Could she hate him for that? Should she walk away now, forget him as he’d forgotten her all these years?

Part of her knew he did not deserve her—or Ellington, for that matter. Yes, the child—really a girl on the cusp of womanhood—was a terrible pain with no manners, but could Ruby blame her any more than she could her father for everything that had transpired thus far? Ellington had admitted she knew who Ruby was that night she’d found her and Harold, locked tight in a compromising embrace.

So much could have been different, should have been different, had Ellington been honest with her. They could have started a relationship then, instead of putting each other through this. The harsh words they’d exchanged over their short acquaintance could have been avoided. Ruby would have removed Ellington from the circumstances she felt trapped in. No child deserved the life of abuse that Ellie had led.

Ruby hadn’t a coin to her name, but she would have made arrangement for her sister.

As her breathing slowed, she heard a light sobbing.

Moving closer to the bed, Ruby removed her gloves when the heat of the room assaulted her. She saw a small figure sitting within the curtains surrounding the massive four-poster bed. Ruby pulled the drape back to reveal the withered frame of her father, lying motionless beneath a heaping mound of blankets.

Next to the marquis, Ellie sat curled in on herself, clutching her father’s feeble hand.