The other two looked somewhat chastened at that though Olivia added stubbornly, “Decades of hard labor is probably more of a satisfying punishment, in truth.”
Matilda’s attention remained firmly fixed on Anna while the other chattered around them. “Do not attempt to hoodwink me, Anna.” She smiled. “I know you too well. What is the matter?”
“Is something wrong?” Phoebe jumped in, finally noticing.
Anna took a shaky breath. “Please, do not worry about me. I am quite well. Just tired, that is all.” She forced another smile. “What were you saying about your book, Matilda?”
“Anna,” Matilda urged. “What is wrong? I shall not relent.”
Olivia and Leah helped to close their circle of five, everyone’s attention now where it should be—on their friend, who was obviously in need of her sisterhood.
“It is silly,” Anna said quietly, “and you will think I am being selfish, but I promise you, I am so very happy for all of you. It is just…”
No one said a word, giving her the space and time to continue whenever she felt ready.
“It is just that… I cannot pretend anymore,” she blurted out, clamping a hand over her mouth. “I cannot pretend that what you all have is going to happen for me. I gained some of my hope back when Matilda and Albion found joy together, but in recent weeks, it has failed me again. I have lost my faith in love, and I think it is gone for good, this time.”
Matilda bundled Anna into a side-hug. “That is simply not true. You cannot lose faith because you are the most beautiful, most deserving, most wondrous, most generous, sweetest soul there is, andanygentleman would be fortunate to love you! That is how I know youwillfind happiness. I feel it in my bones, and they are so rarely wrong.”
“With respect, Matilda, saying things like that does more harm than good,” Anna replied in a ragged whisper. “I have heard the same thing all of my life. I have waited for my prince. I have been patient, I have been resilient, and… now, I must learn to accept that it is not my fate. I can expect no happy ending anymore, considering my age. The best I can hope for is an arranged match… and that terrifies me.”
Matilda was about to launch into another, more determined lecture about Anna’s merits and all the hope thatshehad for her friend when someone cleared their throat just behind the tight circle of women.
“I apologize for intruding,” said the most beautiful, striking, disarming woman in all of society. A vision in scarlet, every bit as legendary as her reputation.
“Countess! Heavens, you are not intruding!” Matilda yelped, for she had long admired the woman. The Countess of Grayling—the exception to every rule, who had claimed her right to be a Countess with no husband or male heirs and made the very foundations of society tremble in her presence.
Olivia, Leah, and Phoebe looked equally awestruck, gazing at the Countess as if she were a queen. Only Anna seemed unimpressed, for she had always made it clear that she did not favor the Countess. Indeed, she thought the Countess unsavory and shameless and the very antithesis of what she believed in though she would not have used such unkind words.
“Anna,” the Countess said, smiling. “May I call you Anna?”
Anna shrugged. “I do not mind it.”
“It is you that I wished to speak to, but I shall not interrupt your evening,” the Countess continued, her voice warm and soothing. “Might you oblige me by joining me for tea, one day this week? At your convenience, of course.”
Anna seemed suspicious, eyeing the Countess. “Me?”
“Yes, you.” The Countess chuckled. “An hour or so. I will not take up too much of your time.”
Anna chewed on her lower lip for a moment before hesitantly answering, “Of course. I would be… um… happy to.”
“Excellent.” The Countess flashed a wink. “I shall send word to you, and I shall look forward to our meeting.”
She was gone in the blink of an eye, leaving the rest of the Spinsters’ Club reeling and gasping.
“You must tell us everything!” Olivia urged.
“Yes, tell us when you are to go, and we shall take you there in the carriage, so we can hear it all the moment you are done,” Leah agreed.
Phoebe put a protective arm around Anna. “You do not need to tell us anything. Do not listen to a word they say; they are just jealous.”
“Obviously!” Olivia laughed.
Meanwhile, Matilda slipped her hand into Anna’s and gave it a gentle squeeze as if to say,I have not forgotten what you were saying. You might have lost faith, but I will not. I am here for you.
For no matter how happyshewas, she would always be at her happiest when her friends were happy too. It pained her to see Anna suffer, and she prayed that her trusty bones were not wrong about the only spinster left in the Spinsters’ Club.
* * *
