Theodore turned to face his friend.
“What happened to the last married couple of my blood who spent so much time together?” It was as if he had shot a gun across the room.
Gabriel colored and looked down. They had been friends for so long that even though Theodore had told Gabriel very little, his friend had still seen for himself plenty of times as they had grown up what the relationship of Theodore’s parents had been.
“That was your parents. That isn’t you.”
“Their blood is my blood,” Theodore reminded him. “I have made a plan for the way this marriage will be, and I shall stick to his Gabriel.”
“Very well, have your way.” Gabriel stood from his seat. “To make the marriage what you wish it to be, what you wish it to achieve, you will still have to be seen in public together. In four days, Evelina and I are holding a ball. Say you and Margaret will come?”
Before Theodore knew what he was doing, he was nodding in agreement.
One ball with Maggie cannot be so bad. Can it?
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Margaret stood alone outside the back of her father’s house. She was looking in through the window, seeing her sisters crowded around a card table.
They were having fun, laughing, each one winning a hand in turn, placing down their cards victoriously.
Margaret raised a hand and knocked on the window, but not one looked toward her at the sound. It was as if she were invisible, and the noises she made soundless. She was no longer a part of the family.
She envied their laughter and their smiles. It made her gut curl with jealousy as she raised her hands to cover her arms, trying to fight the cold. She noticed she wasn’t wearing the warm green gloves Theo had given her. She longed for them, but confused, she didn’t know where she had left them.
Then a shout went up in her father’s house.
Margaret stared through the window to see her sisters all jumping up from their places at the table.
Evelina flung herself in front of Louisa, Alexandra and Penelope, trying to protect them as the door burst open.
Margaret thought it would be their father, but it wasn’t. It was a man made of dark shadows, his face indistinct from the shadowy form. He threw himself forward, going to attack the sisters.
The whole house shook, as if an earthquake shuddered beneath their feet.
Margaret threw fisted hands at the glass window. She was trying to break it down, smash the glass and return her sisters, but she couldn’t get through. She was forced to pummel the impenetrable glass as her sisters screams filled the air.
The shadowy form moved for Evelina first, throwing her to the ground as she clutched her rounded stomach.
Margaret shouted.
“Evelina!”
Margaret sat up in bed. Breathing heavily, she looked around, throwing the covers off herself as her gaze settled on the moonlit chamber.
It was a dream. Just a dream.
She bent forward, hiding her face in her hands as she considered everything she had seen in that nightmare. It was no great leap of the imagination to see what had conjured it.
Their father, like a monster, had infected their lives. She feared it would hurt all of them forever more. That shadowy figure was their father and Margaret, unable to make it in through the glass, was always going to fear her inability to help her sisters.
Scrambling out of the bed, Margaret could not stand still. She paced up and down in her chemise, pulling at her neckline. The nightmare had left her heated to the touch, her skin practically on fire.
She needed someone to talk to, someone to explain everything to, in the hope they could offer some comfort.
Margaret turned to face the adjoining door in her chamber.
She knew it led to Theodore’s room. She also knew it was bolted tight, meaning she could not possibly go in to talk to Theodore.
