“I mind that you just sent my parents out of the house.” She waved an arm at the door.
“What? Did you actually want to spend hours at a time here with them talking down to you?”
“Maybe I deserved it,” Frederica said, watching as Allan jumped back from her, as if she had burned him.
“What did you say?”
“Maybe I deserved it.” She climbed off the armchair and stood straight, her hands on her hips. “They are right to make me sensible of the situation I have put myself in, aren’t they?”
“Sensible of it? Or guilty?” he challenged.
“They are one and the same thing!” she insisted.
“No, they are not.” Allan turned away, pacing on the spot. “For anyone to belittle another’s position in life takes extraordinary pride, but from one’s own parents… it’s disgusting behavior.”
“It’s only right after what happened,” she said, trying to raise her voice to match his.
“After what happened?” he repeated in alarm. “You and I were found alone in a corridor. We were only talking. You know as well as I that we did nothing wrong. For God’s sake, I only stopped you from falling downstairs when we were seen. Why should you be ashamed of that?”
“It’s not that.”
“Then what is it?” he challenged fiercely. “Because I cannot see why you would want your parents in this house to make you feel dreadful about yourself when we did nothing wrong.”
“Maybe it is my fault,” she complained, latching onto the last thing her father had said. “I put myself in these situations.”
“You were walking down a corridor!” Allan practically shouted the words. “Oh yes, that’s the act of a scandalous woman, isn’t it?”
“Do not be sarcastic now, Allan, please.”
“Then explain it to me.” He took a step toward her. “Explain to me why on earth you should suffer guilt and shame in your own home and be satisfied to be belittled even more for it from your own parents.”
“Because you were not my only scandal, Allan, remember?” She threw the words into the air, not knowing what else to do. “What came before…” She held her hand to her chest. “It casts a long shadow.”
“And what did exactly happen before?” Allan said, his voice now deep and low. “What is it you are not telling me?”
CHAPTERTHIRTEEN
“It’s not easy to talk about.”
Allan couldn’t stop staring at Frederica now. He wasn’t even sure he blinked as he waited for her to speak. The emotion on her face was ragged, her eyes glistening with unshed tears. She turned away from him, running her hand up from her chest to her neck, almost as if she intended to stifle the words which wished to escape from her lips.
Allan didn’t know what else to do to make her speak, but there was something here he did not know, something he had to know if he was going to ever have any chance of making Frederica happy in this house.
“Freddie,” he softened his voice, surprised when that new nickname fell from his lips again. She turned to face him, those glistening eyes wide. He walked toward her, stopping when he was just a few inches in front of her. “You can trust me with anything. I need you to know that.”
Something relented in her face. A tear slipped out of her eye, and she brushed it hastily away.
“I know,” she said shakily. “You have helped me when no other would.”
“Then trust me now,” he pleaded, hurrying to find a handkerchief in his pocket. Rather than proffering it to her, he gently wiped away another tear, aware of the way she stared up at him in wonder.
It was a moment of softness and intensity. He didn’t want to break away from this closed-off feeling, the sensation that they were the only two people in the world.
“It was my other scandal,” she whispered.
With the words, that soft illusion broke. He passed her the handkerchief. She fiddled with it, staring down at it as she began her story.
“He wouldn’t let me go.”
