But of course no one would. No one could. The men left to head to the drawing room, leaving Annabelle deflated andhopeless.
Seeing Annabelle’s sorrowful expression, Josephine parted her lips to speak, but nothing came out of her mouth. There were so many things that she wanted to say to her daughter, so many ways in which she wished to apologize, but she did not know where to start. It was hard for Josephine to admit that she had failed, especially when it was the first time that she had been asked for help inyears.
Annabelle glanced at her mother, but she did not say anything either. As far as she was concerned, she was in this mess alone. There was not anyone who could get her out ofit.
Annabelle leapt up from the table and she walked briskly to her bedroom. She wanted to hide, she needed to escape until Watson was gone, she did not want to see himagain.
Of course, she was not about to get that lucky. Less than an hour later, the butler found her hiding place, and he said the words that would drag her unwillingly fromit.
“Your father wishes you to come back to spend time with Lord Ashdown,” he told her in his monotone voice. “They are still in the drawingroom.”
Annabelle had never been invited into the drawing room in her life, and to be perfectly honest she had not ever wanted to go. She saw it as a room where men discussed business, and that was dull. She would much prefer to be with her friends, discussing the things that mattered toher.
This time she wanted to go even less than usual. Her fists clenched by her side while she tried to think of an excuse not to obey her father’s wishes, but nothing good enough came to her. There was no escapingthis.
“Right, I shall come now,” she said wearily. “Please tell my father that I shall be there in amoment.”
The butler did not move, he ignored Annabelle’s request. “I must wait for you, I have been asked to escort you to the drawingroom.”
“Of course you have.” Annabelle tapped her foot on the ground, letting out some of her frustration in the mildest way possible. “I suppose there is no point in waiting then. Let us go, shallwe?”
Every step that Annabelle took filled her heart with increasing dread. Now that the men had been drinking and the atmosphere was more relaxed, there was no telling what would be discussed. Maybe the wedding plans would be progressed, which was the opposite to what she needed. She wanted to speak with her father alone to try again to prevent this from happening, she did not want to be abandoned by plans already beingmade.
However, when Annabelle arrived in the drawing room, she was surprised to see only one set of eyes looking back at her. And not the eyes shewanted.
“Where is my father?” she asked curtly, not at all enjoying the idea of spending time alone with Watson. “He called me here to meet withhim.”
“He is in the kitchen, getting some more drinks for us,” Watson answered with a lopsided grin. “I am pleased to get some alone time withyou.”
He sidled closer to Annabelle and she felt her whole body stiffen with panic. Her eyes flickered behind her but the butler was no longer anywhere to be seen. He had deserted her just when she actually wanted him there. It was almost as if the entire world was againsther.
“We had such a lovely evening at your sister’s wedding, did wenot?”
“Erm, oh yes, we did.” Annabelle tried to be calm with Watson, she did not want to seem like she was being irrational, when her father entered the room again. “It was a very nice nightoverall.”
Watson casually placed his hand on her hip, which caused Annabelle’s legs to freeze up as if they were frozen in ice. He was not supposed to touch her like that, there was nothing right about it. Why did he not seem to care about that? And why could she not move? It was almost as if she was completely frozen intime.
“And I presume that you are very happy to hear the news that we are to be wed?” Annabelle could not answer him, there was such a massive ball in her throat that she could hardly even breathe. “I, personally, am incredibly excited to have you as my wife. I am particularly looking forward to our wedding night. After the dance I promised you, of course. That will be a joyfulmoment.”
The lewd comment caused a boiling hot sickness to swirl in Annabelle’s stomach. Watson was not a gentleman at all, yet he had her father completely fooled. If he could see him trying to ruin his daughter’s reputation now, maybe her father’s opinion would change. The ease that he spoke those very scary words also made it obvious to Annabelle that this was not an area of life to which he was astranger.
To Annabelle, it was acutely obvious that hedidspend a lot of time with courtesans. She hated that. It made her feelill.
“I... I...” she stammered in a panic, praying internally that something would save her. “I...”
“You, you, what?” Watson laughed nastily at her. Annabelle got the distinct impression that he actually liked to make her feel discomfort. If her father forced her to marry him, she would be in for a lifetime ofit.
“I just... I want to see my father,” she finally gasped. Annabelle’s mind spun so frantically that she could not even attempt to act strong. She revealed her vulnerabilities and weaknesses to Watson without even thinking about it. “Where is he? I should go and findhim.”
She forced her legs to step backwards, but Watson only followed her. His grin had now twisted into a sinister smirk, showing Annabelle just how much evil he truly hadinside.
“Your father wishes to meet you here, I think that you should wait for him where he has asked you to doso.”
“N... no, I do not thinkso.”
Her heart thundered painfully against her chest, she could feel it pounding violently against her rib cage. Annabelle wanted to look around the room to find a much-needed escape route, but for some strange reason, she could not drag her eyes off of Watson’s however hard she tried. She could feel herself being sucked into his nasty, evilweb.
Thump,thump.
