“It is the only time I ever disobeyed my father.”
Perlita gave a little huff of laughter.“Nonsense.”
Bella gave her an indignant look. Perlita said, “You were often disobedient.”
“I was not!”
“What about the time you rode the black stallion bareback?”
“Oh.” She’d been severely beaten for that.
“And when your menses began and Papa told you that you had to ride sidesaddle and must learn to be a lady and the very next day you—”
“All right, I didn’t always obey Papa in every single little thing. But I still should have—”
Perlita shook her head. “What? Carried Mama and me—kicking and screaming—to a nunnery? And you a child of thirteen? The whole idea was ludicrous from the start. Forget about it, Isabella. Get on with your life.”
And with those matter-of-fact words, the burden of guilt and self-recrimination Bella had been carrying all these years lifted.
Yes, she did want to get on with her life. All those years of dreaming…
One of her dreams was to be part of a family again. She looked at her sister. Nineteen, ruined, and in Ramón’s clutches. And one day soon she’d be dumped for an heiress. It was no way for a beautiful young girl to live. Had Perlita even been away from Valle Verde?
She laid her hand on her sister’s arm and said, “Come to England with Luke and me. We’ll help you find a husband there.”
Perlita gave her an astonished look, and Bella hastily added, “Or if you prefer we could take you to Barcelona where your mother is, or Madrid.”
Perlita said nothing for a moment. She picked a sprig of rosemary and sniffed it, then crushed it in her elegant fingers. “Thank you. It is a generous offer. But I will stay here.”
“With Ramón?”
“With Ramón.”
Bella hesitated, then said, “A mistress, Perlita? Like your mother?”
“I love him,” Perlita said.
Bella recalled the raised fist. “He doesn’t hit you, does he?”
Perlita shook her head. “Never.” She could see Bella still had doubts and added with a little smile, “Ramón looks very fierce—and I think he would happily kill your husband in a fight—but most of the time he is all sound and fury. Truly, with me he is always gentle as a kitten, except in bed, when he is a lion.”
Bella tried not to blush at such frankness. “And when Ramón marries his heiress?”
“First he has to find a rich woman who will take him.” She gave a philosophical shrug. “Not so easy since the war. Heiresses are in short supply.”
“But with the title, he’ll find someone, and then where will you be? In the little pink house in the next valley?”
Perlita turned and looked out toward the hills. “I was born in that house. It’s not so bad.”
But she was nineteen years old, Bella thought. What nineteen-year-old dreamed of living in the same isolated cottage she was born in, in the same lonely position as her mother? Even her mother was married now and living in the city.
“I always thought your mother and you must be very lonely.”
Perlita said nothing.
“If you came with us—”
“No! I stay here.”
