“What?” Annabel said, shocked. “What?”
Suddenly the room seemed very quiet, and she was aware of Ewan turning his head and looking at them.
“You needn’t marry Ardmore,” Imogen continued happily. “The scandal is over. Isn’t it wonderful?”
Wonderful, Annabel thought in bewilderment. Wonderful?
Ewan wasn’t at all bewildered. The moment Annabel’s family entered the room he had a sickening sense about what was coming. The worst of it was that he deserved it. Merely on the grounds of egregious stupidity, he deserved to lose her. Not that he would allow it, whether he was the village idiot or no.
As Annabel stared at her sister without speaking, Imogen’s face fell a little. “You are happy, aren’t you? We drove at night, even, to make sure we’d get here in time.”
“Of course,” Annabel said quickly. “What a terrible journey you must have had. I can’t think how you managed to get here; why, we only arrived yesterday ourselves.”
“I hope I never hear the word carriage again!” Griselda said. “Just look at me: I’m a shadow of my former self!” She looked down with horror at her figure. Sure enough, her luxuriant curves seemed slightly less generous.
“We just couldn’t bear to think of how you cried, the night before you left for Scotland,” Imogen said. “I know you planned to return to us after six months,” she said, taking Annabel’s hands in hers. “And we all know how common broken marriages are in London. But it’s a terrible thing to endure a marriage of that sort. We all felt so. And then Lucius Felton announced that he’d discovered a way to quell the scandal.”
Ewan was trying to rein in the temper that he would have sworn he didn’t own—not until Annabel entered his life. “You did say six months?” he asked, as if he were merely trying to clarify a point of light conversation. Unfortunately, even he could hear the savage edge in his voice.
Imogen had the grace to look a little ashamed. “The plan was made in the heat of the moment,” she told him. “But it’s inconsequential now, because Felton found a Miss Alice Ellerby—a Miss A.E.!—who was desperate to escape her parents’ grasp.”
“A happy coincidence,” Ewan said flatly. Annabel wasn’t looking at him. Surely she couldn’t believe he would ever allow her to return to London.
“Felton paid Miss Ellerby a large sum of money, and she published a truly scintillating account of her relationship with you, Lord Ardmore, in Bell’s Weekly Messenger.”
“Her relationship with me?” Ewan repeated.
Imogen nodded. “Then she ran away to America with a groomsman, as I understand it. Thanks to Felton, she has a dowry.”
“There will be a bit of palaver about the wedding that didn’t happen,” Griselda said, sounding utterly exhausted. “But since I had taken ill and didn’t leave the house after you and Annabel left, we’ve put it about that Josie and I traveled with the two of you.”
“Your reputation as a rake is blossoming,” Imogen said, obviously trying to make up for spilling the news that Ewan’s fiancée had intended to desert him promptly after the marriage ceremony. “What with my behavior on the dance floor and now the ardent Miss A.E., you’re quite the man of the hour.”
Ewan said nothing. Cursing before one’s future wife’s family was not considered good ton.
Imogen started talking faster. “There’s nothing more heartbreaking than a loveless marriage,” she said. “A marriage forced by circumstances is bound to be a tragedy.”
“There are forced marriages and forced marriages,” Ewan said. He swung around, knowing that Annabel would be able to read his face. “Don’t you agree?”
She looked back at him, head high, her eyes inscrutable.
“I’d be grateful for a chamber in which to lay my head,” Griselda said. “These Scottish roads are deplorable.”
Ewan offered his arm. It was for the best that he leave the room before his temper got the best of him. That temper he didn’t own…until a month ago.
“Josie, come with me!” Griselda called.
“This is a delightful surprise,” Annabel said to Mayne, watching under her lashes as Ewan left the room. Clearly, he was ferociously angry. Annabel swallowed.
“It was a surprise for myself as well,” Mayne said, looking annoyed. “I’m in grave need of a tailor. I was kidnapped by your sister.”
Imogen laughed. “Poor Mayne has been complaining about the state of his dress all the way from London. He’s had to wear Rafe’s clothing, and a sad comedown it’s been.”
“You kidnapped Lord Mayne?” Annabel asked Imogen.
She waved her hands airily. “He is so dreadfully set in his ways, and truly, such an old-fashioned man. I knew he’d refuse to accompany us.”
“Indeed,” Annabel said, “why should he wish to make a fortnight’s journey into Scotland?”
“In the middle of the racing season,” Mayne put in.
“Because I asked him to,” Imogen said stoutly.
“Except apparently you didn’t ask him—”
“She did not,” Mayne said. “She called at my house and naturally I entered her coach immediately, since I had not yet beat it into your sister’s head that it is thoroughly indecorous to halt her carriage where all and sundry might see us. Next thing I knew, I was on my way to Scotland.”
“Well, I’m very grateful to both of you,” Annabel said, feeling queerly ungrateful. “It was very kind of you to come rescue me.” It was so kind that she might break into tears at any moment.
“It was really Felton who took care of it, finding that Miss Ellerby and so on,” Mayne said. “But I find myself wondering whether you are truly happy to greet us, Miss Essex.”
“Of course she is!” Imogen said quickly. “How can you ask such a thing, Mayne?”
“I am always happy to see my sisters,” Annabel said, meaning it. The very thought that they’d come all the way to Scotland to rescue her—even if she was ungrateful enough to be unsure about her deliverance—was likely to make those unruly tears appear. Imogen was frowning, so Annabel added, “You must be exhausted. Let me bring you to Ewan’s housekeeper.”
It was midnight by the time everyone was in a comfortable room, with a steaming bath and fresh night clothes. Imogen had demanded a room next to Mayne, and he had insisted on a different floor. Josie hadn’t wanted to be in the schoolroom, as Griselda thought proper, and then Griselda had discovered that her room faced east, and she disliked an east-facing room due to the possibility of morning sunlight.
Yet finally…finally, everyone seemed to be suitably accommodated. She’d seen Ewan once, in passing. Their eyes met, and then Annabel hurried past. What must he think of her? She had planned adultery, but also desertion. What man would want a wife with no scruples? Pangs of regret and humiliation made her feel faintly nauseated.
She just sat down on the edge of her bed when she heard an awful shrilling noise. For a moment she didn’t even recognize it as a scream, it was so high and so piercing.
Then she started running blindly in its direction, chilled to the heart by the pure terror of it. The awful screaming went on and on as Annabel flew down the corridor, down to the stairs. Doors were opening up and down the hallway, people’s voices were calling out and still she ran. It was the library, she thought.