Page 73 of His Highland Duchess
“Your Grace!” Mr. Jeffries swept into the room in a flustered state. “I did not mean to wake you, but…” He was shaking, his eyes wide with panic. “But… but… but…”
“Speak, Mr. Jeffries…” Lysander yawned and stretched, not in the mood for his servant’s theatrics. “What is the matter?”
“It is Aurelia, Your Grace. She is gone.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
“Leave me be,” Margaret groaned, rolling over in bed.
“I will do no such thing,” Catherine said rightly. “If you think that I am going to let you wallow in misery all day, then I am frankly a little insulted. That you would think I am that type of sister.” Margaret had her back to Catherine, and her eyes closed, so she could not see what her sister was doing. But she heard her feet walk across the room and toward the window, and then she heard the sound of the curtains being thrown open.
“Argh!” Margaret cried out as bright light flooded the room. And not the light of early morning either, but that which came when the sun sat high in the sky, for it was well into the day by this point. “Close the curtains!” Margaret snatched her pillow from under her head and shoved it over her face.
“What on earth makes you think I would do that?”
“I told ye, I dae nae want to get up,” she spoke through her pillow.
“Well, I can see that well enough for myself.”
“Close the curtains!”
“No,” Catherine said. “If you want them closed, you will have to do so yourself. Only that will require you to rise from your bed. Quite the predicament, isn’t it?”
Margaret pulled her pillow from her face and glared daggers at her sister. “Are ye enjoying yourself? I hope that ye are.”
To that, Catherine offered a forlorn expression; truly, she looked as if she might cry. “Enjoying myself? Margaret, how can you say such a thing? I have been beside myself with worry all morning. I hope you know that.”
“There is nae reason to worry.”
She snorted. “Lies. Now…” Across the room she came, heading straight for Margaret. There, she sat on the bed and rested a hand on Margaret’s shoulder. “It is time to get up. I know you do not want to. I know it feels as if you might never wish to again. But Margaret…” She sniffed and gave her shoulder a squeeze. “Wallowing in self-pity will solve nothing. In fact, it will only make it worse. To lie here all day and run over in your head how tragic everything has become will compound on your shoulders and strangle you. And that will do you no good.”
“Ye’re nae going to let this go, are ye?”
“Not on your life.”
Her sister was right, Margaret knew. Although she was in bed, Margaret had not been sleeping.I dae nae think I will ever sleep again, with how rotten I feel.She had been lying here wide awake, thoughts of misery and sorrow cascading through her mind and her body both, so that she felt like she might be sick.
Time was the great healer, Margaret had told herself. But how long would that take? It had been three days now since she left Lysander’s home, and she felt no better than she had that first morning. If anything, she felt even worse.
Another day or two at most… perhaps when I leave for Scotland, as surely by then things will start to feel better. They have to!It was tomorrow that she would be leaving, a day which brought her feelings of dread. And that was the least of it.
Her emotions were mixed. A part of her was angry, but Margaret reasoned that it was forced anger. She wanted to be furious with Lysander. She wanted tohatehim for what he had done. Alas, it was not possible, because despite his being the one who had kicked her out, she knew the fault of this situation to lie at her own feet.
She had been trying to do the right thing. Ironically, it was because of how much she loved Lysander and his daughters that she had acted the way she had. She did wonder still if perhapsshe had given in too easily. Had she stood her ground, would things be different?
Nae… I doubt that. Lysander is many things, and stubborn is one of them. It took so much for me to coax his feelings out of him so that he was ready to admit them to me, true. And the second he believed I had spurned him, they died like a fire doused by water.
There would be no going back. That, as much as anything, was what hurt the most. Margaret had been given a chance unlike anything she had dreamed; she had ruined it, and now she was left to deal with the consequences. Such was the way of love…
“Now, come on, the day is too glorious a one to waste in bed.” Catherine threw back the bedsheets. “And if nothing else, perhaps a walk will make you feel better.
Margaret doubted it very much. But her sister was almost as stubborn as she was, and at the very least, Margaret reasoned that she needed to get out of her own head.
“As you say…”
Together, they walked through the house, Catherine with her arm around Margaret’s waist. “I take it you are not hungry?”
“I doubt I will ever be hungry again.”
