Page 66 of The Last Debutante
“Have you had a fall, then?” Bethia asked, nodding to the back of Daria’s trousers.
Yes. A fall from a very great height.“I have been in the forest,” Daria said curtly. She stalked to the window and looked out. There was no one left in the bailey. It was as if the entire day had disappeared.
“You’ll be wanting a bath,” Bethia stated.
“Thank you. I do,” Daria said coolly.
Bethia’s second brow rose to meet the first. “Are you wroth?”
“Wroth? Why should I be wroth? No, Bethia, I am not. Not in theleast.” She began to pull the shirt from her trousers, wanting out of those clothes, especially now with the image of Isabella, looking regal in her blue gown and matching cape, looming in her mind. “But I do not care to be paraded about all of Scotland in pantaloons.”
“It’s a wee bit too late for that, aye? Mark me, you’ll be one of us ’ere you know it.”
Daria stopped what she was doing and stared irritably at Bethia. “I will never be one of you, Bethia.”
Bethia picked up Daria’s coat. “I donna wish it, if that’s what you think. I’m only the messenger.”
“Do you want to know whatIthink? I think you hide behind that nonsense. Or you deliberately seek to vex me with it.”
“I’ll no’ deny that,” Bethia said with a shrug. “But no’ in this. As I live and breathe, you will be one of us.”
“Enough,” Daria said wearily, and sank onto the chaise. It would be just her luck to become one of them and watch Jamie wed Isabella.
“I’ll send a lad up with water now, aye? You’ll want your bath before the Brodies settle in.”
“What do you mean?” Daria asked, startled.
“If the kitchen is to be believed, Miss Brodie has had a change of heart and wants the laird now. They’ve come to negotiate the dowry.”
Daria’s heart began to sink like a stone in a turbulent sea.
Bethia was watching her, but for once, she didn’t appear to scarcely tolerate her. She looked as if she pitied her.
The stone that was Daria’s heart disappeared into the dark depths of lost hopes. She could feel the blood draining from her face and glanced down to work the buttons of her pantaloons. She felt lightheaded, as if she had been turned round and round. “Good,” she said at last. “Everyone at Dundavie wishes for an heir. Perhaps now you will all have one.”
“Aye, we’ll have one,” Bethia said confidently as she walked to the door. “We’ll have a stable of them, I’d wager.” She walked out of the room.
“One day you will not be so bloody certain of everything, lass,” Daria muttered, and fell onto the chaise. She stretched one leg out, closed her eyes, and thought back on her day. On her most glorious, stupendous day. She didn’t wipe away the tear that fell from the corner of her eye. After all she’d endured without shedding any tears, she was entitled to at least one.
JAMIE HAD BELIEVEDthere wasn’t much that was worse than being shot, but right now, looking at Isabella, he’d prefer the lead to split his skin than have to endure her company.
She was as lovely as ever, her smile as luminous as he recalled. She was speaking to him in Gaelic, her voice melodious, in a way that would soothe anyone, particularly when she placed her slender hand on one’s knee, as she had with him.
A month ago, Jamie might have been relieved at her change of heart. But now—today—he only felt oddly detached. “Have I understood you, then?” he asked when Isabella had finished what sounded like a carefully rehearsed speech. “You believe you made a mistake in crying off?”
“Aye, that is what I mean, darling. I was a wee bit hasty. I was distressed after that awful fight, and I thought... I thought that I was doing what I ought to do as a Brodie. You understand.”
He wasn’t entirely certain that he did understand. He glanced down at her hand on his knee. “That was two months past, Isabella. Has it taken two months for you to realize your mistake?”
“No, Jamie. I understood it straightaway,” she quietly admitted. “But it took me that long to overcome my pride.” She smiled ruefully.
So did Jamie. He supposed he should have been happy at her change of heart, or at the very least, understanding of it. He guessed she would like him to take her in his arms and kiss her, tell her all was forgiven. He should have averred she was the best possible match for him for so many reasons and admitted that he still had feelings for her.
Yet he said or did none of those things. The only thing he felt with any conviction was cross. With Isabella. With the Brodies and Campbells in general.
Isabella had always been able to read him rather well, and she seemed to now. She leaned across his lap, her mouth next to his earlobe. “I’ve missed you so, Jamie,” she whispered, and lightly bit his ear before fading back to smile at him.
Jamie didn’t move.
