Page 85 of The Lover's Eye
Marriane’s mouth quirked into a smile.“You have a look about you when you loathe something.Your nose wrinkles, and you pinch your lips like an old dowager.Not very subtle, I’m afraid.”
Isobel’s eyes widened, and her brain began to catalogue all the moments she might have spent glowering at her sister’s husband.A simple breakfast was delivered on two trays, and Isobel found her voice.“I want to know everything you know.About what they found, and how Giles was with her.”
“Can you not put these questions to your husband?”
A familiar stinging started deep beneath Isobel’s skin, and she focused on buttering her toast.“No.He had me promise not to.”
Marriane made a sound that was half-cluck and half-curse.“Men,” she grumbled.“Infuriating creatures, always.”
Isobel tried not to watch and marvel as her sister sat up and began eating with enthusiasm.“You said Martin seems affected, too?Whatever for?I did notice he and the reverend seemed quite close.”
Marriane swallowed.“I do not think it’s the reverend that has him vexed, but the amount of people coming and going from the cliffs.They want to see where she was found, and ask him what condition she and that necklace were in.He can’t find a moment’s peace at the fishing cottage.”
“Necklace?”Isobel squeezed her eyes shut.She should have realized why Reverend Gouldsmith had waited so long to return the blasted thing—it had only just been found.
“Yes, it was one of those lover’s eyes, or so they say.I loathe them.Find them scary looking.”Marriane reached for a second piece of toast and slathered it with marmalade.
“Yes,” Isobel said vacantly, suddenly imagining Giles’s eye around Miss Gouldsmith’s neck.A beacon of protection, even after death.“I am not fond of them either.”
“I think Papa made us that way.Lording around Mother’s necklace like some prize, when really, the painting looked nothing like her eye.Say—did he ever make you wear it?”
The squeamish feeling from the carriage revived in Isobel’s stomach.“To the Everly Ball, but pray do not remind—”
“Did you know, that was one of the first pieces of jewelry Martin tried to commission for me after we wed.He thought it would be so romantic, and I told him, ‘Dear, do not waste your coin, for I shall never wear it.’”
Marriane grinned, seeming satisfied with herself, and added a heap of sugar to her tea.She did not have the appearance of health back yet, but she was acting like herself again.It was a wonderful sight; Isobel only wished she could be in better spirits to receive it.
“Enough moping,” she said, bumping Isobel with her elbow.“Tell me what’s brought you here.”
Isobel divulged every prickly event that pressed into her mind: the interruption of her wedding night, the mystery of the blue room, the promise she had made to Giles, Lady Sempill’s scathing tongue.By the time she recited what she’d heard outside the library door, she was short of breath.
“And worst of all, I afforded him a chance to confide in me last night.He said nothing!Pretended all was perfectly normal.”
Marriane had been listening carefully and now leveled a hard gaze at Isobel.“Let me begin by saying you should not have run away from him,” she said matter-of-factly.
“I did not.”
Marriane’s brow arched.“Did you speak with him before you left this morning, or sneak past his door with all due haste?”
Isobel stiffened.
“Right,” Marriane said, “now on to the rest of it.Has he taken you to bed yet?”
Isobel colored up.“What does it matter?”
“Oh, it matters.”
“Yes,” Isobel said quietly, picking at the decorative fringe on her skirt.“He was very gentle with me.It was all very … different from what I expected.Enjoyable, even.”
Marriane gave a small smile and lifted her hands in question.“What matter is all the rest, then?”
“What?”Isobel’s mouth gaped.Her sister’s coolness further provoked her outrage.“You cannot expect me to be unaffected; to be perfectly fine living with all his secrets, and yet none of his trust.”
“Stop, Isobel.No amount of wondering will alter your situation.There is nothing to do but accept what is now—Aurelia is gone, and along with her, any child that might have been.It is a terrible thing, yes, but Trevelyan himself seems to have moved past it.He married you, and more than that, it sounds like he cares for you.”She laid her hand over Isobel’s and gave it a little shake.“Trust me, you mustn’t waste that.”
Isobel nodded weakly, but a rising wave of tears left her throat dry and chalky.“But he loved her, he—think, Marriane, you once told me you had never seen a more enamored couple in all your life.How canIever hope to mean as much to him?”
She started to say more, to give voice to the cracking feeling opening her chest—I’m afraid I’ll never be enough—but she was on the brink of tears.
