Page 5 of The Lord who Captured Her Innocent Heart
Ella stepped back. Already, her mother shifted in conversation, mentioning something about the menu at the upcoming engagement affair, about chatting to Frederick’s mother about her opinion. Ella’s stomach lurched. She tapped around her mother and father, aching to dart into her bed, to be alone. But she knew that the moment she entered her house, she might fall into the presence of the happy couple. Imagining their strange giggling, their glowing eyes of wonder and excitement, chilled her.
She felt cast out, an orphan, a woman without a country. She headed towards the door, her body fully shaking, now, and then through it and finding herself in the same hallway she’d walked along nearly every day of her life. Her ears ached, hunting for some sign of Tatiana and Frederick. Perhaps this was masochistic in nature.
Ella heard nothing. The house hummed with its emptiness. She darted toward the staircase, rushing up, blasting into her bedroom and falling into the mattress. Her nose pressed against the comforter. Her inhalation was deep, loud. She kept the air in her lungs as long as she could before releasing it. And with that release came what she knew would come: aching, horrific sobs, ones that made her body clench tight.
The world she’d expected had fought back, lent her nothing in return. She’d never felt less hope for her future. She’d never felt more alone.
Chapter 3
Ella was ordinarily a very good judge of time, but as minutes passed in her bedroom that sad afternoon, she wasn’t entirely sure if it was the same day, the same week, the same month, even, before Tatiana appeared back on the landing outside her door. Ella heard the familiar footsteps and drew her head from the pillow, her ears craning. She scrunched her face, waiting. Ordinarily, Tatiana just burst into her bedroom without warning, and this was no different. It was as though Tatiana wasn’t aware that the entire world was crashing around Ella, that she found it terribly difficult to breathe.
“There you are!” Tatiana cried, leaping upon Ella’s bed and bouncing down until she fell on her knees. She dropped her hand atop Ella’s back, rubbing it. “I couldn’t find you. I assumed you’d be downstairs reading in the garden. You’re always reading in the garden.”
“Not today,” Ella said, her voice low. She felt if she turned towards Tatiana, she might show her tears, her distress. She swallowed hard, trying to force herself to pull together her emotions. This was, in every effect, a lie. She didn’t remember lying to her sister so much in years previous.
She supposed that all had to change, now.
“I’m sorry that I ran away like that,” Tatiana said, giggling. “It’s just, we hadn’t seen one another in ages, and I truly missed him. The moment I saw him, I knew he’d done it. He’d finally asked Father. He said he would, but you know, you can never truly trust what a man is going to do.”
At this, Ella’s heart dipped lower. “You can trust Frederick. Frederick isn’t just any other man,” she said, feeling, for a moment, defensive about the man she loved.
It only took a second more for her to remember: she’d trusted him to love her back, and he hadn’t. How could she trust anything at all, then?
“That’s true,” Tatiana sighed, seemingly lost in thought. “I can’t believe he’ll be my husband. Think of it, Ella! All those afternoons that I thought he was such a silly man, reading his books, thinking his philosophical thoughts. I could have already had him. But I waited and I waited. I suppose it’s a good thing, as I allowed myself the space and time to truly know…”
She paused for a moment, leaping up from Ella’s bed and pacing. Ella turned to watch her, ensuring she swiped a blanket over her face and eyes. In time, Tatiana tossed her black curls back, seemingly not caring to look at Ella at all. Perhaps this was a blessing, despite its selfish nature.
“It was ridiculous to see him again, Ella.” Tatiana sighed, still pacing. “It was as though time stopped around us. He’s so terribly handsome, you know. I suppose I never looked at him so very hard, back when we were growing up. Do you remember? Was he always so good looking?”
Ella longed to tear her hair out. She drew herself up from bed, allowing her feet to drop to the floorboards below. Could she pray to God, tell him to strike her down – end her life for good? For truly, this felt like the greatest insult, putting her sister with the love of her life.
And it wasn’t as though Tatiana and Frederick had anything at all in common! This thought rollicked through Ella, turning her stomach. She drew her eyes towards Tatiana, aching with the question.
“What is it the two of you talk about, anyway?” she asked, arching her brow.
Tatiana didn’t notice the darkness in her voice. She giggled, returning to her seat beside Ella on the bed. “This and that, of course. Really, he just tells me how beautiful I am. And how much he likes my art. And how he can’t imagine how he got me, as I was the most eligible woman in Society. His words, not mine.”
Ella longed to roll her eyes back. She kept them centred upon Tatiana, trying to come to terms with the pure, unadulterated love she had for her sister, alongside the very pure love she had for Frederick. “He doesn’t tell you about the books he’s read? Or – did he mention all he learned in Bristol? My goodness, his head must be filled with so much knowledge, after all those months away.”
At this, Tatiana shrugged, twirling her black curls. “I dare say, there will be times in our marriage when I’ll be so wretchedly bored that I will have the time to sit down, to ask him – say, ‘Frederick. What was it you learned all those years ago, when we were apart?’ And he will surely blink at me and say, ‘my darling Tatiana, I haven’t a clue!’ And we will laugh about it. What does it matter what he learned, Ella? We’re building a life together. We aren’t building a library.”
Ella pressed her lips together. She felt another wave of tears stirring behind her eyes but pulled them back. She turned again towards the mirror, sweeping her hand across her busted-up fringe.
“Besides!” Tatiana sighed, drawing her arm around Ella’s shoulders. “I’m so grateful that you and Frederick have books in common. Perhaps you can speak to him about it, so that he doesn’t bore me to death with the details.”
“Why is it you didn’t tell me, Tatiana?” Ella said then, almost blurting it. She turned her face quickly, so that her nose aligned with Tatiana’s. Their green eyes connected. Ordinarily, there was so little they had to say aloud to one another since they knew the intricacies of their body language; since neither had memory of the world before the other had been in it.
“I really did think we told each other everything. I never thought you would just fall in love like that without me noticing,” Ella continued, her voice growing softer.
Tatiana wrung her hands, casting her eyes to the ground. Outside, the gardens glowed with the very last of the late afternoon light, a strange, oddly eerie orange. Tatiana was right: Ella longed to be in the midst of those gardens, her mind tossed between two covers of a book.
“It was just the letters, his letters throughout the time he was away. Those were what truly changed my mind,” Tatiana murmured, giving Ella a soft shrug. “It wasn’t a conscious choice to lie to you. The romance existed wholly in my mind. And I wanted to make sure – after seeing him in the flesh – that it was real.”
“And it’s real?” Ella whispered.
Tatiana gave a firm nod. Again, this felt like a punch in Ella’s gut. Her mind hunted for what to say next, anything at all.
But what she said might have been the most detrimental thing of all.
