I bit back an angry retort as I absorbed the look on her face...and the undeniable sting of truth in herwords.
Amy had been my mother’s goddaughter since birth, but after her own parents had died, she’d been shifted from home to home among her various aristocratic relatives—too high-ranking to be fobbed off on strangers, but too inconvenient to be welcomed in any one household for long. She hadn’t had a permanent home of her own until she’d finally reached the age of majority and been taken in by my mother, first as Mother’s assistant and then as her politicalprotégé.
She’d always been so good at adapting to every situation that I sometimes forgot how she’d first developed that skill. And of course, I had only been a girl when she’d arrived all those years ago. It was hard to remember now that she hadn’t always been a natural, essential part of our family, negotiating between me and my mother at our worst and saving all of us from one another more thanonce.
I released my held breath with a heavy sigh and relaxed my clenched fingers from around the bedcovers. “I loveyou,” I told her, “even when I don’t understandyou.”
“I know you do, darling.” Amy pushed herself up from her chair to join me on the bed. “I’m the only reason you and your brother both remember to change your clothing and even eat proper meals now andthen.”
“That’s...ah.” I winced. “Well, thatistrue, of course, but it’s not why I love you, and you know it.” I aimed her a sidelong look as she settled in beside me. “Does Jonathan know, by the way? Why you weren’t given Mama’s place in theBoudiccate?”
“Oh, really.” Amy shook her head at me. “Your older brother is a historian. Did you think he couldn’t research the truth of that for himself? He even offered to release me from our marriage at thetime.”
“Ha.” I bumped shoulders with her companionably. “Clearly he doesn’t know you so well after all. As if you would ever let go of anyone you caredabout!”
“Never,” Amy agreed blithely. “You and Jonathan have been caught in my wicked clutchesforever.”
I tipped my head against her shoulder, clinging to the moment even as I felt the minutes tick away. More snowflakes melting against myskin...
She let out a gasp and grabbed my hand. “Cassandra!”
Frowning, I let her place my hand on her rounded belly. “What’s wrong? Are you in pain? Or—oh!” Her belly bounced hard against the palm of my hand, and I jerked backinstinctively.
Then my brain caught up with me. “Wasthat—?”
“Your new niece.” Amy’s face was alight with joy. “She must have wanted to greet her aunt! I’ve been waiting and waiting for her to finally introduceherself.”
I stared at her, struck dumb. Then I looked down at her rounded belly, covered by her elegant dark green, ivy-patterned cottongown.
Holding my breath, I placed my hand with the utmost care in exactly the same place it had rested before.Waiting.
Nothinghappened.
Amy laughed. “Don’t look so glum,” she said. “You’ll see plenty of her in just a few more months, youknow!”
“Of course.” I took a breath and forced myself to smile and draw my hand back as if it genuinely didn’tmatter.
As if I would have months to feel the baby kick, any time I wantedto.
As if I would be there when she wasborn.
I said, “Youaregoing to help me assist Miss Banks and the other women like us, aren’t you? Even if it isn’t what the Boudiccatedesires?”
Amy’s chest rose and fell with her sigh. “I will always support you,” she said, “and I would never refuse you my advice. But I’m afraid that in this particular case, you’re the only one who has a real chance of convincing the people who matter. If you are truly willing to come forward and talk openly about what happened to you—which will mean swallowing your pride, Cassandra, and answering the most intrusive and insulting questions again and again, for the public to pore over at their leisure—until everyone finally truly believes that your accident had nothing to do with yoursex...”
“Of course,” I repeated quietly as the truth of it sank throughme.
Firing off a series of letters, no matter how passionate, could never be enough to win my case. No, I would need to answer endless, prying questions afterwards from the newspapers, the politicians and the Great Library alike...and that process had no hope of being completed within the next sixdays.
But I couldn’t leave my sister-in-law to sort that out for me any more than I could give up the opportunity to meet my first niece in person. Ihadto solve the elf-lord’s challenge, no matter what ittook...
...Which left only one option, no matter how unpalatable it mightbe.
I would have to seek out Wrexham myself and ask for hishelp.
Suddenly, I wished that I had poured that cup oftea.
10
