Page 13 of Snowed In with the Jilted Duke

With a sigh, Penny rolled over with her back to Pippa, settling herself for sleep. After a long moment of indecision, Pippa continued into the dressing room and put herself in Sally’s capable hands.

There was no point in telling Penny tonight. She needed her rest. She would tell her in the morning.

And hope Penny could find a way to forgive her even if Pippa could not forgive herself.

That night as she slept, Pippa found herself back in Penny’s darkened sickroom.

Flickering candles. Her sister’s gasping breaths. The doctor’s grim words echoing again and again.

She is in God's hands now.

Mother sobbed brokenly, but Pippa could not spare time for her. She stared fiercely at her sister's face, complexion ashen beneath the flush of fever. Penny's breath came fast and shallow, and her head would toss from time to time as if to shake off whatever visions her delirium brought.

A maid placed a cool, damp cloth in her hand and, without looking away, Pippa sponged her sister's face with it before laying it across her burning forehead. Penny sighed a little with momentary relief.

The one comfort Pippa had was Penny's grip on her hand. The rest of her body was limp, but she clung as fiercely to Pippa's hand as she was clinging to life. Pippa could not help but feel that Penny could not die as long as she held onto her.

Her mind raced with curses, imprecations, prayers, but the same thought came over and over again.

If you let her live, I'll never so much as look Kendal's way again. Not ever.

In her dream, the rasping breaths stopped with a long sigh. In her dream, Penny never woke again, leaving Pippa trapped in her spiral of horror and shame and regret. Alone.

Forever alone without her twin.

Just as she deserved.

5

The next morning, Oliver did his best not to yawn as he descended the stairs to the breakfast room, his mood foul. He had tossed and turned all night, swinging between disgust at himself for taking advantage of a guest in his home by kissing Pippa, reliving that kiss, and racking his brain to find a solution to the bind he now found himself in.

He could not marry Penelope. Not now. He would need to speak with her this very morning and beg her to release him from their engagement, but he could scarcely roust her from her bed to demand she do so. Neither of the Montgomery sisters were early risers.

And once Penelope had freed him… the loan from her grandfather would come due immediately. The thrice-damned loan his father and her grandfather had used to force them together. The loan he had no way to pay back without breaking the entail and selling off properties he had only just begun to make profitable again after years of his father’s neglect.

Oliver set his jaw. It would be difficult—even ruinous—to pay off the loan, but it was better than tying himself to Penelope when he had… feelings for her twin sister. Feelings he was uncertain as to the nature of, but strong enough to know that marrying Penelope was the wrong choice. It could only end in disaster for all of them.

He opened the door to the breakfast room, only to find his grandmother already seated at the table, serenely nodding to the footman as he handed her a cup of tea. “Ah, there you are at last, Kendal.”

Gritting his teeth, he bowed to her. “Yes, here I am, Grandmama.” The last thing he wanted after his sleepless night was a long conversation with her. Especially when he needed to steel himself for the conversation with Penelope.

“Fetch us more poached eggs, Thomas.”

“At once, your grace.” The footman bowed first to the dowager and then to Oliver before exiting the room. Oliver crossed to the sideboard that held the urns of coffee and tea and, after a moment’s hesitation, poured coffee for himself before selecting a piece of dry toast and seating himself at the head of the table. He picked up the steaming cup to take a sip.

“I thought to scold you this morning, but Teasdale tells me you apologized quite handsomely to Miss Penelope in the library last night.”

His sharp inhale caused the sip of coffee he had just taken to go down his windpipe, and Oliver choked for a long moment under his grandmother’s benevolent eye before he was finally able to clear his throat, putting the cup down with an irate thump.

“He told you?”

“I am still the lady of this house until you are wed. Everything that happens under this roof is within my purview.”

Horrified, Oliver looked around to confirm once again they were alone in the breakfast room.

She stirred her tea. “I was afraid I would need to have a stern talk with you this morning after your behavior in the drawing room after dinner, but if your betrothed is satisfied, then I must be as well.”

Head spinning, Oliver rose. “Please excuse me, Grandmama. There is work I must attend to in the library.”