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“I would be if I could find them, I assure you,” Cecelia said, fluttering her hand nervously in front of her.
“But you stormed out of the breakfast room a little more than an hour ago.” Lady Ramsdale’s brow arched delicately. “Have you been lost for that long?”
“Unfortunately, yes,” Cecelia admitted. “And I’m very sorry that you saw me storming about at all. It wasn’t my intention to upheave your household.”
Lady Ramsdale bustled her two younger daughters quickly from the room. Then she motioned for Cecelia to have a seat. “Life’s not worth living without a little upheaval, dear,” she said. She regarded Cecelia with warm eyes. “Do you want to talk about what’s bothering you?”
Not at all. She couldn’t possibly discuss the fact that the lady’s own son had taken her heart and squashed it like a bug under his shoe. “Nothing is bothering me,” she said, forcing herself to smile. “Thank you for letting me stay until the moonful,” she added.
“Thank you for lending us some of your magic. I know it’s not easy for you being here.”
“Life does go on, doesn’t it?” Cecelia said with a heavy sigh.
“Does it?” Lady Ramsdale asked. “Does it go on? Really?”
Cecelia stuttered. “I’m certain I don’t know what you mean, Lady Ramsdale.”
Marcus’s mother waved a breezy hand in the air. “Oh, posh. You’re in love with one of my sons, and the other is using you shamelessly to needle him.” She took a sip of her tea and offered Cecelia a cup. She waved it away. “Not very sporting of Allen to pick you as a way to get back at his brother. But it might be what Marcus needs to do the right thing.”
“The right thing?” Cecelia reached for a cup of tea after all, because she suddenly couldn’t swallow the lump in her throat.
“My son is an idiot if he thinks he can follow society rather than his heart. I think he’s regretting his decision. And he regrets it even more every time you step away from him.”
“Marcus has no regrets. Sometimes I think he wishes he’d been born human rather than half fae.” She murmured the last.
“Marcus is chasing a dream he’s had since he was a small lad. Since he was taken from us, he never knew what it was like to have parents, and he’s dead set on pleasing his human father.” She set her teacup down. “What he doesn’t realize is that his father doesn’t care if he takes over his title. He just wants him to be happy.”
“He’s happy now, from what I understand,” Cecelia said quietly.
Lady Ramsdale laughed loudly. “Happy? That young man is miserable without you.”
Cecelia set her own cup down. “Did you call me here because you needed my magic? Or so that you could toss the two of us back together?”
Lady Ramsdale tilted her head from side to side as though weighing the value of her response. “A little of both, perhaps.”
“I wish you hadn’t,” Cecelia said clearly. “I wish you’d just left me be. It was just starting to get easier without him.” Things weren’t getting any easier with her father. But that was neither here nor there.
“Oh, you poor darling,” Lady Ramsdale cooed. “I would never have sent for you with the intention of making you miserable.”
“Yet, you have,” Cecelia said as she got to her feet.
Lady Ramsdale stood up just as quickly. “What can I do to make it better?”
“I don’t think you understand, Lady Ramsdale.” She heaved a sigh and pinched her eyes closed tightly.
“Help me understand,” Lady Ramsdale pleaded.
“All I’ve ever wanted to be was Marcus’s wife. That was our plan. We’ve talked about it since we were young. We would go hunting for frogs when we were young, and we talked about
how we would teach our children to do the same. And when we got a little older, we talked about how we would go on missions together, even into our old age. And we planned our future. We used to sit out under the stars and talk about it all. He’d put his head in my lap and everything felt right. Until he decided that he didn’t want the life we’d planned.”
“I had no idea Marcus had made such a muddle of things,” Lady Ramsdale said, scratching her head.
“Our dreams were gone. And he had new ones. But I didn’t. I had nothing. So forgive me if I’m a little bitter about the whole situation.”
“No need to forgive you, dear,” she said quietly.
“I just wanted you to know. He threw me away. And it has taken me over six months to pull myself back up to stand on my feet. And just when I thought I could, you summoned me here. So, I came. But don’t expect me to act as though things are all fine and good between us, because they’re not. He doesn’t love me anymore. And I am too angry to love him.”
