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The swing was wet, but she brushed the worst of it away with the edge of her hand and sat down, not caring if the damp overtook her skirts and soaked her to the skin. The metal was cold beneath her palm as she gripped the chain and pushed the swing with her foot.
The very best part of a heavy fog was that it was easy to cry and hide the evidence of it. She let the tears mix with the droplets on her cheeks, blurring her vision as they collected on her eyelashes, and she let her head drop to rest against her hand on the chain.
She felt the emptiness of the house next door like a hollow ache in her chest.
No more Reeve children shrieking and playing in their garden and tumbling their way into her own, grabbing for Shelley and Byron, clambering over the swing and hollering their successes over their siblings.
No more chats with Susan and Betsy, commiserating over their beaux and looking over the new ribbons that they had always been so excited to show her.
No more nightly talks with Caroline, with glasses of elderberry wine in hand.
She hadn’t wanted things to change.
But the change wasn’t all bad, was it? Arabella stilled the swing. After all, there had been one very interesting andverywelcome development since the Reeves had inherited.
Kissing.
Frequent, charming little kisses that she and Caroline were finding as easy to exchange as currency.
Delightful kisses, stirring up her heart.
They had never hadthatbefore.
And kissing had never felt like that in Bath with Mr. Worthington.
An idea swirled in her head like the fog creeping up her skirts. She wanted Caroline. And she wanted all her old dreams. Why settle for the opportunity to exchange kisses when she craved so much more? Why nottrysomething?
The conversation that they had in the tea shop with Grace and Maeve had been revelatory. It had opened the door to opportunity that she had never thought she would have.
This was going to be risky. But the prize was suddenly tantalizing.
Determination settled over her like a suit of armor.
Or at the very least like a chain mail chemise.
She pushed away from the swing and raced up to the attic. Realizing that her dress was wet, she yanked it over her head and wrapped her chemise-clad body in a shawl that she kept folded at her desk. Shivering, she pushed her spectacles up her nose and thudded her sketchbook open to a fresh blank page.
The Rules of Pursuing an Heiress.
Arabella stared down at the spiky black words that flowed from her pen. Did shedare? She was just a shy spinster with a reticule full of ginger comfits. Bearer of sweets and library books, not wedding rings.
But she had read plenty of novels. She had seen friends fall in love and get married and move away. She had heard romantic stories of visitors whose gallant suitors proposed to them on the beach or on the bluffs. Her own year in Bath had ended in an engagement.
She should knowexactlywhat to do to secure Caroline’s affections.
A frisson of delight shivered up her spine as she thought of courting Caroline. Wooing. Pursuing. Why not become her suitor in truth? Or—better yet—hersuitress?
The very idea was shocking. But oh, so tempting. All she needed was to find the confidence to reach for what she wanted. A lifetime of shyness hadn’t earned her the life that she yearned for. If she wished to gain something different, she needed to screw up all the courage that she could muster in order to seize the moment.
She tapped her pen against the page and thought about how gentlemen pursued ladies. Could she not do the same?
She wished there was a guidebook she could consult on how to do the thing correctly, and wondered how gentlemen got their best advice. Probably from other gentlemen at the clubs. Arabella didn’t have access to such things.
She knew that it wouldn’t work at all if she followed the advice for a woman to pursue a gentleman. Why, Caroline would find it ridiculous in the extreme if she should feign a sprain and have to be carried into the Reeves’ townhouse, fainting and sighing away and encouraging tender solicitations.
She certainly couldn’t drop her handkerchief in the street and expect Caroline to pick it up with any hint of romance—she would be laughed at for her carelessness if she tried such a thing.
Simpering over her every conversation and agreeing with her every word would cause Caroline to wonder if she had become ill.
