Page 62 of The Forsaken

Linnie’s observation was met with nods from the gathered McQuoid and Smith ladies.

Eira, still hanging on her mother’s hip, gave Andromena support. “She misses the nursery, mama.”

Myrtle stroked the top of her daughter’s head. “Does she, poppet?”

Eira nodded, but neither McQuoid sister saw, as they stared intently at Andromena.

Under their scrutiny, she fought the urge to shift her weight.

Fleur, who had only recently discovered she was with child, began softly weeping. “It goes so fast. One moment we are babes in a nursery ourselves, and the next,” she cradled her belly, pressing the material against her gown as she did, displaying the gently rounding.

Cousin Cassia brought her younger sister close and held her while she wept.

Cassia’s aptly named, tow-headed daughter, Guinivere, glanced up at her mother. “Aunt Fleur is crying again?”

“She’s always crying,” Eira complained. “That’s how my mama used to be when she was with—”

Myrtle raised her voice and cut out that too-wise observation. “Loves, would you allow the women to speak with Aunt Andy?” The young mother looked for the respective nursemaids, who came over to gather their charges.

“What happened?”

Blunt questions were a specialty amongst the McQuoid and Smith families; but she didn’t expect betrayal from Meghan of all kin.

“Nothing,” Andromena spoke with quiet adamance. It didn’t matter.

Arms collectively crossed, Andromena’s devoted sisters and cousins, adorned in each shade of the rainbow, stared dubiously at her.

Because they knew her so well, and loved her so much—and because it had always been the six of them—they turned to one another. They pulled each other out of trouble. They took the blame for each other’s crimes to confuse their families. Even as grown women, they had matched the colors of their ballgowns to the soft pale arc made from rainbows bent by water.

But this time? Andromena was alone. Her sisters and cousin had families—husbands and children. They had struggles. Fought their own demons.

Andromena looked at the wooden pirate ship. It was the same ship she used to climb all over. The Earl had made one for each of his children, nieces, and nephews when they had their first babies. She saw herself standing at the wheel with a toy wooden sword, waving it at make-believe monsters. “Do you ever wish we could just go back in time?” she whispered.

“Nev—ow.” Cassia scowled at the duchess. “Yes?” Her corrected answer tilted up into a question, not confirmation.

“I know what this is about.”

All eyes diverted to Fleur.

Andromena’s heart beat faster. “Y-You do?”

My God, what if she wasn’t alone and the three of them who attended Lord Rutland’s were all being blackmailed and they had each kept it close to prevent the others from—

“It has been since I married.”

“Yes!” Andromena exclaimed. Her heart broke into a full gallop. She grabbed Fleur by her chiffon pale violet sleeves.

“You will find love, too,” Fleur promised.

And it was such an odd thing to say when they were talking about blackmailers that it took a moment to register; they weren’t talking about the same thing at all.

“I also doubted I’d find what Cassia, Myrtle, Meghan and Linnie did, too.”

“I also didn’t believe I would find love,” Cassia said. “Especially with Nathan supposed to wed a lady he’d been betrothed to since the nursery.”

Linnie lifted her hand in consensus. “Nor I.” The Georgian emerald, crowned heart ring gifted by Jeremy glittered in the fire’s glow.

That flimsy bubble of hope burst.