by Matilda Hart
********
Chapter 7
It had taken almost four hours of riding to get to the spot that Percival had planned to go to. It had been a difficult ride too. The terrain at times had been hard for Belle to carry Alexandra across and Alexandra hated to feel Belle’s stress, but the spot was beautiful and that almost, so very almost made it worth it.
They had stopped deep into some woodland they had entered. The thick bushes and overhanging trees, though had left a small spot next to the river where the sunshine could pour through. The horses all stood by the river, as they drank away the thirst, which their long walk had brought to them. The sound of their heads breaking the water was only broken by short, sweet bursts of twittering from birds, which were close by.
”This spot is lovely,” Alexandra said, as she looked over at Percival.”How did you come to find it?”
”It was a place recommended to me by my friend, Gabriel, it should be him that you give your thanks to.”
Alexandra shook her head lightly and walked away from Percival. She knew that there was nothing she could do to stop the marriage, but that didn’t mean that she had to endure his dullness, anymore, than was absolutely necessary. ”Did he tell you that I picked this place?” Gabriel asked, as she walked passed him. She didn’t stop. She just carried on until there was some distance between her and the rest of the men who had made the journey. ”It’s quite rude to ignore a person,” Gabriel quipped, as he walked up and sat down beside her.
Alexandra turned to him with an annoyed look on her face. ”I told you that we could not see each other again. Why are you here?”
”Percival is my friend,” Gabriel said innocently, but his eyes sparkled with mischief.
”That may be so, but there was no need for you to come on this trip.”
”There was every need. I arranged it,” he said with a suddenly serious look. ”I thought it was about time that you met the man you are to marry. Can you tell me after this that you would be happy with him? Can you tell me that he has more to offer to you than I do?”
Alexandra shook her head. ”You are focusing on all of the wrong things. This marriage is not about my happiness. It has been arranged. The deal has been done. I refuse to ask my father to back out of it. Percival is as you said he was. He is a good man and with all due respect, I could do a lot worse.”
”Of course you could,” Gabriel said quickly. ”I have never disputed that my friend is a good match. I am, however telling you that I’m a better one. You know it though. It’s not something I need to tell you. So, why can’t you just admit it?”
The sound of splashing water caught Alexandra’s attention and she turned to the source of the sound. Half the men who’d taken the ride were jumping into the cold river with relieved and happy looking faces. ”You should come join us,” one of them called out to Alexandra, when she caught his eye. ”It feels great after getting so hot on the ride.”
Alexandra looked back at Gabriel. She could see him pleading with his eyes for her not to go. She pushed herself up and gave him a look, which could only be described as apologetic, because that’s what she was. She was sorry that things were the way that they were. She was sorry that she couldn’t be with him. She was sorry that they had even met in the first place, because for they had, she had no idea what it was that she was missing from her life. Now she had to go on every day knowing exactly what was missing. Now she had to wake up every morning knowing that she’d walked away from it, so that she could spend the rest of her days serving the dull man, who refused to speak when riding a horse.
She turned and walked away from Gabriel. She quickly pulled off her dress and jumped into the water without hesitation. It was cold. The cold bit at her skin, as she submerged herself fully. She brought out her legs, so she could pull herself back up to the surface, but something wet and sticky had caught on her leg. She forced her eyes open against the sting of the water and looked down. Her leg was tangled in thick weeds, which would need a knife to cut through.
She could feel herself starting to panic. Her chest was getting tight. A fire had been lit close to her heart, as the oxygen in her body turned dirty and then into carbon dioxide, which was poisoning her from the inside out. She tried to move her arms. She tried to kick her legs, so that maybe the water above her would be disturbed, but she’d already been under long enough for the world to start dimming around the edges and her hope of anybody coming to save her were quickly fading away.
A light feeling took over her. Darkness poured in front her eyes, until she couldn’t be sure whether they were open or closed any more. The tight feeling in her chest was starting to leave her. The panic was fading away too. She could feel herself growing happier, as the suffering slowly faded and her mind started to shut down.
******
Chapter 8
Alexandra opened her eyes and tried to swallow. Her throat burned angrily with pain, as her dry mouth sent nothing down. She looked around her. She recognized the room. She was back at her grandmother’s. She was looking up at the ceiling in her room. She moved her head slightly, so you could see who was sitting beside her. Her head was heavy and her neck sore. She grimaced with the additional pain she had just added to her body, as her eyes came back into focus.
The first thing she saw was his hair. Red like fire against the otherwise bland background of dark purples and greens. ”Gabriel?” she croaked. Her lips felt, as though they were cracking as she formed his name in her mouth, but she managed to get it all out.
”You almost drowned. If I hadn’t of seen those bubbles rising up to the surface. If I’d of been only a minute or two later,” he sounded panicked, as he spoke. ”You could have died. None of them saw you. Percival wouldn’t even leave the river side after I’d pulled you out. He insisted that I brought you back, so that he could continue on with the ride he’d planned.”
Alexandra opened her mouth to speak, but Gabriel quickly stopped her. ”You shouldn’t speak. You need to rest. I just thought you should know that someone cares. I care. You know that, don’t you?”
Alexandra nodded slowly. She tried to stop the pain from reaching her eyes over the movement, so that Gabriel wouldn’t be able to see it. ”I know that you believe that it is your duty to marry that man Alexandra, but I love you. I have loved you from the moment I saw you looking over at me at the ball. I don’t tell you that I want you, because I see you, as a possession. I tell you that I want you, because you are the only thing that will make my life complete. How can you expect me to stand aside, so that you might marry a man who does not know the sun when he see’s it?”
A soft knock came at the door. Alexandra tried to look over, but she couldn’t raise her head far enough. Gabriel had been right about one thing. She needed some rest. Her whole body had almost shut down on her. If the panic in Gabriel’s voice was anything to go by, then she had been very close to death, when he’d pulled her out of the river, so she wasn’t surprised that she felt, as though she’d been tangoing with the hooded demon all day.
”I’m sorry to intrude,” Alexandra’s grandmother said warmly, as her footsteps entered the room and grew closer to the bed. ”I see that you have woken up,” she said, as she smiled down at Alexandra. ”I’m glad to see that you are okay. I’m quite unsure about who was most worried about you between Gabriel and myself, but I can assure you that your health returning is something, which I imagine we both take great delight in.”
”I should leave you both, so that you can speak,” Gabriel said, as he stood from the chair he’d been sitting in at the bedside.
”No, not quite yet,” Alexandra’s grandmother said quickly. ”I was hoping that I might be able to speak with you both.”
”I hope that everything is okay?” Gabriel asked.
”You see the thing is, I noticed it when you brought Alexandra here today. It was the look in your eyes. You were so afraid of losing her. You were in so much pain over the thought of her not being in the world anymore. I w
asn’t quite sure what I should do with that information. I wasn’t quite sure whether Alexandra felt the same or whether you had simply become obsessed with my granddaughter, which is not a crime that I would blame you for, if it were true,” she added. ”After hearing what you have just said to her though, I am quite certain that this feeling goes between you both. I cannot stand aside and watch my granddaughter marry a man who did not return her to me safely. I cannot stand by and watch, as my granddaughter turns down the love, which she has always, so desperately sought. I will be writing to her parents today about the agreement between them and Percival. I think you’ll find that it’s broken very quickly, once they hear about the charming young man that will be joining our family instead.”
”Would Alexandra’s parents call of the arrangement they have made?” Gabriel asked doubtfully.
”They wish for their daughter to be happy. I doubt that they would stand in the way of that, regardless of the backlash they might receive. I am sure once I have explained to them everything that has happened and the way that you both feel, that they will insist upon your union.”
”If that is true, then why has Alexandra been, so unwilling to ask them?” he asked, as doubt about her feelings crept into his mind. Her grandmother seemed so open to the idea of them being together and she was insisting that her parents would be too, so why had she been so reluctant? Was it because she did not want to be with him?
Alexandra’s grandmother smiled and Gabriel warmly. ”That girl has a heart of gold. I believe that she would walk through the fires of hell unscathed if she believed that it would help the ones she loved. She was doing what she believed to be right, even though for her it wasn’t.”
Gabriel nodded. Her grandmother did not need to explain about the materials, which made up Alexandra’s heart. He knew already that she was thrown into action by only the best intentions.
”Gabriel,” Alexandra said weakly and he quickly turned back to look at her. He had thought that she had fallen back to sleep. ”I’m sorry I fought against this. My grandmother is right. I was going through with the marriage, for my father, but I refuse to believe that he would find happiness in my discontentment. I want to be with you. Do not think otherwise.”
”I shall go write the letter this moment,” Alexandra’s grandmother said, as she took in the warm scene in front of her. ”I believe I’m leaving you in very capable hands,” she added, as she walked out of the door and closed it quietly behind her.
THE END
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Desired By a Duke
Introduction
Constance Sutton’s marriage to Thomas was one, just like many in the time, was arranged by her father and even though he was a good man to her, there was something missing. She spent her time sewing or singing and after a few performances across Devonshire, she was invited to sing for the duke’s birthday party, something she found to be a great honor. When the flirtatious duke, who had somewhat of a reputation for being a ladies man, asked her for a private drink, she reacted as any proper wife should and politely declined his invitation even though his handsome face burned itself into her mind. She spent the next few days thinking about the duke and when she was scheduled to return, something happens that makes her change her mind about being faithful to her husband and soon, she finds that she can’t live without the handsome duke, Jefferson Carlisle. Will she be able to hide her feelings about the duke from her husband? Can they find a way to be together or will her marriage to Thomas stand in the way of true love?
Chapter One
My twenty second year had just started when I first began to live my life and never once before then had I ever thought that I was missing out on anything or thought that there was more than I’d already been offered. Up until then, I’d always lived for someone else or done what was expected of me but for the first time ever, I finally did something that I wanted instead of what was proper and demanded of me. The rolling hills my family’s home in Manchester had held my heart since I was a child, so when I was told that I would have to leave at the age of sixteen to marry Thomas Sutton it nearly shattered my heart into a million pieces. Though the handsome Mr. Sutton was a kind man, I’d always secretly hoped that I could marry for love, which was a foolish notion for a woman but it was a dream to feel the flutter of a heart that beats only for another. I longed for the passionate whispers and secret glances that only lovers share but I was blessed to have a husband who was kind and provided me with a very stable life. Thomas was a thin man with a large heart and despite the fact that I’d married him after meeting him only once, we had developed a strong friendship that had evolved into a love that I could tolerate and after a while it seemed to make sense that my father had paired me with Mr. Sutton instead of one of my other would-be suitors, which were neither as young nor as handsome as my Thomas. We were married at his home, where I learned to be a good wife by every meaning of the word and after a few months of trial and error, we managed to become man and wife in more than name. I found that I had fallen in love with him and when we found out that I would be expecting our first child, he was elated beyond all measure which is why he was so devastated when the pregnancy failed. He never shed a tear nor showed any sign of sadness in the company of others but I could see the pain in his heart that radiated from his eyes when he would glance at my belly. Over the years, there were four tries and losses and it got to where our nightly visits were less and less. I wasn’t certain that he’d been keeping a mistress but I wouldn’t hold it against him or lay blame if that were the case, for I had not performed my duties as a wife by providing him children. These things only came from my own mind and Thomas had never made me think that he had sought solace in the arms of another but it had crossed my mind when he would work late or be gone with no explanation as to where, but it wasn’t my place to question his whereabouts.
As a girl, my mother taught me how to maintain a household so that I would be prepared when the time came for me to marry and I was quite proficient in the kitchen and had more than adequate talent with a needle and thread. I made most of my own clothing but Thomas preferred his slacks and shirts to come from the store in town but I had made him a few nice jackets over the years and since I had no little ones to care for, my days were usually spent sewing or singing. I loved to sing and was quite good, having been asked to perform at many parties and special occasions over the years and made a bit of a name for myself. Mostly, I sang as I did chores around the house or when I played the pianoforte in the sitting room where we would occasionally entertain guests. We didn’t throw elaborate galas or balls anything near the glory of the goings on at Hartford Manor, estate of the Duke of Devonshire and current residence of said duke, Jefferson Carlisle. When we would entertain at Briar Landing, the home that had been in Thomas’ family for generations and would have no heir upon his demise, we usually had his friends and their wives over for some conversation and music in the sitting room, which was elaborately decorated from when his mother still lived and I didn’t have the heart to change anything in her favorite room. Eloise Sutton was a well-respected and most beloved woman and her passing devastated her only son to the point that it pained me to think of causing mo
re grief by removing or replacing any of her belongings.
I heard the clop of the hooves of the horses that pulled Thomas’ carriage and I went to the kitchen to get the meal ready to put on the table. Having a warm supper for him gave me pride in the fact that I was able to do something nice for him since I was quite an excellent cook and tonight’s ham would prove just that. I heard him on the porch as he was dropped off, allowing Herman to take the horses to the stable for the night. He’d been an excellent caretaker and driver for many years and I’d heard my Thomas remark on more than one occasion about how he was more than a hired hand but someone whom was considered family. The front door opened and closed before I heard him call my name from the foyer and I placed the honey glazed ham in the center of the table.
“Constance, my dear?” He called for me once again and I appeared from the dining room, through the side door that led into the main hallway.
“Welcome home, darling. I trust you had a good day at work.” I took his hat and jacket, hanging them on the rack beside the door, awaiting his reply with a soft smile on my face.
