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CHAPTER ONE
Isobel slowly closed the bedroo as it squeaked loudly in protest In the silence of the h to wake the entire household She waited for several long moments Her heart thumped heavily in her chest She was certain that any mo down the hallway towards her, his face odly hour, all too ready to give her another sound thrashing for si alive
Her stoht of the beating she would get if she was caught outside of her roo
‘You can’t allow nerves to get the better of you now! Not with the only chance of escape possible at last, and freedo to journey across the upper hallway,’ she silently chastised herself
She stood shrouded in inky blackness, and tried to quell the rapid thundering of her heart With each passing ht air rean to wane
It had only been a few scant minutes since Kitty had appeared at her bedroom, yet Isobel already felt a lifetime older Her stalwart maid had taken a considerable risk to offer Isobel the opportunity to escape the harsh cruelty of her uncle, and take control of our own future Dear Kitty, as now strapped, battered and bruised, to a hard wooden chair - as Isobel had been - a prisoner in the room behind her Isobel shook her head remorsefully and considered the past fewtwist
“His one in theto be wed and taken off his hands,” contempt laced Kitty’s voice “He has sold you Miss, to one of his old crones if’n you please! A Bertrao with ‘im on the morrow, you knoill happen!”
Isobel knew exactly ould happen She shuddered against a wave of terrified revulsion It would be the saot into one of his rages The bruising was deep and plenty; the cuts raw and painful Isobel knew that Kitty would not be allowed up to tend to her battered flesh afterwards She was very aware that lately, her uncle’s rants had becoun to fear she could actually survive his next ‘lesson’
“Please, ht! Now! You have to do this!” Kitty pleaded in a voice that, although kept low for fear of discovery, lost none of its urgent insistence
Isobel nodded jerkily in agree apart froan to unravel before her in a confusing, and terrifying, jugestion Was it really that siiddy elation, and sickening nerves, as she considered the enormity of what she was about to do Could she really take the branch of freedo so readily offered to her? Apart from her uncle and her Aunt Elspeth, she had only a handful of surviving fa miles away She felt like she had buried most, if not all, of those ere nearest and dearest to her over the course of the past few months, until there was hardly anybody left to care
With no protector or guardian likely to couardianship, Isobel ell and truly stuck in the daily hell she had been cruelly drawn into since her brother’s death
There had been only man, besides her brother, whom she had once considered someone she could trust But he had unfortunately proven to be as duplicitous as her conniving uncle downstairs
She had given her heart and body to Dominic Cavendish, Lord Havistock, oh so foolishly Despite his initial gentle she had innocently offered, before pro her to walk up the aisle with another woossip was indeed accurate, he hadIsobel, and was already in the process of setting up his nursery!
“Da her own folly
Quickly closing off the painful hts back to her current predicament ‘There was certainly nobody else in life, other than Kitty, whoht bleakly ‘You are well and truly on your o, so get used to it’
The stark reality of her situation was raw But what shall I do? Where should I go? Trying desperately to quell the growing hysteria, Isobel took several deep breaths to try to calm herself down, and think rationally She was suddenly so very glad for the reassuring presence of the wo at least, she wasn’t completely alone in the hideous situation she was in
“Please Miss, you have the pouch of coins Master Peter left you with?”
Isobel nodded hesitantly, and sed against the luht of her elder brother