All the Blood We Share by Camilla Bruce

Author:Camilla Bruce [Bruce, Camilla]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Penguin Publishing Group
Published: 2022-11-22T00:00:00+00:00

20.

KATE

“ANDREA KEEPS TALKING about the beauty of the Summerland,” I told Mr. Morrin. The widower had come riding to the inn early in the morning, and now he sat before me at the table; our hands were entwined on the tabletop, our fingers braided in a tight grip. His skin was warm and dry, and his breathing came heavy, much like mine. He might as well have entered a trance himself for the passion he displayed. If I opened my eyes, I knew his would be right in front of mine, burning with dark intensity.

I only wished that it were me they burned for, and not his long-dead wife.

“What else does she say?” he asked in a husky voice. “Does she say something about Alma and Constance? Is Lavinia with her still?”

“Oh, she misses her girls terribly,” I said. “It pains her a great deal to be away from them.” I had given him that same message at least a dozen times before, but he seemed to crave hearing it—to get that reassurance. He feared for his daughters’ future, I figured. He feared what was to become of them without a mother to steer them right. “She says that you’re doing well.” I bent my head and creased my brow, as if I was straining to hear. “She says that she is at peace now, because she knows that you will do right by her daughters.” I had long since stopped making a real effort with Mr. Morrin. I knew very well what he wanted to hear.

“And Lavinia?” Mr. Morrin kept asking about his dead daughter as well.

“Oh, she is with her mama, held close to her bosom. You don’t have to worry about the child.” I really wished he would take it to heart. I had said that, too, many times before—and yet he kept coming, pressing coins into my palm and asking me to say it again.

I did not understand him at all.

At first when he came calling, I had thought the dead woman was just an excuse, but when he kept coming back without anything much happening between us, I started having my doubts. He liked me, I could tell as much, but he sadly seemed unable to do much about it.

I feared he was still married in his heart.

“She wants you to move on, Nicholas,” I said. “She wants you to find happiness again. I detect a certain worry—nay, distress . . . She is determined that you look out for yourself and find some joy in life.” I said this from time to time to nudge him a little, but thus far, it had not yielded much result. Ma chuckled in the rocking chair, amused, no doubt, by my performance, though she did not understand much of what was being said. I wished I could crack one eye open to give her an ugly stare.

It would not do, though, as I was in a trance.

“How?” my handsome sitter pleaded before me. “How am I to find happiness?”

“Oh, it might be closer than you think,” I assured him.

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