“You brother told me Drew called on Mr. Abbot yesterday afternoon.”
“He did,” Arabella said cautiously, uncertain why Will had broached this subject. “He spoke with father about a potential marriage between us.”
“And was rejected, yet again.”
Arabella shrugged, though disappointment roiled through her at the reminder. “Father is simply being protective. Once he’s been made to see that Drew is more than capable of taking care of me—”
“Bella, you cannot be so naïve. I’m sorry, I do not wish to be harsh, but surely you understand Mr. Abbot has plans for your future.”
She scowled. “What sort of plans could he possibly have for me? He has his legitimate daughter through which he can gain more power, prestige, and money.”
Reaching up to stroke her cheek, he gave her a true smile this time. “You sell yourself short, my dear. You are a lady in every way, and beautiful as well. Mr. Abbot can see this and will seek to make the most advantageous marriage possible. I love my brother, and I know how the two of you feel about each other. I certainly cannot tell you not to love him, or tell him not to do everything he can to secure a match. I just … I don’t want to see either of you hurt if your father has his way in the end.”
Arabella returned Will’s smile, taking his hand and giving it a squeeze. “You are a good friend, and I do understand your concern. But I won’t be forced into an unwanted marriage. Drew will not give up until father sees things our way, or I become old enough to wed without his permission. Either way, we be together. I have faith in us.”
“Your unending optimism is one of the things I love most about you, Bella. Forgive me, I meant no harm.”
“I know you didn’t. Of the three of us, you’ve always been the most reasonable and pragmatic. We need that balance sometimes. Thank you.”
She went on tiptoe to kiss his cheek. He clutched her arms and bent his head to accept the chaste peck.
“Anything for you, Bella,” he murmured.
Will then tucked her hand back in the crook of his arm, expression placid as he led her across the lawn toward the home she had grown up in. With a resigned sigh, she prepared herself to step back into a role she loathed, a place she’d never quite felt she belonged in.
Just one more year, she told herself.
When measured against the rest of her life, it seemed like a paltry amount of time. For Drew, she would wait as long as it took.
Two years later …
The warm waters of the ocean washed over Arabella as she knelt on the shore, shaking like a leaf in the wind. She was chilled to the bone, as if her heart had turned into a ball of ice pumping arctic waters through her veins. She hardly registered the height of the tide as it swept over her. The gentle waves that had lapped at her skirts that afternoon now crashed high enough to splash her bodice, sending tiny crystalline droplets through the air and scattering over her neck and face. She wished the waters would rise high and strong enough to drag her into the depths of the cruel sea.
Had it only been two years since she’d stood here with Drew, whispering her hopes and dreams for the future—a future in which he would be her husband the father of her children?
This morning, the moment had felt like only yesterday, but that was before she’d received the devastating news of his death. Arabella had only to close her eyes to remember the last time they were together, the details burned into her memory like an indelible brand.
“I don’t need your father’s permission or the words of a priest for you to be mine,” he said. “In my heart, you belong to me in every way that matters. No one can take that from us.”
“Yes, Drew. I am yours and could never belong to another. I need no outside force to approve or make our love more real.”
Opening his palm, Drew met her gaze while unsheathing the stiletto he always carried in his belt. Arabella gasped when he dragged it across his palm, but he didn’t so much as flinch as a thin slash appeared through the skin and blood welled within.
“Now you,” he murmured, his voice low but heavy with meaning and purpose.
She understood what he asked for without explanation, and suddenly Arabella wanted this too badly to worry over fleeting pain. A moment of oneness, a ritual grounding them in the moment and to one another, was more important than the possibility of a leftover scar.
Offering her hand, Arabella kept her gaze on Drew’s face rather than the place where his sharp blade slid across her palm. The brief sting faded to a dull annoyance as he pressed his palm to hers, his fingers tight against the delicate bones of her hand. Arabella gripped him back, trembling with the weight of the moment as he looked deep into her eyes and spoke the words that would bind them together for eternity.
“Blood of my blood, flesh of my flesh … I am yours and you are mine. Only death can part us now, Bella. No matter who or what may try to come between us, know that I will not allow it. If I can draw breath, there is no force in this world that can keep me from you.”
She had pressed her cut and bleeding palm against Drew’s and repeated the words binding them together for life. It hadn’t mattered that their little ritual could be considered pagan and sacrilegious, that their union was no real marriage and it meant nothing to anyone but them. Arabella wouldn’t have cared, for that night she and Drew had been the only two people in the world. If it was real and true to them, what did it matter what anyone else thought?
Now, he was gone, leaving her to grapple with the loss of her hopes and dreams. There would be nothing for her but this yawning pit of grief and abandonment that had opened within her. Arabella wished it would consume her, obliterating her very existence in the same way the treacherous sea had wiped Drew’s away.
“Oh, Drew. How can I be expected to live without you?”
Reaching into her bodice, she took hold of the wooden talisman she kept tucked out of sight. The surface of the circular pendant had been carved with the face of a lion in startling detail—a luxurious mane surrounding a majestic face, complete with a snarling mouth and sharp, pointed teeth. Drew had made it himself, taking painstaking care with the delicate carving tools—so different from the instruments he employed when making barrels and pieces of furniture. It didn’t matter whether a task required the brute force of his back and shoulders, or the finesse of his slender, dexterous fingers, Drew had worked magic and miracles with wood. When he finished whittling the piece, she had begged him for it—a part of Drew to always carry on her person.
“Why a lion?” she asked him when first laying eyes on the piece.
Drew offered her his vibrant smile, smoothing his thumb over the mane of the carved beast. “Lions fiercely protect what they love. They do it with pride and unflinching courage. I saw one in a traveling menagerie at Port Royal once. I pitied the beast for the cage it was forced to inhabit, but as he paced and prowled, I watched him and realized … despite the iron bars, he hadn’t lost the majesty of his bearing, nor the pride that made him hold his head high. Then, he looked me right in the eye, as if we were the only two creatures in the world.”
“That must have been frightening!”
“It was. But it was also … special, I suppose. I cannot describe it. I felt as if he wanted me to know I had no need to pity him. He was still strong, still brave, still the king of beasts. Mankind could trap him in a cage and strip him of everything it means to be what he was … but they couldn’t take away the fact that he was a lion. They could never strip him of his regal dignity, or the strength within. The moment the cage was opened, he would be free once more … an unstoppable force of nature.”