Joanna Johnson - Scandalously Wed To The Captain

A tear slipped down one sunken cheek and Dorothea cuffed it away, although not before the glitter of it sent ice piercing Grace’s insides. For the family she had known since childhood to be ripped so cruelly apart seemed the worst of injustices and from the tumult of her emotions a new thought arose to make Grace wonder...

Had Spencer seen his brother die, cut down in front of him in some battlefield across the sea? Wouldn’t that go some way to explaining why he seemed so closed off, so strangely emotionless? She could only imagine with a powerful shudder what kind of effect such an experience might have on a man’s soul. It was a startling possibility, yet one that seemed so blindingly obvious, and Grace felt a suddenly overwhelming rush of compassion for the man who had previously inspired such wariness and confusion.

‘None of what has befallen your family is your fault. I hope you know that, despite your regrets.’

Dorothea shrugged a thin shoulder beneath expensive linen. ‘Regrets are one thing I have no shortage of. The reason I sleep so little every night is out of worry for my only remaining son. If only there was something I could do, some way I could rest easily, knowing he won’t be left so alone when I am gone—and yet I fear nothing can turn him from the path he has chosen.’

Grace nodded gravely, the truth in Dorothea’s words plain. ‘I can only imagine how such thoughts must trouble you. I wish there was something I could do to ease your cares.’

Her sad gaze was fixed on the white hand that held her arm, lost in the world of compassion that gripped her—so she entirely missed the slow movement of her friend’s eyes in her direction and the look of dawning contemplation that crept in to brighten them.

‘Do you truly mean that?’

‘Why, yes.’ Grace forced her lips into a small smile despite the sorrow growing ever heavier in her chest. The image of Spencer’s grim face crowded out all other thoughts, the most obvious reason for his tightly drawn expression suddenly clear to her in terrible understanding.

He has suffered so much and with his mother so ill surely there can only be more heartache to come for him. I wish for his sake, and for the friendship we might once have had, that things could be different.

‘Believe me—if there was any way I could help you or Spencer with the unhappiness that plagues you, all you would have to do is ask.’

‘ Any way? Any way at all ?’ Dorothea reached for a glass of water standing beside her bed, turning away so for a moment Grace couldn’t see her face. ‘Even if it were in a way you never would have dreamed? Even if it seemed the most unlikely thing imaginable?’

‘Even then, to repay your kindness and ease your cares, I give you my word.’

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