CWMBR 29

Chapter 29

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When she returned to Glynford, she’d be hounded by people, whether she liked it or not. No one would realize at first that she was Bridget Pennington, married to Ain Wise, but as the reporters from the same newspaper clamor to find out, her identity would be revealed.

There may be unnecessary crowds at her place of residence and at the theater. As Ronan said, her private life could really interfere with the theater's operations.........

The thought made Bridget's heart sink. To be honest, she wished she could just stay at the abbey. At least until the court case was over.

But when would that be? If Ain was determined to torment her, he could drag out this messy battle indefinitely, and it would be unkind to her, and unkind to Joseph, who had been so hospitable to her, to wait for it to end.

"You can't even keep that."

"Me?"

As if he hadn't heard her at all, he placed the chrysanthemum he'd brought on the grave. Unlike her wilted chrysanthemums, his had thick stems and fresh leaves.

Even that seemed to show the gap between him and her. Even though they were the same chrysanthemums, they were so different, so how much more so would humans be? There were groups that shouldn’t be together, but she overlooked and that was how things ended up like this.

Bridget laughed bitterly as she thought about it.

Now she felt a strange sense of entitlement.

"I think it was that uncle of yours who was louder than me."

"It's not your voice I'm pointing out."

Ain's jaw dropped at the blunt retort. After a moment of silence, he casually changed the subject. "I've told Fergus to crack down on the press even harder. There will be no photographs taken, and rest assured that any future stories will be vetted by us, and no more speculative stories will be allowed to run. They’d have to be insane to go to all this trouble to come near you or me."

"I see."

With that brief reply, silence fell once more.

Bridget was making it clear with every fiber of her being that Ain's presence was very intrusive to her time of mourning.

The tone of her voice was blatant enough that even the most casual observer couldn't help but notice. Ain felt the same way, and didn't want to stand by and watch. After all, he had paid his respects, so it was the least he could do.

Still, he couldn’t make himself leave and kept bringing up the subject.

"I heard the investigators have made contact with your doctor."

"And?"

"They found bloodstains in the mansion."

Bridget's slender shoulders visibly stiffened. Ain narrowed his eyes at her reaction and continued.

"In the room you were staying in, to be exact."

Bridget lowered her head. She was silent for a moment, then her lips curled slowly.

"If it were so poisonous, I would have sought out the blood of a beast and sprinkled it ..................."

Bridget looked up, spitting out a voice darker and more callous than before. Her face was pale, with only her cheeks stained pink. Her makeup-less face reflected her unhealthy condition.

"That's what the hired help told me, that they left blood all over your room because it was so hard to get rid of."

The servants said things like that. Whatever they were thinking on the inside, it wasn't usually serious enough to keep them from saying it out loud. This simple anecdote was enough to give Bridget an idea of how she had been treated by the servants at the manor.

Ain unconsciously spat out an excuse-like response.

"Mr. Coleman said there was nothing wrong with the monthly reports."

"So, you're saying they did nothing wrong because you naively believed the manager’s report?"

There was no resentment in her voice. It was as dry and parched as drought-cracked earth, but that didn't mean it didn't really blame Ain. Ain recognized that the tastelessness was a sign that all the resentment had dried up and left her with nothing.

Months of neglecting her, and now it was showing before his eyes.

“It could really be animal blood. Call an investigator right away to check. How do you know if it’s chicken blood or rabbit blood?”

"The investigator............... had come."

The same day Ain found the blood, Declan called a private investigator just to be sure. Ain agreed, thinking Declan's judgment was sound, and the room Bridget had been staying in was left uncleaned and untouched.

It was obviously the right thing to do, but when it came time to tell Bridget about it, there was a subtle sense of trepidation. It was as if ..........he was emphasizing to her that he wanted her to know his distrust, which was a new emotion for Ain, who had already expressed his distrust of her on several occasions.

Bridget smiled faintly at Ain's response. She looked a little incredulous.

"That's good."

Or was she just devastated?

"While you're at it, call up every famous doctor in the world to examine me, and I'll be happy to oblige."

Maybe she was even angry.

“Oh, whoever you bring in, there is no expert who can surpass Donna Green, right? She’s an actress, but she seems to have great medical knowledge. She has the insight to see through the miscarriage of a woman you haven't seen in months to be a lie.”

At the mention of Donna Greene, Ain involuntarily frowned. It brought back memories of the night he'd run into her in Breford.

"Don't be sarcastic."

"Do I sound sarcastic? You can’t stand the thought of your first love being mocked?"

Bridget got to her feet, all traces of her clouded smile gone, and faced Ain with a ghostly pale, lifeless face.

"Then you shouldn't have done something to deserve this."

"What?"

"Did you think I was going to be polite to you, people who deny my child even exists?"

Ain was silent. Bridget continued bluntly, as if she didn't need his answer.

"I can't wait to see the royal investigators, I'm curious to see what they'll say and what they'll find."

Bridget didn't expect their marriage to survive anyway, but waiting for the investigator’s findings was intolerable, at least as intolerable as the denial of the lost child's very existence. To be told it was animal blood, to be told it was all an act, to be told it was never there in the first place, was unacceptable.

An impartial royal investigator would at least tell the truth, or at least not make up things that weren't there, as Ain had so vigorously insisted.

Ain frowned at Bridget's words. He pursed his lips and spoke in a suppressed voice.

"Even if the miscarriage is true.................. there is no proof that the child is mine."

All that came out was a stubborn, tightly clenched sliver of doubt. Bridget drew in an involuntary breath. She couldn't feel anything but hatred for the man in front of her, only guilt and remorse for the life that had entered her body unknowingly and passed helplessly.

"You're right, it's not yours."

Ain's eyes widened slightly at Bridget's affirmation. She couldn't tell what surprised him. Honestly, she didn't want to know.

Except that Bridget now agreed with him perfectly.

"It’s mine."

She didn't need it to be recognized as his. It was gone so all the processes and verifications of truth were meaningless.

“I lost my child because of my own fault.”

As long as it was recognized that the child had once existed, as long as it was not forgotten.

***

Bridget packed up her things and left the monastery the afternoon of the day she met Ronan and Ain in the cemetery.

She had intended to stay at the abbey until the death anniversary of her parents and then travel to Glynford the next day, but she changed her mind as soon as she saw Fergus and Declan waiting for her outside the Abbey. She ignored Declan, who seemed eager to talk to her, and went straight to Joseph to tell him she was leaving. Joseph said he had some business in town and offered to drive her. It was a favor she couldn't refuse.

She gathered her things, dropped a modest donation into the monastery's collection box one last time, turned around, and took a deep breath.

It was time, indeed, to return to Glynford.

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