With All My Love, Angel _ Anthony Bridgerton

Chapter 10: The Secret

Four years later..

It was a rainy Sunday in London and the weather had matched the mood of the young mistress of the house. The large estate seemed so quiet in the gloom of the winter months. Angel sat on the settee in her mother's private room on the second floor near her parent's chambers. 

The room was a cheerful one dressed in her mother's favorite colors of lilac, gold, and ivory. There were other subtle hints of colors like fuchsia, lime greens, and violet. She had picked patterns with frills and flowers, gold trims and lace. The very settee she sat on was designed with patterns of flowers, like poppies, hydrangeas, and calla lilies. She used to outline them with her fingers as her mother sat reading to her. 

Sitting in that room that her mother loved, where she took her first steps and learned the piano, it was devoid of those emotions of comfort and love that it had been filled to the brim with. All she could do was sit and stare at the fresh-cut roses her mother insisted on changing every few days. Yet she could not smell the fragrance of the red and white flowers surrounded by baby's breath and pearl accents. In a room once filled with color and life, she was like the grim sitting there in her charcoal dress and black gloves. 

The funeral had been one of the hardest moments of her life. All she could remember was the pure white rose that she tossed on top of the casket before they filled the hole with soil. Now the people of their closest company were filtering through the house sharing condolences with her and her father. Something in her broke when she held Daphne in her arms.

The Bridgertons had been by her side the entire time throughout the whole ordeal. Violet had even made a point of coming every day to help her father through the horrible reality and the grief that he was feeling. Today though she did not know if it was the way she held her, or how her tears fell onto the sleeves of her dress, or the sobs that echoed in her ears it had all come crashing down on her. This was the reality, and the reality was that her lovely, beautiful, and amazing mother was dead. 

She would never get another hug the one that filled her with warmth and poured her with love. She would never see her walking through the halls of their manor with a satin robe that was every color of the rainbow while she carried around a cup of tea. She would never hear her call her name in excitement or even in anger ever again. So she ran up the grand flight of stairs that led her to the second floor where she locked herself away in the room where she and her mother had shared some of the best memories of her childhood. 

She had cried till her heart filled with a pain that she had never truly known she could possess. Only to find herself sat in the spot her mother had always loved. A place where the sun shined on her beautiful face highlighting the ringlets of reds and browns in her hair. Where her emerald eyes were rimmed with golden light that seemed to pour out of her, or the smile she only shared with her daughter the one that seemed to always hold a secret. Angel's face was red, marked with tear stains, her eyes puffy and pink. Now the only thing that she could hear was the rain that tapped on the floor-to-ceiling windows. 

Swirls of grey and black clouds stormed on. She had never felt so alone, so hollow. Not realizing it one of the doors had started to shake, Angel was unaware too lost in her own grief to hear anything but the taps. Tap tap tap.. She just sat there perfectly looking into the void of her thoughts. The door that led to the adjacent bedroom was carefully opened. 

Anthony had made it to the funeral he had stood beside his family and his godfather in support of the tragic event. Angel though had not been well. She had been locked away in her room for two whole days before she emerged for the funeral. Her maids had told his mother the trays of food that were left outside her door remained untouched. Once Anthony saw her he could see the state of frailness in her constitution. It had grown like a weed destroying all the happiness she had once held. Now she was hollow a shell of the person that he had known so long ago.