An Improper Courtship

Outpourings of truth

Edited

A few days had dwindled past and the courage Lady Kate and Sir Michael had mustered were currently tethering on the edge as they awaited Honey to finish reading the letter in her hand.

If the look of disbelief was not painful enough for Lady Kate and Sir Michael then Honey-Rose's trembling hands would have broken their hearts. Honey swallowed the tears that threatened to fall and looked up at who just this morning she thought were her blood and flesh.

In her hands was a letter detailing what her 'mother' had done to conceive, she also held the will to a giant fortune she had not yet fully processed internally.

Lady Kate and Sir Michael were afraid to speak, for once they were waiting for their daughter to grant them permission. Honey sniffled, she focused on her breathing, aiming to case in the tears, yet to her dismay as the emotional girl she was, they escaped in a free-flow. Lady Kate rushed to embrace her daughter as she always had.

"You will always be our daughter," she whispered in her hair, stroking the red tresses she had inherited from her father.

Sir Michael stepped forward to join the embrace. The three stood wordless in the same position for what seemed like a good moment. It was Honey who broke the silence,

"I am not angry with you both, but I need a while alone."

Her adoptive father, smiled sadly, "We are here to answer any of your questions."

As Honey left, her mind swirled with thoughts that had been quelled until this moment to the darkest corners of her mind. She had forced smiles, laughter, over-excitedness and a constant need to please people to distract herself from questions that had confused her like "Why was she the only redhead in the family?", "Why could she not be as her mother or Alyssa were, poised and calm?" "Who was that man she had faded memories reading her stories and kissing the tip of her nose?" There had been many questions, the feeling she did not fit entirely as she wanted to.

Honey realised there was nothing really to do with this information, her adoptive parents had saved her from the shame of being a bastard child to a dead man. She had not grown up missing anything and had been blessed with loving parents. Yet, despite all these thoughts, Honey still felt as though something within her was amiss. Her heart was not at ease, though her tears had dried, she knew they were lurking to fall again. This was who she was emotional, and over-expressive and never secretive. What she felt was shown on the exterior.

Rosalie had been to the best of her ability avoiding Blake, it was not out of malice or because she desired to. In her mind, it was what she needed to do as she sorted her thoughts, her morals and her emotions. She had told Blake that they would talk seriously after she had spoken to her father, but speaking to her father meant that she would have to make a huge step.

Ask for forgiveness.

Ask him to forgive her, her naivete, her wrong assumptions. She prayed that her father would not hold it against her for after all she was his child and in her youth, she had been justified to believe so. The inner secrets and relations of her parents had been held away. 

"There you are," Blake crept up behind Rosalie, he snuggled his arms around her waist and though stiff at first, she allowed herself to relax in the embrace.

"You interrupted my thoughts," Rosalie murmured, looking out of the drawing room's window. Blake squeezed his hold tighter, he knew they could not risk staying in this position for too long but he wanted to savour the feel and touch of the beautiful love in her arm.