Highland Awakening by Jennifer Haymore Read Free Book Online

give her a wineglass on the verge of breaking.
    She allowed him to help her out of the chair. But then Sarah appeared, standing at her other side.
    “Thank you so much, Mr. McLeod. Esme, dearest, I’ll take you to get cleaned up. Everyone, please, enjoy your dessert. Lady Esme and I will return shortly.”
    Esme was mute with horror as they left the dining room and headed upstairs. “Oh, dear,” Sarah murmured as she ushered her along. “You’re going to have to change your dress. I don’t believe this one is salvageable—at least not tonight.”
    Esme managed a nod as they reached the top of the stairs and turned toward her bedchamber.
    She was hopeless. She’d embarrassed her family yet again.
    Once they were safely inside her room, she stopped short and put her head in her hands. “Oh, Sarah,” she said, her voice laden with misery. “I’m so sorry.”
    “Don’t be,” Sarah said with her usual efficient kindness. “You are hardly to blame for a faulty wineglass.”
    She shook her head miserably. “Mr. McLeod was just being kind. You and I—along with everyone else in that room—know there was nothing wrong with my glass. I have failed you and Trent again. I knew I shouldn’t—”
    “Stop,” Sarah said, her voice quiet but firm. “Of course you should. You haven’t failed us. All you did was spill a glass of wine.”
    “I…just…I can’t…” Her voice shook, and Sarah led her to the chair at her desk.
    “It’s all right,” Sarah soothed.
    Why was she like this? In the grand scheme, Sarah was right. She’d only spilled a glass of wine. But people would giggle about it tomorrow. There might even be another idiotic caricature of her in the gossip rags.
    It was yet another failure to add to all her other public failures, and en masse, they threatened to crush her.
    There was a knock on the door—Polly come to help her change her dress. Sarah must have summoned her at some point during the long walk from the dining room.
    As Esme sat, trying to get her breathing under control, Polly and Sarah chose another dress for her to wear, speaking in low tones in her closet. They emerged with a primrose ball gown edged with white, with a wide white belt just below the breasts.
    “What do you think?” Sarah asked.
    She gave a nod of approval. “Yes.”
    Sarah came over and laid a hand on her shoulder. “I need to go back downstairs. You’ll be all right?”
    “Yes.”
    “And you’ll rejoin us as soon as you’re dressed?”
    She gave Sarah a hopeless look. “Are you sure you want me to?”
    “Of course.” Sarah’s voice was warm and honest. “Listen, I know how challenging these parties are for you, Esme. But your brother and I are proud of you. We think you’re brave and strong for attending these events that are so difficult for you.”
    Esme managed a small smile, amazed that they were so kind to her after everything she’d done. It surprised her that they hadn’t given up on her long ago. Perhaps the time she’d caused a half-dozen partygoers to fall into a heap on a ballroom floor, provoking a riot of glee in the gossip rags the following day. Or when she’d been so buried in her secret writings that she hadn’t noticed her mother had disappeared from her house without a trace days earlier. Or perhaps when she’d inadvertently given Princess Charlotte the cut direct…
    Truly, she should not be allowed outside her bedchamber. It would be better for everyone.
    “Thank you, Sarah.”
    Sarah bent down and kissed her cheek, and in a flurry of skirts she was gone, closing the door softly behind her.
    “Here now, milady,” Polly said, “let’s get you out of that wet dress.”

Chapter 6
    Ten minutes later, Esme headed back downstairs, her hands clutched into fists at her sides, reminding herself with each step that she needed to do this. Avoidance was cowardice, and it was her duty to make a reappearance.
    But a part of her knew it wasn’t only duty that drove her; it was an