Microsoft Word - Cinder-Marie_Sexton.doc by Dawn Read Free Book Online

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    How in the world did women manage?
    Behind me, I could hear voices calling. Somebody
    was coming after me. I pulled the ridiculous sandals from my feet and ran. I ducked behind the row of waiting carriages. I was vaguely aware of coachmen and drivers, their eyes wide with shock, as I bolted past them.
    "Guess that one's dance didn't end well," one of them laughed.
    I ran all the way home, gasping for air against the constraints of the corset I wore, wishing I could tear the damn thing off, but the coachmen might do more than stare if the woman flying past them was bare-breasted.
    Finally, I stumbled through our gate and up the
    front stairs. I stopped short on the porch. The light was on in the parlor. Aunt Cecile was waiting up, anxious for word from her daughters.
    I couldn't let her see me—the specter of her dead sister, dress torn, feet bare and caked with mud. I could go 53
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    in the back door, but even that seemed risky. What if she called to me to bring her tea or stoke the fire?
    With a moan, I went back down the stairs. I went to the only place I could think of. The only place that was mine: the clearing in the woods. The place I'd first met Xavier. The place where I'd met the witch.
    The meadow was empty, of course. I fell to the
    ground in a graceless heap, glad to finally be able to sit. My side ached from running. My feet hurt. One lacy sandal remained clutched in my sweaty fist, but I'd lost the other somewhere along the way. I felt a bit bad about it. I hoped the witch wouldn't be mad.
    I took a few minutes to catch my breath. The
    crickets had stopped their songs as I passed, but now they began again. Something skittered away unseen in the woods. It was quiet and peaceful. Moonlight shone through the trees, dappling the forest floor.
    I tried to reach behind myself to undo the dress and loosen the corset, but the buttons were too high up my back. I couldn't reach. After a minute of stretching and straining, I gave up. One more reason I was glad to not be a woman.
    I leaned back against the fallen log Xavier had left his gift on. I'd traded that gift away for two spells, and a few short hours, but it had been worth it.

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    I thought about Xavier. I relived the dance. I
    remembered the feeling of him holding me close. The taste of him. The hardness of his erection against me. Heat kindled again in my groin, so familiar, and yet so strange. I remembered the soaring joy in my heart when he'd asked if he could kiss me.
    I curled up on the soft leaves of the forest floor.
    And I thought again, as I drifted off to sleep, It was worth it.

    * * * *

    I slept fitfully at first, but at some point, the constriction around my chest ceased, the itchiness of the lace went away, and I fell into a comfortable slumber, at home in my own body.
    I woke well after dawn. I was myself again, wearing my usual patched clothes. My feet were bare. My worn boots lay on the ground next to me.
    On any other morning, I would have been up at
    dawn. I wondered if Aunt Cecile and my cousins were looking for me. Would they wonder where I'd gone? Would they care? I could only hope that after the late night, they'd all slept in.
    I stopped by the well behind the house to clean

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    myself off. My feet were scratched and dirty from my barefoot sprint home. I washed away the dried mud and pulled my boots on before heading inside.
    I knew right away something was amiss. I could
    hear Jessalyn and Penelope in the living room, talking frantically over each other. Deidre turned to glare at me.
    "Fine morning for you to be off missing," she said.
    "They're in a right uproar."
    "Over what?"
    She waved her hand at me dismissively as she
    turned back to her stove. "Something about the prince and the ball."
    I had work to do. I had no reason to get involved.
    No reason at all.
    Except she'd mentioned the prince. Whatever had
    my cousins in a "right uproar," it involved