Summerset Abbey: Spring Awakening (Summerset Abbey Trilogy) by T. J. Brown

water on her face and dried her eyes. Taking down her hair, she brushed it out, before coiling it back upinto a simple chignon. After a deep breath, she walked out of the bathroom to face the inevitable.
    He stood in the center of the room, his arms hanging loosely by his sides. He looked more unsure than she had ever seen him, and even though her heart throbbed, she knew she couldn’t let him see her pain. She couldn’t let him know. All over Britain, women were saying good-bye to their men. She didn’t want him worrying about her as he marched off to war.
    “Prudence . . .”
    She went to him then and took his hands in hers. They were rough, his hands, but so strong and so gentle when he touched her. Bending her head, she kissed the calluses on his palms.
    He slipped his arms around her and she took a deep, shuddering breath. “I know, my darling, I know,” she said.
    “It’s the right thing to do, Pru.”
    A slow burning ignited in her chest. The right thing for whom? Not for her and not for him, surely. For the Crown? For the realm? She tamped the anger down. Arguing wouldn’t stop him from going any more than tears would. She knew with knowledge as old as time that nothing would sway him from his purpose.
    “When?” she asked, her voice muffled against his chest.
    “I’m not sure. I just signed up today. There’s a bit of confusion right now because of all the volunteers, but I should be sent to Salisbury for training.”
    Prudence nodded, unable to articulate anything around the lump growing in her throat. Andrew tilted her chin up until she was looking into his eyes. In her flight from Summerset and the truth she’d discovered about her heritage, Andrew had been the rock that she’d clung to. She clung to him now, wishing she didn’t ever have to let him go.
    “Thank you,” he said.
    “For what?”
    He didn’t answer. He bent his head to put his lips to hers, and with a grief-stricken desperation she kissed him back, soaking in every bit of her husband her heart could hold.

chapter
five

    V ictoria flung her bag on the small table just inside the door the moment she walked into her flat. Not even after dancing until dawn at some society function had her feet hurt so brutally. “Susie! Please, if you have a heart, bring me a cup of tea and a tub of water for my feet.”
    Susie, who had been a scullery maid before filling in as an emergency lady’s maid, had been only too happy to leave Summerset and Lady Charlotte behind to become Victoria and Eleanor’s housekeeper, where she dined alongside the girls, slept in a warm, clean bed, and enjoyed an entire day off once a week. Even though London still frightened her, her daily life had improved and she considered Victoria a saint.
    “You shouldn’t have stayed so late, miss,” Susie called from the kitchen. Victoria could hear the running of water and knew she would soon have her aching feet soaking in a steaming tub of water sprinkled with lavender and bath salts.
    “I stayed as long as I had to,” she called back, peeling off her uniform cape and entering her spacious sitting room. She and Eleanor had been living in the flat for several weeks, and a transformation had already taken place. They had done most of the cleaning themselves until Victoria had sent for Susie to help with the more difficult tasks of painting the walls and repairingthe plaster. The flat contained an eclectic mix of fine furnishings from Victoria’s former home in Mayfair and more worn pieces from Eleanor’s home. The back of their blue-and-gold Chippendale sofa was covered with a worn quilt made by Eleanor’s grandmother, and Victoria found the jumble homey and charming.
    “They are working you too hard,” Eleanor mused from where she reclined on a lounge in front of the windows.
    Victoria startled. “I didn’t know you were home. And don’t talk to me about working too much. You didn’t get home until two this morning and left before I awoke.”
    Eleanor