After four more days at sea, after four more days of the cold fogginess and icy shock, Cora had slowly begun to thaw. She ate, though she could not taste, she read, though she could not think, she walked the decks, though she could not stand for long. Robert had taken note, it seemed, and he kept by her side almost relentlessly. So relentlessly, in fact, that Cora did not have a moment alone. Robert seemed to follow her everywhere. He seemed to always be peering down into her face when she chanced to glance upward at him. He seemed to find small ways to touch her - her shoulder, her elbow, the small of her back – as if to ground her, as if to bring her back to present. But she was in present. She was in an inescapable present that Robert, herself, nor anyone else, could save her from. It was an inescapable present that Robert somehow exacerbated, if only by his attentiveness. She found herself retreating to her bath chamber and sitting on the floor there to escape him. He even requested to sleep by her side at night, and repeated his request every night, though she could not allow it. Not even once. She could not acquiesce.

Why? Why should he sleep next to her? She wouldn't make love to him. She wouldn't. It was a lie, and to think of it make the place where it had been, the place that had once cradled so much hope and joy, feel both heavy and yet achingly empty. Cora rested her hands across her corseted stomach and closed her eyes. She couldn't help but to immediately picture Robert and it angered her. Why should she picture him? Why should she think of him before anything else, especially when he had lied to her?

She spread her fingers over her belly and frowned. No. No, that wasn't quite right. Come to think of it, it wasn't a lie, and that's what really hurt. He'd never said it. He had never said that he loved her, she'd just wanted so much to believe that he did. But now it was clear to her. He did not. He had forbidden the last chance she'd ever have to see her father, and that wasn't love. Robert could not love her.

When at last they docked, Cora was both grateful and afraid. She wanted so much to be with her mother, to see her and to speak to her…to hear her loud, unabashed voice. But landing also made it real. She knew that when she arrived home, the house would be dark, and he wouldn't be there at the door. She knew that the home that she was returning to was not the home she'd left. It was not the home that was bright and busy with life. Not now. And furthermore she knew that her father's family would be there, the family she hadn't seen in over a year – most of whom had not come to the wedding. How could they have? It was an ocean away. No. They'd never met her husband, only heard of him through letters and what her father had told them. The Lord to whom she'd given her father's money.

Lord Fortune-Hunter.

She peered up at Robert who was looking out over the pandemonium of the docks. She could tell at the terse concentration gathered between his brows that the sight before him was unnerving. Crowds and unorganized chaos always seemed to unnerve him. He liked order. He liked routine. She brought her gaze to what he saw.

The port was bustling; there were throngs of people, crates, luggage, surrounded by shouts, whistles, foreign tongues, all being dusted with fresh falling flurries. As they finally descended the platform, Cora could feel the freezing spray that the wind picked up from the sea below and threw around them. A snowflake fell on her cheek and she brushed it away.

The closer they got to the ground level, the closer Robert inched in toward her, until at last his arm was around her shoulders and holding her to him. Cora allowed it. She allowed the firm hold he kept of her upper arm. She allowed to be drawn in slowly to him, his chin lifted and searching. A fleeting sensation of safety fluttered in her chest.

"I don't see Harold. Surely Harold is to meet us."

Cora closed her eyes and exhaled. His grip on her grew tighter.

"Or your uncle, Frank. Do you see Frank, Cora?"

She covered her eyes lightly with her fingers. "They won't come, Robert. They're sitting shiva."

And suddenly it was colder and his grip on her was beginning to hurt, though she wasn't sure he had tightened it. "Harold is sitting sh-sha, oh for God's sake…whatever it is?"

"Shiva, Robert. Sitting shiva," Cora stiffened her shoulders.

"But he isn't Jewish. You aren't Jewish."

She had to square her jaw to keep from shouting. "Father is Jewish...was..." She took in a breath, closing her eyes again. "He's only respecting Father's wishes. Can't you understand that?"

Robert went on to try to say something more, but Cora didn't want to hear. She didn't want to hear, she didn't want to know, and she didn't want his arm around her. She shrugged out of his hold and took a step away from him, searching the port for a familiar face. In the distance, she spotted him.

"Harrison," Cora muttered and began to walk to the driver and the carriage that were strangely more familiar than even the man who trailed at her heels.

It was snowing harder when they finally arrived.

Cora stepped out into the street and looked up into the sky, letting the white flurries settle among her pitch dress and dark hair. She let them fall frozen onto her skin, and as they did, they melted. It was funny, she thought as she peered up into the gray sky, funny because she felt so cold. Her whole body, inside and out, felt so cold, and yet the snow was melting.

"Cora? My dearest. You mustn't get ill."

She heard Robert's voice two paces before her, and she slowly brought her eyes down, but not to his. Her door. Her parents' front door.

She tugged up her skirts and trudged up the steps, the snow crunching beneath her heels, Robert's hand quickly pressing to her back. The street was loud and hurried behind her, but it all faded away. The snow was falling faster, but she could clearly see the knob. She reached out and gripped it – somehow it was cold, even through her glove.

Inside the foyer, it was quiet. No, not quiet – silent. So silent, in fact, that Cora imagined she could make out the thick quiet sound of the snow falling just outside the door. She could hear that, and Robert breathing beside her.

She walked further into her house, the home that held so many memories of her life, pulling her gloves finger-by-finger from her hands. She looked up and around at all the paintings, the dozens that her father had bought for her at auctions and galleries. She looked to the framed photographs of she and Harold that rested in the usual places, next to various flower arrangements that must have been sent by friends and associates. She placed her gloves onto the speckled-cream marble buffet, the one near the stairs, and looked up to catch her reflection in the tremendous gilded mirror that hung before it like she'd done a thousand times before. But she did not see herself. A black lace cloth hung over it, blocking any light.

Yes, the house was painfully familiar, but not the same. It would never be the same again.

"Cora? Cora, you've made it."

She turned back toward the voice, and looked up to see Harold, her little brother. She'd not seen him since her wedding, as he tipped back drinks one after the other. But she could not move. She could not move from where she stood, her right hand still resting on the buffet. She could only nod.

"Where's Mother?"

Harold came a few steps toward her and Cora watched when he looked up to Robert and stretched out his hand.

"Thank you, Robert. Really. Thank you for bringing her."

And as if Robert had called her name, Cora brought her eyes to his and they locked there for a moment. But despite her immediate impulse to smile she did not. Even if she wanted to.