The dining room fell into a collective stillness as everyone exchanged glances, trying to figure out who had arrived unannounced at this hour.
Isabella rose from her seat, grateful for any reason to leave the suffocating tension of breakfast. She followed Leofric and the others toward the entrance hall, where Fletcher was still hovering, looking like a man who had seen too much that morning.
She heard them before she saw them.
"I told you we should have sent word ahead, George. This is not how respectable families operate—"
"Sarah, we are here now. Stop fussing."
"I am not fussing. I am simply pointing out—"
"Papa?" Isabella called out, her voice coming out smaller than she had intended
She pushed past Leofric and stopped dead in the entrance, her hand flying to her mouth.
