A Fiery Dalliance

XXX

"When a resolute young fellow steps up to the great bully, the world, and takes him boldly by the beard, he is often surprised to find it comes off in his hand, and that it was only tied on to scare away the timid adventurers." Ralph Waldo Emerson

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XXX.

Perrie had known that she would find herself mightily in trouble for travelling to London by herself, but she could not help it. She was totally convinced that she would descend into utter madness if she spent another minute wandering around Ashwood, pondering what was happening and if Joe was alright.

Truthfully, she found herself anxiously worrying about Joe disappearing in London. It was an awfully big city and certainly her father could not keep his eyes on him all the time.

Perrie knew that she was fretting about Joe as though he were a child, but she could not help it. She cared. The Perrie of three months ago would have been disgusted at the idea of caring about Joe Parish.

But Joe was no longer the annoying, horrid lout who had spent his formative years terrorising her. Of course, he was still that boy, but he was also a man who carried an unholy load, and it was one that he was frightened of dropping.

A blind man could see that Joe was breaking, and that he didn't know how to fall into someone. Perrie had already told her sister that she did not think that Joe loved himself. It was clear that Joe struggled immensely with what had happened while he was in the navy, and there was clearly great animosity and tender wounds surrounding his relationship with his father.

Something had brought all of this to a head for Joe. Something had brought everything to the surface, forcing him to confront it all, and he simply did not have the ability to handle it. Yet.

"Does your mother know what you have done?" Adam growled.

"If she did, she would have stopped me from coming," Perrie replied pointedly. "I did leave a note, and Lily knew where to find it."

"So, Lily knows?" challenged Adam.

Perrie bit down on her lip and chastised herself for revealing her sister's part in it. "Lily told me not to come. She couldn't stop me. Papa, please, you know I needed to be here."

"No, that is not something that I know, Peregrine," Adam snapped. "Upstairs with you. You are to stay in your bedroom until I can think of an appropriate punishment." He shooed her in the direction of the staircase. "You are far too reckless. Imagine that your carriage had been set upon by highwaymen!"

Perrie trudged towards the stairs. "I had a driver and two footmen. I was not entirely alone!" she retorted.

Her father had already scolded the servants for bringing Perrie to London, but Perrie had assured him that she had told several white lies to make them believe that she had permission to go. Adam had then said, "If they believed that, then they are gloriously stupid."

Perrie had already ascended half of the staircase before she turned around. Adam, who had been following closely behind her, nearly walked into her. Perrie was still a head shorter than her father, despite being on a higher step than him. She sighed, before wrapping her arms around Adam's torso.

It was Perrie's instinct to argue. She could often get her way when she argued. She knew that her father did not like to have conflict with any of his children. He valued having a loving and respectful relationship with all four of them, and that stemmed, Perrie understood, from his tumultuous childhood, adolescence, and early adulthood growing up with a mother and a father who were not particularly warm, loving, or sensitive to the needs of their children.