She doesn't know how long she sits by the side of the house. She can feel her pulse racing, her heart pounding in her chest. The sun sinks beneath the horizon; stars slowly emerge in the inky sky above. She listens and waits. Finally, after what feels like an eternity, she hears the front door open again. Catches the light footsteps moving away from the house. She waits until they fade into the distance. Then Angelica stands.

The door isn't locked and she doesn't bother to knock. She pushes it open and walks inside. Through the parlor, up the stairs, down the hall. Walks to the office because she knows that's where he'll be, where he always is, even now.

Half dressed, hair tousled, he sits at the desk scribbling onto a piece of paper. He turns from his work in surprise to see her standing in the threshold. Angelica takes in the look of astonishment and panic that crosses his face as he abruptly stands to face her.

"Angelica! W-what-?" he looks into her eyes and knows at once that she has seen everything.

For a long, excruciating moment she says nothing. A vicious, violent fury courses through her veins. Finally she speaks.

"How long, Alexander?" The rage is barely suppressed in her voice.

"Angelica, please-"

"How long? How long have you been doing this?"

He flinches at pure venom in her voice. He looks away.

"Four weeks."

"Who is she?"

"She lives down the street, Maria Reynolds, she came to me-"

"And you decided to fuck her."

"She came to me," he continues quickly before she can cut him off again, "not long after you left. She said her husband was abusing her, mistreating her. That he had run off with another woman, and she didn't have anywhere else to turn. She asked for my aid; I couldn't turn her away. I offered to help her-gave her some money. And then-"

"And then you decided to fuck her. Forgive me; I didn't know this was an act of charity," she says derisively. "You were just a generous soul, giving a poor woman some comfort in her troubled times. How noble. Just how long were you planning on comforting her? All summer? After we came back? Until you could find someone even younger and lovelier and more eager to lift her skirts for you?"

"I-I never meant for any of this to happen. I was so tired, so exhausted. I told myself I had to stop it after the first time. Told myself it was wrong. But I was weak. " his voice sounds hollow.

"And what, Alexander, are you going to do if she gets pregnant? If she has your bastard in her?" Another brief look of panic flits across his face, and she can tell he has not thought of this possibility. Add that to the list.

"I would have thought you of all people would have understood what this means. What could happen because of this. Did you think you could keep this a secret forever? What will you do if someone else finds out? Or in your selfish delusion of reality did that not occur to you as well?"

She thinks of Eliza and her heart breaks. How can she possibly tell her what she's seen? How could she find the words to destroy her sister's entire world?

"This will break her."

"Yes." He doesn't argue. They both know this is true.

"My sister, the most trusting, kindest, purest soul… will break because of what you did. Do you know what will happen to her if this gets out? Her honor, her reputation, all gone. Because of what you did."

He avoids her eyes again, but she can see the guilt racking him. "Eliza…"

"Do you know excited she was? How disappointed she was after you said you wouldn't come? She's been thinking of you all summer, missing you, wishing you were with us. She should have been angry with you, but she wasn't. Do you know why? Because she loves you and respects you and she put your needs before her own. And the children… dear god, the children. Have you even thought about what this is going to do to them? To find out that their father betrayed them and ruined their family all because he couldn't control himself around one begging girl? Of course not. No, you were thinking only of yourself and your desires and what you wanted. " She breathes heavily.

Alexander turns from her and walks to the window, staring out of it to the street below. Silence hangs in the room once more. Angelica waits for him to speak.

His voice is barely a whisper when he replies at last. "No one must know." When he turns to look at her, he is the most pathetic she has ever seen him.

Who is this man? What has he become?

"If after this you still have any shred of the love you once had for me, please, Angelica. Don't tell Eliza. Don't tell my wife. She can never know."

"You don't deserve to get away with this."

"I know."

"You don't deserve her."

"…"

Angelica strides over to Alexander and grabs him by the collar. He stares down at her, pleading. When she speaks again her voice is soft but her words iron.

"You listen to me, and don't you dare say another word. Eliza is the best thing in both our lives, and I love her more than anything- do you hear me? More than anything in this world. If you were half the man I thought you were, you should have felt the same. You would have never been anything but utterly devoted to her. However, what's done is done. I won't tell her, but don't you think for a second that I'm doing this for your sake. I'm doing this for hers, because if she finds out…God help you Alexander. I won't see my sister in that pain. I can't do that to her."

"You will stop seeing this woman. You will stop talking to her, stop writing to her- all of it. You've destroyed everything. Now you get to pick up the pieces. Do you understand? You will spend the rest of your life making up for what you've done to Eliza."

She releases him and stalks toward the door. Turns to face him once last time.

"Congratulations."

It is only much later, when she is miles away and headed back upstate on the first carriage out of the city she can find, that a voice in the back of her head whispers to her.

What about you?

Across the sea, all those months, his letters had been all that kept her going. What she looked forward to.

She may not have slept with him, but she won't deny the sparks that flew between their letters, the raw emotion that coursed between them in every correspondence. She knows he's felt the same. She saw the look of longing he had given her when she had arrived.

How many times had she lain in bed and dreamed of him? His eyes, his laugh, his smile… Wondered where she would be if only she hadn't seen Eliza that night? If she had never introduced her sister to Alexander, and stepped aside… what could have been…?

Is what you've done any better?