Tessa was talking to other people but she saw the exchange between Quinn and Nesta. From when they started their conversation to where she went away for a dance, she saw their little interaction with each other with their eyes and she could not help but be more worried.
She knew Quinn said not to address the matter again but she could not help but wonder how Quinn would manage being away from her if she were to find out their secret and the reason they sought her out in the first place and ran away from their lives forever.
She could see the way his jaw clenched whenever Nesat was not looking and that is because she was away from him and with another man, she just hoped he would come clean with her.
Nesta loves him and would not want to be apart from him if he were to tell her his secret. She moved to where he was standing and silently fuming watching Nesta laugh at something the other man said.
"Tsk, tsk. If only the men in this room knew what danger awaits them for even thinking about Nesta, they would not even want to look her way." She teased him.
"It's what I must endure for me to be with her without questions of her honour, I would never do that to her. I'd rather suffer myself than see her suffer at the hands of their cruelty."
Quinn said with so much emotion that Tessa did not believe it could come from him but this is Nesta they were talking about, the girl makes her do things she did not believe she could ever want to do again.
"If that is how you truly feel Quinn, what do you think would happen if she were to find out about our dreadful secret.
I know you said not to talk about the subject again but I could not help but see the way you were clenching and unclenching your fist and jaw while she was in the arms of another man.
Do you not think you would make her suffer if she were to believe everything is a lie?" Tessa said, trying to reason with him.
"Everything is not a lie, and you know it. I can not lose her to the hands of another man and I forbid you to take action on your own and say anything to her Tessa, I never pegged you to be the soft type. What do you think she would do if I told her everything? She would run from me, call me a monster, and never want to see me again. I don't think I can handle that, I don't even want to handle that, she is mine and mine alone. So do us both a favour and keep your emotions in check for the rest of this season. Before the season ends, Nesta and I would be married and be together, then I can start to tell her some things.
"Ok, I will keep my emotions in check. But just so you know, if anything should happen to her or if she doesn't want to be in our lives again because of this, I would never forgive you for it. Do you understand?" Tessa said angrily and she did not even wait for him to answer her before she stormed out.
She continued walking along the lawns of the Thortons estate away from the gathering, away from everybody and most especially her brother.
She had only walked a few steps when she heard the loud screaming voice of a woman, she rushed to the place where the sound was coming from to find a man's dead body on the floor. She moved closer to inspect, silently hoping it was not what she was thinking.
She turned the man's body around to find that it was one of the footmen of which household she was yet to discover but the blood that was gushing out of the man's neck provided her with a lot of information.
She focused her sense of smell and sniffed the air to know where the culprit was hiding but could not smell a wimp of his scent.
She asked the lady whose scream alerted her and was standing against a pillar for support in fear her legs might not be able to hold her again.
"What happened?" Tessa asked the lady but she could not talk as she was just staring out into the shadows behind the massive tree across the lawn. Tessah shook her so she would come to her senses and give her something to find out who had done this.