“What are you doing? Stop this at once! There is no need—”
“There is every need!” snapped the duke, breathing heavily. He turned his attention back to the viscount. “You will answer for this—name your second!”
Good God, did he mean to duel? He had taken leave of his senses!Her heart thudded furiously. Surely, he could not think there was anything between herself and Emrys? It was absurd. All this for a simple hug?How does he trust me so little?
“I will not! For God’s sake, Layne, see sense! It is not what you think!” Ashford said, nursing his eye which was swelling rapidly.
The altercation was already attracting attention, and Sarah gasped with horror. So much for her first ball being a success. It would be a scandal instead, and its hostess at the center of it.Is this my fault? Had she behaved wrongly?But no. It washisintemperate behavior that had made a scene, not hers. Even if she was somehow the motivation for it, he was the one who had lost control of himself.Could he be so overtaken with unfounded jealousy that he was lost to all propriety?The notion made her heart race.
Just then the dowager duchess appeared, and Sarah got another first-hand lesson in how to be a duchess.
“There you are, my dear,” she said, looping her arm through Sarah’s and drawing her away. She smiled at the assembling company and said, “The viscount has fallen and bruised his face. There is nothing to see here. Please return to the ballroom.” She transferred her gaze to the duke and said, “You will see him attended to, Robert.” She then sailed off down the path towing a hapless Sarah with her.
“Mama Duchess, I—”
“Never admit to anything, my dear,” said the dowager duchess calmly.
*
Robert, brought toearth abruptly by his mother’s intervention, bottled his fury and escorted the viscount away from the scene to his library. Shutting the door, he rounded on his erstwhile best friend and said, “What the hell were you doing with your arms round my wife?”
Even as he said the words he knew he was being unreasonable.So much for having buried my fears over Lannister!It was only insecurity over Sarah’s feelings for Lannister and his unresolved anger toward the absent earl that had boiled up and spilled over at the sight of Sarah in Ashford’s arms, not any true misdeeds on their part—he knew that. It was Lannister he truly wished to hit, but he’d taken his anger out on Ashford instead and caused the kind of scene he abhorred.I’m a bloody fool.
The viscount cupped his swollen eye and sank into a chair wearily. “Take a damper, Robert. I’ve no designs on your wife as you’d bloody well know if you paid any attention to anything around you!”
“What is that supposed to mean?” asked Robert stiffly. He was aware he was being ridiculous, but he couldn’t seem to stop. He stalked to the cabinet and poured out two glasses of whisky. He shoved one at Ashford and tossed off his own.
“You’ve had no eyes for anyone but Sarah for the past month.” Ashford tossed back the whisky and sighed, closing his other eye as well as the one that was all but swollen shut.
“And who gave you leave to call her Sarah?”
“You did, you idiot!”
“Yes, well, I didn’t give you leave to sneak off into the garden and hug her! What the hell were you doing?” That ache in his chest was back.
“Sarah,” said the viscount somewhat belligerently, “was giving me counsel on a marital matter, if you must know!”
“I don’t see how that gives you the right to put your arms round her!”
Ashford sighed. “It was a sisterly hug. Nothing more. I was upset, and she was giving me comfort.”
Robert rounded on him, the image of Sarah in the embrace of another man still far too vivid in his mind’s eye. “Well, I’ll thank you to find comfort in your own wife’s arms!”
The viscount rose at this point and said wearily, “I’m going to bed. I suggest you calm down before you speak to Sarah, for if you rail at her like this, you’ll do more damage than you can undo in a twelvemonth!” He opened the door and with uncharacteristic temper slammed it behind him.
Robert sank down at his desk and put his head in his hands with a groan. What was he going to do?
*
It was wellover half an hour later that Robert returned to the ball, where Sarah and the dowager duchess were trying to behave as if nothing had happened. The rest of the evening passed in some species of nightmare for Sarah. Robert may as well have been an automaton, he was so stiff and proper. She longed to shake him, but of course she couldn’t, and did her best to behave with all decorum until the last of their guests departed or retired to bed.
The dowager had a few words to say to Robert, but Sarah didn’t hear what they were. Instead, she bade them both goodnight and retired to her room, where she waited in vain for Robert to appear. It was the first night since their wedding he had not come to her.
She wept tears of hurt and frustration into her pillow. Should she go to him? They needed to speak about what had happened. She argued with herself for a few minutes then flung back the coverlet and, tying on her robe, went to the door between their rooms. She hesitated, then gathering her courage, she tried the door handle and found the door was locked.
Shocked, she dropped her hand as if stung.
Surely, he couldn’t think there was anything between her and Emrys? But then why was he treating her this way, as if she were an adulteress? She had done nothing wrong except comfort a friend.Hisfriend.
