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Harmony fought nightmares, sobbing into her pillow. Nightmares of Court’s angry words and reproachful stare. Nightmares of his father’s study, of being bent over the desk again and caned on her bottom while being lectured in the most cool and biting way.
Standing still for the strikes of the cane was not even the worst thing. Having her bottom—and her soul—bared for punishment, the humiliation of his hand forcing her down when she tried to struggle away. No, those were not the most heartbreaking things. The most heartbreaking thing was his contempt for her, and her reciprocal contempt for him. She hated what had become of their marriage. She hated that study. She hated that desk. She hated her husband for not trusting her and loving her.
She slept late the next day and kept to her bed, reading and occasionally repositioning herself so she couldn’t feel the soreness of her bottom. There weren’t many marks but there were enough to make her feel a continual shame.
Mrs. Redcliff knocked on the door and entered, dropping a curtsy. “Your Grace, will you dress for dinner?”
Harmony shook her head after a moment. She could not make it through dinner, not tonight. She could not sit across the table from him and respond to his small talk. She could not tolerate an hour of his mother’s arch looks and Mrs. Lyndon’s vicious prattle. “Kindly tell His Grace that I’m not feeling well enough for dinner.”
The lady’s maid flicked a glance over at the side table. “You haven’t touched your tea tray. Is there anything I can bring that would be more appetizing?”
Harmony looked back at her book. “I am not hungry.”
The kindly woman flushed and busied herself straightening things that didn’t really need to be straightened. A few minutes later she returned to Harmony in entreaty. “If you do not eat, you will not fit in your lovely dresses.”
Harmony shrugged. “He will buy me more.”
“Shall I help you into your nightclothes then?”
Harmony forced a smile to bring her some ease. “I am still in my nightclothes from yesterday, since I am so lazy.”
Mrs. Redcliff’s hands shook as she trimmed the candles at the bedside. “Your Grace, if you don’t wish to undress in front of me for fear I will see… For fear… I have already seen the marks, Your Grace. Forgive me, but—”
Harmony held out a hand, silencing the maid’s words. “Don’t fret, Redcliff. He believed I deserved it. He is my husband and…” She made a face. “I suppose it is within his rights to punish me if he feels it’s warranted.”
The woman set her mouth in a hard, firm line, letting her expression tell Harmony exactly how she felt about that.
“Perhaps you should send word downstairs that I will not be at dinner,” Harmony suggested, to give the hovering woman something constructive to do. She bustled off muttering, and Harmony sighed in exhaustion. It was bad enough to deal with her own frayed emotions without Mrs. Redcliff storming about.
Harmony wished she had her mother.
She even wished she had her father or her brother. Anyone to accept her and love her unconditionally, just as she was. Awkward, impulsive Harmony Barrett. The merest thought of her childhood home across town in Brook Street nearly brought her to tears.
Mrs. Redcliff returned with a tray of milk and sandwiches, and Harmony ate a little to placate her. She was just finishing when a sharp knock sounded. Without waiting for an invitation, her husband entered and stopped inside the door, dressed for dinner in his usual starched finery. She sat up a little straighter, waiting to see what he would say, waiting to see whether his present mood was as prickly as hers.
He looked at Mrs. Redcliff. “Leave us.”
Yes, prickly. The maid’s spine snapped to stiffness as she faced him, and for a moment Harmony feared she would redress him. To her vast relief, she drew up her skirts instead and took her leave. As she exited through the dressing room, she shot Harmony a fortifying look.
Brave Mrs. Redcliff. If her husband were to dismiss her for such insolence, there would be nothing Harmony could do to stay his hand. That was the main lesson he had driven home the night before—that he had all the power in this marriage, and she had none of it. What she intended by her words and actions had no meaning to him. Everything she did or did not do would be reflected through the lens of his will, and the lens of the greater society.
Oh, she had warned the man, warned him clearly so many months ago. She had told him what a trial she would make of their marriage. Now he surely understood what she’d meant, but it was too late for both of them. She had begged him not to marry her but he had insisted. Now it had come to this. She was his prisoner. His burden. A wife he could not fix and could not love.
He turned from the dressing room door, regarding her with the full force of his gaze. “How long are you planning to hide here and sulk?”
Harmony closed her hands on the edge of the sheets. She would not let him goad her into more misbehavior. “I am not sulking,” she said without rancor. “I do not feel well.”
“It is time for dinner.”
She didn’t move from her place in the bed, not even when he crossed the room at a brisk pace to pick up the book on her nightstand and look at the cover. Great Disasters in the Age of Modern Politics. He sighed and put it back down.
“You have a new interest in politics?”
“I have a new interest in the inability of people to get along,” she said.
His gaze snapped to hers, then traveled down to the bodice of her nightgown. “Did you even dress today? Did you rise once from your bed?”
She yanked the sheets up to her neck, feeling bared by his stare. “I told you, I am not well.”
He crossed to her, making a show of feeling her brow. “You are not well, or your pride has been injured?” He put his fingers beneath her chin and raised her face to meet his. “Did you learn nothing last night? This immature, self-centered behavior greatly disturbs me. I will not tolerate it.”
“Will you take me to the study again?” She flung the question at him with false bravado, pushing his hand away.
“Perhaps,” he said. “If I think you need it. In this battle of wills, you shall come out the loser. That, at least, I hope you understand.”
I hate you. She had screamed it at him last night, and his hard, cold authority only exacerbated the feeling. I hate you. I hate you. Where is the Court I love?
“You can take me to the study a thousand times,” she said, “and I will still be me.”
“And I will still be me,” he replied. “You behaved badly and I punished you.”
“You were unjust. I did nothing wrong.”
“I read the letters, Harmony. Every one of them. They were not lurid but they were inappropriate. You are a married woman and he is a man.”
“He is an old man fixed on history and travel. How silly you are.”
Court drew himself up tight, as if he were restraining some very unpleasant words. He let out his breath and spoke in a steady voice. “If you cannot recognize the fault in your actions, I fear you may be beyond redemption.” His eyes left her, looked past her with a new indifference that devastated her. “Stay here in your rooms if you like.” He made a dismissive gesture and started toward the door.
“I want to go home.” She didn’t yell the words, or sob them—although she felt like sobbing. She spoke them with the same quiet and cool tone he used. When his back stiffened and he turned to her, she said again, “I want to go home. Right now.”
“Right now? Impul
sive as ever. You are truly beyond the pale.”
“I want to go home,” she repeated stubbornly.
“To Hampshire? I don’t think so.”
“To Brook Street. Father is still in town. He will take me in.” She had no idea if that was true, but she said it anyway. “I will go there this very night.”
His gaze was glacial. “Will you? I hope you are prepared to walk.”
She shivered under his regard, remembering another time and place when she felt helpless, furious and thwarted. When she had indeed been desperate enough to walk. She could tell from the look on his face that he remembered too. “This time,” he said, “rest assured I will not rescue you from your folly.”
She sat straighter in the bed, blinking back tears. “It is not so far to Brook Street as it was to Newcastle.”
His expression frightened her. “Do not attempt it,” he bit out. The door slammed behind him, the starkly echoing bang hurting her heart much more than her ears.
*** *** ***
Court arrived to dinner a short while later with his wife’s words still echoing in his head. How silly you are. How silly.
Silly indeed, to have such bruised pride over the words of a sulking wife. If she had called him brutal or unfeeling, or horrid or mean or cruel, he could have coped with it, but silly cut him too close to the bone. Since the day he met her, he had had a sinking feeling of becoming ever more ridiculous. To be called a silly man by Harmony, the silliest, most unreasonable creature in the world, was very nearly an unbearable blow.
Even more unbearable—she wanted to go home.
She would not go home. He’d sent a man to alert the gatehouse that she was not to call up carriage nor horse for her own use without his permission. It was petty, yes, and the servants undoubtedly thought him a tyrant. He was becoming a tyrant, because of her. Not just a tyrant, but a jealous, abusive husband.
Oh, God.
He had abused his wife.
He could try to excuse his behavior the night before by saying it was his right, by saying she deserved it for being disrespectful to him and corresponding with another gentleman behind his back. None of those excuses rang true to him though, not in his heart. He had lashed out at Harmony because his feelings were hurt and because he feared losing her. Now he wondered if he’d lost her for good.
