This made her at least twice as furious as she had been because that had beenhertrick, damn it all. Her trick and his stupid demand. And so, he came and just stole it from her?
Rude. Rude and annoying.
She had sullenly eaten a roast beef sandwich—it was exceedingly good, and she was furious about it—before stomping off to thelibrary on the justification that it was utterly impossible to be in a poor mood while in the library.
She was proven wrong.
She was staring, barely seeing anything, at a wall of gorgeous, expertly bound books when, finally, her husband decided to make his appearance.
“What’s wrong with you?”
She whirled on him like he had set her on fire.
“What is wrong withme?” she demanded. “What is wrong withme?Iam not the one who disappeared all day.Iam not the one keeping secrets.Iam not the one who didn’t tell hissisterhe gotmarried.”
She was shrieking. She knew she was shrieking, and she knew that was unreasonable, but she couldn’t seem to stop.
“Iam not the one who treats other people like theydon’t matterbecauseIam not a self-important duke, you stupid,stupid, stubborn man!”
She punctuated this last statement with a stamp of her foot. It was the childish end to a childish tirade—hell, to a childishday.
All it did was serve to hurt her ankle.
He waited until she was done, then just one moment more to really make his point.
And then he said, “What I meant to say is… you seem upset.”
It was so understated,solevel, that it practically shocked Phoebe out of her bad temper. Maybe this was why they suggested cold water for people who were hysterical. Evidently, a cold attitude would do the same.
“Yes,” she told him. “I just listed all the things I’m upset about. They are mostly focused on how, just yesterday, I married a man that I did not choose, and how, every minute since then he has been plaguing me.”
This might still have been argumentative, and yes, childish, but Phoebe didn’t yell it, so she considered that a triumph.
Aaron paused, looking at her with the slightest tilt to his head.
“No,” he said slowly, like he was tasting the words in his mouth. “No, that’s not it.”
She was extremely close to just walking away. Extremely close.
But then he said, “Phoebe. Just tell me.”
Those four words weren’t a command. They were a request. Maybe even a plea.
But whatever it was, they were soft. Almost kind. And Phoebe could see, all too easily, that refusing to answer him now would be like stamping her foot—it would only hurt her, and it would accomplish nothing.
Telling the truth…
Well, that would hurt, too, but it might accomplish something in the end.
Wearily, she tilted her head, indicating the pair of chairs near the fire. It made for a cozy image—the cheerful blaze, the pair of overstuffed armchairs, the two of them, seated across from one another.
It made her throat clog with misery.
Aaron waited, patient and undemanding as Phoebe gathered her thoughts. She ached to tease him about a soldier’s patience, about waiting for the moment to strike—anything to distract from the story she had to tell.
But that would be a coward’s way out. And she did not want to be a coward—not for herself, not in front of a hero.
“My mother died at Christmas,” she said, feeling as though her voice was coming from somewhere very far off. “I last spoke to her on Christmas Eve, and when I woke up on Christmas morning, she was dead.”
