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Soon after luncheon that day, Otilia walked with brisk purpose along Bond Street. The dowager had asked her to buy a few necessaries while she took a nap.
Both women fell into a routine while the Marchioness lived in her own house in town. Breakfast. Strolls in the park. Visits. Tea parties and other ton functions. Otilia focused on them and avoided random thoughts like the plague. Though the struggle not to think of Edmund had been tragic, thankless and mostly ineffective. She lived in alertness for when they would cross paths in the social scene, but so far it did not happen
.
The journey back to London had gone in a lighter mood than when she had set off to Buckinghamshire, as the Marchioness revealed to be an easy chat. They got along so well, Otilia became surprised. Often enough, stories of conflict between lady and companion popped up in newspapers or books. She felt happy they did not follow this pattern.
In a non-descript grey dress and cloak, and a simple bonnet covering her sugar-brown hair in a tight bun, she proceeded back to the dowager’s house as she passed in front of a book shop. Eyes glued at the window, she gave in to the temptation of going in and looking at the recent publications. The shop, nearly deserted at this time, held that delightful smell of books. Lady Charlotte would be up only for tea, so Otilia might spare a few minutes here. Through the shelves, she browsed the spines, picking the occasional book to peer in its pages.
Absorbed in a newly issued book, Emma from a so far unknown author, she did not notice the doorbell ring with a new customer coming in the shop.
“Otilia.” The tone caressed her ears, and she froze, eyes still on the paper.
Every emotion in the palette erupted inside her in fierce battles with each other. Blood drained from her skin in a cold wash, only to return with a vengeance, exuding candent heat through each pore.
Reluctant slowness assailed her muscles when she forced her head to lift to the man. The view of him bombarded her with such an intense force she feared she would fall against the shelf with the weight of it. Edmund’s broad frame clad in graphite finery stood less than three feet from her. His imposing attention was firmly clasped on her.
“My lord.” She curtsied out of sheer habit because her feet seemed to have taken root in the floorboards. The greeting gave her the opportunity to rip her gaze out from his magnetic figure and glue it somewhere over his broad shoulder.
“I saw you heading here,” he said. Of course, he would be in the vicinity. His offices were not far from here.
Her foggy mind rummaged for an excuse to leave. There was no lingering around the man and jeopardising the resolve to keep her distance, emotional distance, that is. And keep her calm in the process. Far-fetched as both might sound. Her eyes darted to her sides, but his tall, brooding person blocked her escape.
“How is your new situation?” The inquiry might seem trivial on the surface, but in between the lines, he wanted to know if she regretted their parting. Or their joining. Whatever.
Regret? No, she smirked inwardly. That would be too superficial a word for the multiple whirlwinds of extreme feelings that invaded her in the quiet moments of the day. Or during the hollow silence of the night. In the confusing images of her dreams, or nightmares, she could not say. In the feverish yearnings of her body. In the unstoppable waves of her memories.
Regret. She wished she had only this, and nothing else. If she allowed it, the want of him would drive her to the depths of desperation. Or hurt. Or the impossible wish to travel so far away it would be hard to find the land on a map. A land where nothing reminded her of him, of their moments and their kisses. Their waltzes—the one they shared in the ballroom, and the ones their bodies indulged in the night.
Regret was what she was trying single-mindedly to have. Before, or after her departure.
And did not.
“Utterly agreeable, my lord.” She closed the book, her hands tightly holding the hardcover, tense.
His scrutiny roamed over her feminine shape, and her skin heated on each place where it rested, almost as a touch. Like being near a kettle with boiling water, the steam rolled up heating spots of her skin.
A deep silence fell between them, loud and filled with the words she tried to lock inside as they bubbled their way to the surface.
In need of something to do with her hands, she put the book back. “My duties await.” The narrow space between the bookshelves would force her to brush on him, but she moved to leave somehow.
He stepped aside to her surprise, giving her room to pass. She had gone two steps with that sense of victory for being able to hold herself aloof…
“I owe you an apology.” The deep voice curled around her ears just as that kettle steam would. She turned to him so swiftly, that she nearly got whiplash. “Apologies,” he amended.
Her eyes latched on his, the unexpectedness of his remark making it difficult not to look at him. Her scattered head searched for something to say. “You do?” She could only come up with this blurted nonsense.
Edmund had clasped his hands behind him, legs apart, jet eyes boring into her. “I should not have made a proposition.” His haughty stance made it all the more astonishing
Their low tones would keep their conversation discreet, or so she trusted. “You were not the first, but will be the last, hopefully.” No intonation here, her insides went frosty.
His head nodded in open acknowledgement. “I did not know,” he said with simplicity.
“You do not know many things.” Her chin lifted a notch.
“True enough.” The admission surprised her even more. “I misjudged you.”
