“Don’t try to blame your father. He, at least, was all civility when he delivered your note.”
“My note,” he repeated.
“The letter you wrote explaining how, after realizing the shame you would bring to your name, you could not go through with our elopement.”
He stared at her in consternation. He’d never written any such words.
“You may stop glaring at me in an accusing fashion,” she continued. “Three generations of my family protected the wealth of yours. I had no reservations taking your money.”
My God.
All this time, she thought he’d cast her off, the same way he thought she’d cast him off.
His father had lied to her, and his father had lied to him.
His fine, upstanding, morally perfect father had lied in order to separate two people who were, at the time, sincerely attached to one another. And he’d done so simply to preserve his pride.
If he’d known about his father’s lie then, he would have moved heaven and earth to find Vivianne and go through with the elopement as planned.
“I suffered through one, terrible marriage”—she lifted her chin—“but I’m happy now. Happier than I ever could have been with you.”
Harbury steadied himself against the carriage while casting his gaze over his shoulder toward the Hall. He’d the mad desire to either laugh, or weep.
He turned back to Viv again, with an altered, sadder gaze.
But she was happy with Pennington. And he…
Well, he knew now the pain, the sadness, the desperate longing he’d felt had been not for her, but for something he’d known in his heart was possible—the joining of two bodies, two spirits, two souls into a single, stronger entity.
A marriage, as Cassie’s God Mama was fond of saying, of minds.
That kind of marriage, that kind oflove,had quietly sidled into his life, sneaking beneath his defenses in the form of a lady with a wide-open heart and a feather-soft touch.
His father had lied to him and Viv both, ending what Harbury had then believed to be the only love he’d ever know. But in all those years that he’d protected and nurtured that flame, he had never, ever felt the pain he had earlier this morning when he’d thought Cassandra would leave him.
“We would not have suited,” he said.
“Likely not.” She sighed. Her gaze moved beyond his shoulder. “I did love this place, though.”
This place. Not him.
How telling.
*
Settle your littlerow.
The icy calm that had descended over Cassie when Vivianne said those snide words had not yet dissipated. Her body continued to function—she could blink her eyes, turn her head, and even, by deliberately placing one foot in the center of several succeeding risers, climb the stairs.
Her spirit, however, had become a separate being, floating somewhere behind her in murky, moon-shadow darkness, somewhere equally cold.
She’d told Harbury she would be here when he came back. She hadn’t, however, let him know she intended to leave in the morning. But as she’d exited the carriage, she’d made that inalterable decision.
If her wounds were to heal, she had to know what she truly wanted. And to know what she truly wanted she needed perspective, a vantage point to view her marriage. The latter was impossible whenHarbury was close.
When he was close, her body anticipated his touch, her mind remained clouded, and her heart stayed vulnerable to his persuasion.
Ergo, she must seek refuge from Harbury’s influence.
