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“You’re home late,” he said before twisting back around again.

Sylvia closed her eyes, praying that when she opened them he would be gone—a figment of her imagination.

She was not so lucky.

Doing her best to pull on the composure she’d shed at the front door, she padded across the floor to the bar cart and poured herself a whiskey. Not two fingers. Four.

Drink clutched to her chest as though it were a talisman, she turned on her stockinged feet.

“You didn’t write to tell me that you were due leave,” she said.

He glanced up at her, closed his paper, and then folded it once again. Finally, he said, “I’m not on leave.”

“Another meeting in London then,” she said, remembering his unannounced appearance in December.

“The work I did with the admiralty and the navy’s medical service was a success. I’ve been reassigned to London to continue it. I can’t say much else, of course. You understand.”

Sylvia stared at her husband. He was coming home.

Many years ago, when they’d still been in the first flush of their marriage, she might have thought it would be romantic for him to surprise her like this, but this had no romance about it. There was no kiss, no hug, no hello even. Just a simple statement of fact laced with disapproval—“You’re home late”—followed by the bombshell news that he had been reassigned.

She took a long drink of her whiskey and then asked, “Does that mean you will be moving back home?”

“Into my own home? Yes, I should think so,” he said.

She nodded shortly.

“I can’t imagine that will be a problem for you, will it?” he asked.

“No,” she said automatically. “Why should it be?”

“You’re back so late. I had thought that perhaps it might inconvenience you to have your husband home.”

She burst out laughing at the suspicion on his voice. “Oh, Hugo. You don’t have to worry about that. Unlike some, I actually believe in the vows that we exchanged when we were married.”

The jab and every unspoken confession it represented hung in the air between them, and for a moment she thought he might acknowledge the letters in his desk drawer. That would be a start, her tired brain reasoned. Just the simple admission that he had strayed from their marriage.

He did not, however, say a thing.

“If you must know,” she continued, “I’m very busy at the moment. You might find that I am often home late.”

“Your charity work keeps you out past the blackout?” he asked.

She tilted her head to one side to study him. “Frequently. Committee work is more involved than you might think.”

“I suppose Rupert can sympathize, can he?” he asked.

“I’m certain he can. Claire is also very busy,” she lied easily before taking another drink. In truth, she had no idea how her friend managed her social diary when her husband was home from leave. It had been weeks since the pair of them had seen each other outside of a War Widows’ Fund meeting.

Hugo held her gaze for a moment longer but then said, “I don’t anticipate being at the flat much myself. There is too much to do, and I might find it easier to stay at my club some nights. It’s closer to the Admiralty.”

Despite all of the resentment and anger she’d stored up over the letters, her heart sank. He wasn’t even back one evening, and he was already trying to find ways to wriggle out of being at home. To find ways to spend time without her and with his mistress.

All of a sudden, the strain of holding herself together so tightly these past months for the sake of the shop, her sister, her committee, her marriage, all of it was too much. Exhaustion swept over her.

“I’m off to bed,” she announced. “Good night, Hugo.”

She could feel his eyes on her as she walked out, but in that moment she couldn’t find it in herself to care.