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Rhys blinked. “Since when?”
Lady Isabel looked at him with an even gaze. “Since twenty minutes ago,” she said with a sly smile and walked into her new bedchamber.
Rhys was so perplexed that he didn’t persist further. He walked back to the family wing and padded toward his room. He paused in front of the doors to the marchioness’s chambers before opening them. He hadn’t entered this room for about seven years. But he remembered what it had looked like.
When Lady Isabel said the room was being redecorated, this was not what he’d imagined.
No paintings or other decorations were hanging on the walls. The wallpaper was scraped in places, the curtains on one window had been taken down, and all the furniture aside from the large pieces was collected in one corner.
Did she say it had taken her twenty minutes to do all that? Rhys gave the room a once over before walking to the adjoining room door. The bare walls made his wife’s room seem different already, as though his previous wife had not occupied this chamber at all.
Well, good riddance then, he thought and entered his chamber.
* * *
Isabel woke up the next morning feeling fresh and rejuvenated. She was in a clean, bright room with no shadow of the past hanging over her. Isabel performed her morning ablutions, got dressed, and went to have breakfast.
Her husband was sitting at the table, but Millicent was not there.
“Good morning,” Isabel said as she sat down.
Her husband looked up from the paper. “How are your new accommodations?”
“Perfect, thank you. And where’s Millie?”
Vane cleared his throat. “She decided not to join us this morning.”
Isabel’s heart sank. Because of her, she was certain, but she decided not to dwell on the subject. “Can we go to the village today to rectify our mistake from yesterday?”
Vane looked up at her choice of the word “our.” Well, it wasn’t her mistake alone; the least he could do was share the responsibility for it.
“Yes,” he said and returned to his paper.
That wasn’t an enthusiastic response, but at least he didn’t argue. It was a start.
Isabel cleared her throat. “Since I started working on my room, I thought, why not redecorate the entire house? It is quite old, and there doesn’t seem as though much improvement has been made to it for years.”
Isabel needed to spring into action. The busier she was, the less likely she was to think about her abysmal marriage and all the troubles that came with it.
Vane lifted his gaze off the paper. “You’re right. There hasn’t been any improvement since I acquired the title. Except in the marchioness’s room. That one seems to be the one that gets redecorated most often.”
Isabel swallowed. So his former wife had been the one to change her room into the chaos of extravagant elements all thrown together. “So you do not mind?”
“I don’t mind. Just don’t touch my room.” He shielded his face with the paper again.
Isabel pursed her lips. “And since we are redecorating, I was wondering”—Vane lowered the paper, his gaze annoyed—“if we perhaps should take this opportunity to host a house party once we are finished.”
“You seem to want to change a lot of things at once,” he noted. “I wouldn’t hurry.”
Well, of course, I want to make changes. Otherwise, I will lose my mind.“I am not about to turn the entire house upside down.”
“That seems what you’ve done with the marchioness’s chamber.”
Ah, so you saw.“I am only talking about light redecoration, painting the walls, hanging new art, adding some more flowers. It wouldn’t take me long to achieve.”
Vane hummed thoughtfully. “Then perhaps my room could use some of that, too.”
Isabel hid her smile. Finally, they seemed to be communicating. “And the house party?” she asked hopefully.
