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“Then it is time for me to stop dithering and leave London too.”
Chapter 28
The carriage was loaded, the coachman was fidgeting, and a groom held the door open, waiting for Arabella to climb in.
She would climb in. Of course she would. She had marched out of the house with every intention of jumping straight into that carriage and letting it carry her away west.
Yet, curiously, in the short distance between house and carriage, she had lost her way. As if compelled by an unseen power, she had walked around the horses in their clinking harnesses, and now stood in the middle of the street, turning her bonnet and gloves in her hand, staring at the park.
At Guy.
He was with Ursula and Freddie, the three of them watching the little robin redbreast again. They must know she was there, but they paid her no mind. Clearly, a robin was much more interesting than the comings and goings of proud, foolish Arabella Larke.
Perhaps she could draw near him, for one more moment. For one more word, one more smile. Her body would not turn away. It was as if a force of nature was pulling her toward him, the way migrating birds were pulled across the world.
How could she fly off to her friends in the countryside, when all she needed was right here?
Arabella shoved her bonnet and gloves onto a footman and was crossing the road before she even knew her own intention. She was dimly aware of Freddie taking Ursula away, but all she saw was Guy, straightening, turning, tensing, watching her approach.
Oh, to keep walking, right into his embrace, to press her face into his neck, and know that she had come home.
She stopped some six feet away from him. His hair was still golden. His complexion still tanned. She had seen that face laughing and sad and angry and passionate. Now it was inscrutable. Unwelcoming. A closed door to the home she sought.
He could have been mine.
Until he regretted his honorable actions, and resented her presence.
She had made the right decision, for both of them. Shehad. She had set him free to find the true happiness he deserved.
It was just that she had to break her own useless heart to do it.
His gaze flicked past her, to the abandoned carriage. “Running away again, Arabella?”
“I didn’t—”
“You—ran—away.”
“I set you free.”
“Did you expect a thank-you note?”
Habit had her retreating. “Some flowers, also, would have been nice.”
She stopped herself.Not now, pride.
How her heart ached to see him so close, his unsmiling, untouchable face. He could never be hers, but perhaps she could salvage something from the debris.
“Let us put this behind us,” she said. “We can be civil to one another, acquaintances who—”
“No. We cannot.” He fairly scowled at her as he withdrew a letter from his pocket. “This is from my solicitor. It needed only my signature before he sent it, but since you’re here, I might as well give it to you now.”
The thick creamy paper was slightly crumpled as if it had been well handled. More interesting were his bare hands. Were his palms still rough, or were they already smooth? She had given up the right to know.
“What is this?” she asked.
“That thank-you note you wanted, I suppose.” His voice was dry, mocking. “Thank you for setting me free.”
He shoved the letter at her impatiently, so she took it and tore it open.
