AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Oscar's bed felt cold. He wanted his wife beside him…always. He sighed, rubbing his jaw. He pushed off the bed, grabbed his banyan and tied the sash. Then he padded over to the connecting door, but he did not open it. An unknown emotion stirred violently inside his chest. Wrenching the door open, he walked over to his wife’s bed and saw that it was empty.
Oscar made his way from his room and down the winding stairs to the lower floors. A light shone from beneath the library door. Opening it, he faltered as his eyes fell upon his wife. She was curled in an overstuffed armchair in front of the fire, with an open book loosely gripped in her clutches. She was sleeping.
Careful not to wake her, he curved one of his hands under her shoulder and the other at her hip and lifted her, taking his countess to her bedchamber. Quietly shutting the door behind him. Once he had carried her safely inside, he placed her on the bed and tucked the covers around her. Oscar did not return to his chamber but shed his banyan and slipped in beside her.
“Why are you here?” she asked grumpily and sleepily.
“It feels cold without you,” he admitted softly.
She made no answer, and they lay together in the dark as the time ticked by in endless minutes. They seemed to shift closer at the same time and met in the middle. Prue ended up wrapped around him like a vine. Her cheeks against his chest, and her legs hung around his hips. A deep contented sigh went through him, and he pressed a kiss to the top of her head. As he drifted off to sleep, he felt the dampness on his chest and realized his countess silently wept.
The touch of those tears on his chest cut deep into his heart. Worse, he felt like he was losing a part of her that he could not live without.Stop being a damn whimsical arse, he scolded himself, staring into the dark ceiling. Yet Oscar could not escape the feeling that if he did not try to understand his countess, he might lose her forever.
That thought he could not fucking bear.
The very next morning,Oscar stared at his butler with total incomprehension.
“I beg your pardon?”
“Her ladyship left this letter for you, my lord. She instructed me to hand it to you tonight, but I…I decided not to wait.”
Tonight?A glance at the hallway clocked revealed it was only two p.m. Oscar took the letter with a frown and walked down to his study. This morning he had not broken his fast with her, for he had to leave early on business matters with his bankers. Tearing the letter open, he read it.
Dear Oscar,
I have decided to withdraw to the country for the remainder of the season. I do hope you enjoy your stay in town. I believe it prudent to mention I will not be at your country seat, should you be alarmed to not find me there should you visit.
Yours,
Lady Wycliffe.
The note was succinct and lacking the warmth and liveliness he had come to associate with his wife. A peculiar dread clawed its way into his body and dug into his heart. Painfully. She was not retiring to their country home. Prue had not even mentioned where she traveled. He noted what the letter did not say, charming words in the vein that she had bestowed on him last week whenever they parted. It was as if she had once again retreated inside a shell, only he feared this one was not from shyness but profound hurt.
The agonizing awareness caused him to stumble as the realization pierced him.
Do you not believe in love?
Now he understood the ache in her voice when she’d asked that question on their return journey from Hyde Park. He scrubbed a hand over his face. “Bloody hell.” His wife was in love with him, and he had not seen it. His heart pounded in a manner it never had before.
Do you love me, Prue?
Odd, he had not wondered before, but now a desperate need for her affection burned through his blood. Oscar closed his eyes, recalling the tender way she would brush the unruly lock of hair from his forehead. How she would teasingly kiss his nose down to his mouth. The way she returned his lovemaking with breathtaking passion and trust. The closeness between them when they slept together and how they chatted long into the night and shared all manner of subjects that had piqued their interests. They had not just discussed the weather as she had once teased.
There had been an increasingly warm look in her eyes that had warmed him daily. That look had been her growing love and admiration.
And what had he felt but a similar desperate ache that grew daily until it was like a vice around his heart? Once he saw her, his damn heart jerked before it calmed in a comforting way. A mere kiss from her could see him content for the day. And whenever he worked, he anticipated the end of his duties so he could spend time with his wife. What he felt for her extended to more than just protecting and caring for her. He had to see her smile. Had to see her happiness. And his damn chest hurt thinking of the wound he had dealt her that she would choose to put space between them again.
And he had hurt her because he had not paused to think about why it meant so much to her or why the idea of making an alliance with an heiress would ravage her so. He had been so dense, so foolish to fail to realize that his own happiness depended on her. Oscar had to see her. He could not bear her going a damn night, not knowing how he felt. If when he told her she still wanted to leave, he would give her that space no matter how much it killed him. She deserved everything she wanted to be happy.
Striding from the study and calling for his horse to be readied, he faltered in the hallway.
Damn it all to hell. He did not know where his wife was.
Approximately twenty minutes later,Oscar was allowed entry to 48 Berkeley Square, a three-story townhouse, its interiors decorated with elegant femininity and grace. It was evident that a gentleman did not live at the premises, and he had yet to move from the hallway.
Striding down the hallway behind the butler, too impatient for the man to announce his presence, Oscar stopped. Five young ladies were running down the winding staircase, and when they saw him, they skidded to an alarming halt, their expressions varying degrees of shock and curiosity.
“My lord,” a pert voice said. “I was not at home to callers.”
