“My workshop,” Nicholas answered.
“What about London?”his brother insisted.“Parties.Dancing.Other women.”
Nicholas shook his head.“You warned me one day I would become too old to be a rake, and now that day is here.”
“I said that two weeks ago,” Chris pointed out.“You’ve barely aged a fortnight.I understand that rejection hurts.You don’t have to be a rake, but you’re too young to become a hermit.”
Nicholas lifted his head with interest.“What is the minimum age?I hear the Weld family constructed a lovely hermitage on their country pile.”
“You shall not take a post as a garden hermit,” Chris said firmly.“You do realize the position requires you not just to live alone, but to avoid all contact with others.”
“Exactly.”Nicholas nodded.“The answer to a prayer.”
All that awaited him in London was some new series of meaningless affairs.It was no longer what he wanted.He wasn’t certain it had ever been something he desired.
He now suspected he’d been searching all this time for someone who would want more, someone he’d be unable to live without.
Playing the part of rake helped save his pride.He could convince himself that the emptiness in his life wasn’t because he was unworthy of love, but because he had not yet met the right woman.
Well, now they’d met.And he was still unworthy of love.
Chest tight, Nicholas stalked to his dressing room and yanked the bell pull.“As soon as my trunks are packed, I’m gone.There’s no reason to stay.”
“Isn’t there?”
Of course Chris would think that.He still believed inhappy ever after.
“No,” Nicholas said flatly.“It’s over.If Penelope doesn’t even want a two-night liaison, she’s not going to marry me.”
His brother raised his brows.“Did you ask her to marry you?”
“What would that have done?”Nicholas asked wearily.
Chris lifted a shoulder.“Why don’t you find out?”
Nicholas scoffed.“No woman wants to marry a rake.”
“You just said you weren’t a rake anymore,” Chris pointed out.“Marry her.”
“I was a test subject in an experiment.”Nicholas enunciated each word.
“You said that was over, too.”
Nicholas clenched his fists, throat stinging.“I am…”
“All out of excuses?”his brother suggested.
“Hurt,” Nicholas admitted in a low voice.“I tried to be honest and forthcoming in all my interactions.She let me believe we were creating something that didn’t exist.I’m better off alone.”
Chapter 17
Penelope was still slumped against the frigid wall in her best friend’s private observatory.She stared across the telescope at Gloria.
“What are you looking for?”she asked at last.
“Answers.”Gloria lifted her gaze from the eyepiece.“What are you looking for?”
Penelope cast her gaze down at the interlocking glass figurines cradled in her arms.“Impossible things.”
