“I don’t think ye have been listening attentively, Papa.” She placed a hand gently on his forearm. “Just now, Tristan stated quite clearly that he would never force his wife to doanythingagainst her will. Particularly not . . .that.”
Her father reared back. “Ye mean ye haven’t . . .”
“Nae.”
Not for lack of desiringthaton her part. Though she did not clarify the point—fraught conversation and all.
Hadley pivoted and walked over to the window, unconsciously mirroring Tristan two floors below.
How odd.
Her father and Tristan were so alike in many ways—loyal, fierce, devoted—and yet so dissimilar.
Would there come a time when they could breathe the same air and not be at one another’s throats?
“I cannae believe he hasn’t—” Hadley shook his head. “Does Kendall not find ye—”
Thank heaven he did not finish that sentence. Nothing good would be at the end of it.
Mmm, how to explain the situation to her father without betraying her husband’s confidences . . .
“Tristan wishes us to know one another better before we . . .” Isolde took in a deep breath.
“And yourself?” Hadley turned back to her. “What do ye wish, Izzy?”
“I wish tae know him better, as well. I am determined tae make a true marriage of this, Papa.”
“With Kendall? I’ve seen gentlemen treatdogswith more kindness than he’s shown yourself over the past day.”
Well.
He was not wrong on that score.
“I won’t offer excuses for Tristan’s behavior. But we did have a wee bit of an argument just before ye arrived, Papa. We haven’t had a chance tae discuss it since then, and so the whole has been festering. I perhaps have not been as attentive and considerate of him, either.”
“Oh, Izzy,” her father sighed, “as I’ve said, it breaks me tae watch ye search for good in that man. Ye be sailing straight into heartbreak.”
“Perhaps, I am. But I have tae try, Papa. He is attempting to become a better version of himself. For example, Tristan has sworn off his persecution of ye and, the past twenty-four hours excepted, has been attentive to myself.”
Her father snorted. “A tiger doesn’t change its stripes.”
“Perhaps, but I have to believe that such change is possible. I ken ye see Tristan as the reincarnation of his father, but ye forget that he is Rafe’s brother and John’s uncle. That the same gentle, noble blood that flows in their veins also runs in Tristan’s.”
“Izzy—”
“I know ye don’t believe me, not yet, but heisa worthy man, Papa.”
“Do ye love him then?”
Och.
That was the question, was it not?
She had scarcely passed a week of knowing Kendall as Tristan. An exhilarating week, yes, but seven days were hardly sufficient to declare one’s undying passion.
True love—the sort her parents shared, the sort that sacrificed and pledged unwavering devotion—took more time.
Isolde found Tristan fascinating, clever, and unbearably attractive. His laughter and keen observations lit delight in her chest. Surely those were the seeds of love. But if and when love arrived in truth, she would tell Tristan first. Not her father.
