“Scratch that.” Hadley made a sharp motion with his hand. “Of course, with your tender, affectionate heart, ye will come tae love him. The bigger question remains—is a man such as Kendall even capable of loving anyone outside himself?”
Tristan’s expression—yearning, ragged with adoration—rose in Isolde’s memory . . .
She had to swallow back a tightness in her throat.
“Oh, Papa,” she whispered. “I don’t think ye have anything tae worry about on that score.”
Isolde had left.
Tristan stood ramrod-still in front of the window of the private dining parlor, afraid if he so much as twitched a muscle, he would shatter.
His wife had left.
She had taken her father’s hand and walked out the door.
The pain was every whit as awful as he had anticipated. Needles lacerated his chest with each breath.
Perhaps he should have fought for her.
But . . . how?
Her loyalty remained with her father.
Nothing Tristan said or did would ever triumph over that fact.
This entire situation underscoredwhyhe had spent nearly a decade fighting his love for her. Because the scenario had played out as he had foreseen from the beginning.
He had surrendered to his emotions for Isolde.
She had not returned his affections.
And now he was left in jagged shards, forced to watch her sail away, taking his soul with her.
The agony of it serrated his breathing.
The door clicked open behind him.
Tristan ordered his body to turn around, to address whomever had just entered. But his muscles refused to obey.
It was likely only a servant come to clear the breakfast dishes.
The doorsnickedshut and a rustle of skirts drew near. Isolde’s distinct smell of lemon and cheer filled his nostrils.
Oh.
“Come to say goodbye, Wife?” He forced the words past lips numb with misery.
In response, she ran a hand up his spine and through his hair, certainly undoing his valet’s efforts not an hour earlier.
The unexpected touch felt akin to a knife’s edge.
Tristan flinched, pivoting to glare at her.
His wife glared in return.
And then she proceeded to untie his neckcloth.
“Isolde.” He recoiled from her reaching hands.
