He tucked the quill in the spine of the ledger and closed it with deliberate care. “You were right at the lodge,” he sighed. “We should have ended this arrangement when you first asked.”
Something in her chest squeezed. “I did not ask lightly.”
“I know,” he said. “You had sound reasons. I chose to disregard them. That was my error.”
“Error,” she repeated.
He seemed to search for words that would not cut. “You are about to return to a house where your footing is precarious. Your reputation is already fragile. My presence in your life complicates matters you cannot afford to see complicated.”
“That has been true from the very beginning,” she pointed out quietly. “It did not stop you then.”
“My judgment then was clouded by curiosity,” he said. “And other impulses I allowed too much rein. That will not continue.”
Her nails dug into her palms. “You have made a decision, then?”
“Yes,” he replied. “We will not meet privately again. Not at my lodge. Not at my house. If we encounter one another at social events, we will behave as distant acquaintances. Polite. Unremarkable. That is all.”
Her throat burned. “I see.”
“It is the only sensible course,” he continued. “You yourself have proved that any deeper entanglement is impossible. You will not leave London. You will not relinquish your loyalty to a man who despises you. I cannot marry you, and I will not commit myself to a woman I cannot honor publicly. I will not become my father in that respect.”
The words struck her like sharp little stones, each one lodging somewhere tender.
“I never asked you to marry me,” she said, her voice thin but steady. “Our agreement was never about that. I am not so naive as to dream of ducal proposals.”
“You are not naive at all,” he assured her. “That is precisely why I must make sure you do not begin to hope for more.”
She stared at him. “Do you truly think me so weak?”
“I think you’re human,” he answered. “As am I. Which is why restraint is required from both parties.”
Heat surged up her spine, a mix of shame and fury. “Very well, Your Grace. Allow me to reassure you that I will not sit by my window at Fenwick House pining for you like a girl in a horrid novel. I have neither the time nor the inclination.”
His jaw tightened. “I did not suggest?—”
“Youimpliedit,” she cut him off. “You may erase whatever ridiculous notion your mind has conjured. I hoped for kindness, for continuity. Perhaps even for something like friendship beneath all the bickering. I did not expect a future. I know my value in your world.”
“That is not what I meant,” he protested.
“Is it not?” she asked firmly. “You have made your position clear. I shall reciprocate. I have no desire to be a repeat of your father’s mistake. Nor your mother’s disappointment.”
His eyes flashed at that.
Good.
“You and I agreed on seven nights,” she continued. “I tried to end our arrangement. You insisted on continuing it. I agreed. I take responsibility for that. I will also take responsibility for ending it now in my own mind. You need not fear that I am harboring secret romantic schemes.”
He looked as if he wanted to argue further. But then his gaze cooled. “As you wish,” he said.
There it was. The door.
The rest of the journey passed in a silence that felt heavier than words.
Victor reopened his ledger and bent over it with fierce attention, as if the figures could shield him from the inconvenient reality that another human heart sat throbbing across from him.
Gwen turned her head back to the window.
Patches of white drifted across the pale blue sky, shapes shifting and dissolving as the carriage moved. She watched them as if they might offer an answer she could not find within herself.
