“Marriage to you is not abhorrent,” he corrected, a new stone of regret lodging inside his chest, this one a pebble to join the boulders already residing there. “It is, however, not what I would choose, had I the freedom of decision.”
Her lips thinned, and he understood though he had attempted to ameliorate her concerns, he had only served to heighten them.
“And pray, my lord, tell me what youwouldchoose. Mourning your first wife forever until you join her in the grave?” she asked.
It was his turn to recoil, for her words cut deep. Too deep.
Was that what he was doing? Living for the dead, dead to the living?
“I have never made a secret of my past,” he forced out. “I loved my wife. If I had the freedom to choose, she would never have died. My son never would have died. I would not have held him lifeless in my arms only to watch his mother slowly fade away.”
He had said more than he had intended. Revealed far more than he wanted to reveal. And now, he was once more firmly trapped in the past. The agony of that long-ago day revisited him in the form of a fiery ache in his heart. A bayonet to the gut would not hurt as badly. Would not wound him as deeply.
The juxtaposition of his former life with his current life was not lost on him.
He was in a carriage, hurtling onward to the estate he had not bothered to visit since he had been a lad. From the time he had reached his majority, he had spent as much of his time as possible abroad. Away from the father who had never truly accepted him. From the land that had never felt like home. From the obligations he had never wanted.
“Your son,” Catriona repeated softly, the word on her tongue as effective as a lance to his heart.
Somehow, hearing someone else acknowledge Francisco was more difficult than keeping his son’s memory to himself had been.
He wanted to look away from her, from the compassion in her eyes, the softness in her countenance, which had replaced the anger. Somehow, he could not. But neither could he speak. The carriage swayed over the road, and the sudden silence which had fallen between them seemed loud enough to reveal the furious thumps of his heart.
“Alessandro,” she said.
The tenderness in her voice cut him like a blade, for it was undeserved, and yet precisely what he craved.
He gripped his thighs with bruising force. “Enough, my lady. I have grown weary of this discussion.”
“I have not.” Her expression was determined. Fierce.
Cristo.
“I do not speak of it,” he bit out. “Not to anyone.”
This was the truth. Speaking of Maria, of Francisco, of what he had lost, was far too painful. Far too difficult. Their deaths had left an unspeakable hole in his life, in his heart. And so, he had thrown himself headlong into war instead. He had become a machine of death and destruction. It was all he knew how to be, for it was the only way the pain had become bearable.
It had been the only way his life had been worth a damn.
“Perhaps you should speak of it,” Catriona pressed. “You lost a wife and child, Alessandro. You cannot endure such pain alone.”
“I am not alone,” he lied.
“You did not tell your sister,” his wife stated.
Correctly.
Mierda.
“How do you know?” he bit out.
A flush colored Catriona’s cheeks. “I asked Lady Searle. I was curious about you, about your past. I wanted to know more. But I discovered your sister knows less about you than I do. I cannot help but to wonder why.”
He looked away from her, his entire body feeling as if it were wound as tightly as the coil of a pocket watch spring. He gazed out the window, wondering if they were near the inn where they would have a respite and a change of horses. It had been so long since he had last made this journey to Wiltshire, he could not recall the landmarks of his youth.
“Alessandro,” she prodded, ever persistent.
And then, there was a rustle of skirts. Jasmine fluttered over him in the same moment the soft, feminine weight of her filled his lap. He turned back to her, and her face was close. So close, their noses almost brushed.
