She met his gaze, defiant. “I lost count.”
He flinched as if she had struck him. “I see.”
Why did she know a stab of guilt at his reaction, as if she had betrayed him? She did her utmost to banish it.
“We were living apart, Needham.” She looked away from him then, turning her attention to the window once more.
“At your insistence,” he added, correctly.
“Because you bedded another woman whilst you were married to me,” she returned. “I have no wish to engage in another endless round of arguments with you, Needham. Neither one of us will win, and it is fruitless.”
“I was not arguing, Nellie. You were.” His tone was mild once more.
Unaffected.
She did not like that either, not any more than she liked being called Nellie in his decadent baritone. “I told you to cease calling me that name.”
“You have told me a great many things since my return.” He sounded amused.
Her gaze swung back to him. His eyes were crinkled at the corners. Her heart gave a pang, and she did not like that either.
“Someone has to disabuse you of your wrongheaded notions.” Oh, how she despised herself for the sudden breathless quality of her voice. “I do not know how many more ways I can make it plain to you that I have no wish for this farce of a marriage to continue. Nor do I want to be called Nellie or reminded of the past. Leave it where it belongs, Needham, and leave me be.”
His expression turned contemplative. “Why does it bother you so much? If you were as unaffected as you pretend, you would not mind what name I call you by, and neither would you object to our shared history. If you felt nothing at all, you would not have kissed me back.”
She gritted her teeth and flashed him a smile she hoped was feral. “Ah, but as we have already established, I would have kissed anyone back.”
“Is that what we have established, my love?” He leaned forward, until his breath flitted warmly over her lips. “Because it was my understanding that the only thing we have established is that you are a liar.”
She swallowed, tamping down a rush of longing. “I am not a liar.”
“Yes, you are.” He gave her his half grin, the swoon-worthy one. “Do you know what I think? I think you do not want me to call you Nellie because it brings back all the memories of what we were to each other. It is easier for you to carry on with this nonsensical belief you want Sidmouth when you are not thinking of what you stand to lose.”
She ran her tongue over her suddenly dry lips. “I already lost what we had. Indeed, I never had it. Whatever we once shared was a fiction. A chimera. Lies.”
“Was it?” He stroked his jaw with those long, elegant fingers. “When I made love to you, did it feel like a fiction? When I told you I loved you, did that feel like a chimera? Tell me you have a fraction of the passion we shared with Sidmouth. I dare you.”
She stared at him, at a loss. Because he was right, damn him. She did not share this passion with Tom. Tom did not make her feel desperate. He did not send white-hot longing through her by merely sitting next to her on a divan. He did not make her nipples harden with one bold look.
Indeed, Tom had never given her a bold look. Not ever, at least not in her recollection.
Tom was…sweet. Kind. Good.
Tepid, suggested a voice within. She silenced that traitorous voice.
Safe.Tom was safe. Because she knew she would never care for him the way she had once cared for Needham. She knew that while she cared for him, she did not love him. Not in the reckless, wild, all-encompassing way she had once loved the man before her.
“Tell me, Nellie,” Needham murmured now, his gaze dipping to her mouth. “Go on.”
“What I feel for Tom is different,” she managed, her voice trembling. Hesitant. “He cares for me a great deal.”
His head lowered a fraction. “But what doyoufeel for Sidmouth, Nellie?”
What did she feel? Theirs was a comfortable relationship. She trusted Tom implicitly, and that trust had been hard-won by him. He had shown her, over time, that he would wait for her. That he was patient. That he had loved her from afar, even when she had been courted by Needham. He never pushed her. Not even for intimacy. He did not kiss her and make her feel as if she were about to turn into flame.
But maybe that was the difference—one man was permanent and true. The other had been exciting but far too charming, too unpredictable. One had betrayed her and the other never had.
“It is none of your concern what I feel for Tom,” she told Needham. “My relationship is with him and him alone.”
