He watched her sweep from the chamber. If only he knew which one hewouldheed.
She ought tohave poured the rest of the whisky on Huntingdon’s head last night when she had the chance. Indeed, she ought to have left him to rot on the chaise longue so he could awake with a stiff back and neck.
Helena stalked the length of the library once more, a practice which had done little to distract her or lessen the sting of her fury as she awaited her husband’s presence. If he deigned to join her, that was.
Should he appear, she would be sorely tempted not to toss a book at him.
Although her plan had worked and he had not abandoned her in favor of Shropshire just yet, he had been not only rude when he had risen this afternoon and realized she had thwarted him. Indeed, he had been cutting and cruel.
Part of her could not blame him. She had no doubt he had felt perfectly dreadful after the spirits he had consumed. However, any sympathy she would have felt in that direction waned the moment she recalled he had been drinking himself to oblivion on their wedding day.
To avoid her.
His words from earlier returned, bitter and needling.I left you yesterday because I could not reconcile myself to the fact that I was tricked into a marriage with you.But that was not entirely fair, was it? She had hardly tricked him. She had merely gone to her brother with the truth—a truth which she had admittedly stretched in a moment of panic.
“You will wear the carpets threadbare if you continue pacing like that, and then I shall have to buy new Axminster in addition to another set of train tickets.”
The grim baritone had her spinning about to face the subject of her ire.
“My lord.” She dipped into a perfunctory curtsy, noting that he was unfairly debonair after an evening of carousing.
He had bathed and Bennet had shaved him. The bruising on his jaw from Shelbourne’s punches was fading. His bright-blue eyes settled upon hers, and that same old spark lit her from within.
“My lady.” He bowed, effortlessly elegant.
“You still intend to go to Shropshire?” she blurted.
“My intentions have never altered.” He prowled nearer, stopping too far away to touch. “I was merely once more the victim of a hellion.”
“A victim of us both, I would argue,” Helena countered. “Although you do enjoy painting yourself as an innocent, I am not the only one of us at fault. If you had never kissed me or touched me, and if you had never disappeared last night to drown yourself in drink, you would not currently find yourself where you are.”
He stroked his jaw, his stare burning into hers. “Because I am a fool.”
“Is it so foolish to kiss your wife?” she dared to ask him.
“It is when she is as trustworthy as an asp, and need I remind you that you were not yet my wife then?”
His quick reply stung.
She bit the inside of her lip. “You need not be so cruel. What is your pressing concern in Shropshire?”
His countenance remained cool. Aloof. “It is far from you.”
“You are not the only one capable of taking a train,” she pointed out.
“Do you intend to follow me there, Helena, knowing I have no desire for your presence?”
His question should not hurt. Nor should his anger come as a surprise. Their impasse was nothing new, though the day was. Her husband, momentarily diverted from his intended escape, was every bit as unavailable to her as ever.
She decided a change of subject was in order. “When are you going to show me the rest of the house, Huntingdon? Yesterday’s tour was regrettably brief.”
While she refrained from reminding him of the heated kisses they had shared in her apartments, the sudden clenching of his jaw told her he was remembering.Good.Let him pretend he felt nothing for her but disdain all he wished; she knew what it felt like to be held in his arms.
“I suppose we may as well go now, since I will be leaving for Shropshire as soon as I am able. Bennet is seeing to new tickets.”
“You need not sound so grudging about it, my lord,” she told him. “I am your wife now, and this is my home, when in London.”
His nostrils flared, the only sign her words had affected him. “Come, then, if you must.”
