“Here.” She pressed a cool cup into his other hand. “Drink. Someone once told me small sips are best to start.”
She remembered every facet of that day, when she had cast up her accounts and they had made the realization that she was carrying Robby. Why would she remember? He had thought about that day so often. The shock, the fear, and replacing it all, the sheer, unbridled joy.
The ride to London on the train, her whispering her fears of becoming a mother. His reassurance she would make an excellent mama. The future seemingly laden with promise. Theirs to seize.
He brought the cup to his lips, took a tentative sip. The water slid down his throat, and his gut did not violently object. A good sign. His heart was slowing its frantic pace. His head no longer felt as if it was about to split apart in the fashion of a cracked egg.
Another sip. Then another.
Adrian lowered the cup to his lap and discovered he was still clinging to her hand. He was also reluctant to release her. Touch. So simple and yet so powerful. Like speech, it had been taken from him during his time at Dunsworth.
“Better?” she asked.
He swallowed. “Somewhat.”
“You need not tell me. When you are ready. When…”
Her sentence trailed off, and he recalled the reason for his presence here this evening. His ultimatum to her. Had she been about to admit she would marry him?By Godhe hoped so, because he was not certain he currently possessed the strength and presence of mind to further threaten her.
Mayhap he never would. The whole business was distasteful. His anger and resentment had mingled with the desperation of needing to be certain his son could never be legally kept from him again. But something had altered between them just now. He was not certain he believed her capable of feigning such concern for him or such confusion over what had happened.
“When?” he repeated, hoping she would finish her words.
“When you want to talk about what happened to you, I will be waiting, Mr. Hastings.”
Not what he had been wanting to hear. So cool and polite. And again with the formal address. Mr. Hastings. As if they were strangers. As if he had never known the softness of her mouth beneath his, had never been inside her.
“Adrian,” he said.
For a moment, she said nothing. Simply stared at him as if she could not be certain what to do or say.
“Adrian,” she repeated.
Victory. A small one. At least, his true name. He had always loathed the secret between them. With each day that had passed, he had dreaded the revelation more. Had feared she would leave him.
And then, she had.
But not in the way he had imagined.
Unless…
“I like to hear it in your voice,” he said, and he was not sure why. Mayhap it was the severity of his attack this evening, the extreme of the panic, the violence of his illness, perhaps even her compassion afterward. “For so long, I was a number.”
“Adrian,” she said again, her fingers tightening on his.
The urge to kiss her struck him. Ridiculous. Out of place.Christ, what was the matter with him? It would seem he had no ability to control himself. He tamped it down.
“Your answer,” he forced himself to say. “I will have it.”
“I cannot marry you in such haste. I do not know you.”
“Nor do I know you.”
“That is not true. I was always honest with you. I am myself, as you see me now, as you have known. I have no secrets, nothing to hide. Whatever it is you think I have done, I can assure you I have not. I would never have hurt you. You must know that.”
He wanted to believe her.
Damn it.
