“It’s been such a long day,” he said, laying the groundwork to suggest that they both go in and go to bed.
“Yes, the hunting party is quite lively. I find it very droll, but it’s much nicer being out here with you like this.”
Inwardly, he cringed. Perhaps it was best that he simply rejected her outright. It would strain propriety to be so blunt about it, but he was starting to think that until Vivienne thought she had no chance of becoming his wife, she would keep pursuing him.
The sound of other voices pulled him from this contemplation. He stiffened and managed to extricate his arm from Vivienne’s just as Cassian and several other guests came into view.
“Harrow!” Cassian practically shouted, stumbling toward them with a grin. “What’s this? Vivienne here too?” He clucked his tongue and then laughed. “Quite the predicament you put me in; my best friend caught alone in the garden with my cousin! After all, how can I defend her honor without causing great offense to you?” He winked at one of the other guests, who looked rather askance at the whole situation.
“Don’t be ridiculous, Cassian,” he snapped. He knew his friend was joking – and from the evidence, quite drunk – but the last thing he needed was rumors of some dalliance in the garden with Vivienne. It irritated him that Cassian would joke aroundabout something that could cause quite a bit of harm to people they both cared about.
“Why, Harrow, I –” Cassian said, but Thaddeus cut him off.
“You seem to have drunk quite a bit,” he said, “so I’ll ignore the nonsense you’re spewing. But I think perhaps you ought to go in and go to bed. In fact,” he glanced around at the others, “given the hour, I think it would be good if we all went in and got some sleep.”
Without waiting for an answer, he took hold of Cassian’s elbow and started guiding him toward the house. The others followed behind.
As they passed the orangery, Thaddeus gave one last glance in its direction, but it was dark, and there was no way to tell if, somewhere inside, Isolde was waiting for him.
***
It was quite a task to convince Cassian to go up to bed, but finally his friend and the other guests were all headed upstairs. Thaddeus looked at the clock in the main hall and sighed.
It was nearly one in the morning, and he doubted that Isolde would have waited so long, even if she had gone to the orangery. He decided to go to bed and try to explain to her tomorrow.
He was walking along the balcony above the hall, on his way to bed, when movement caught his eye, and he looked up to see Isolde turning into the corridor on the opposite balcony. She must be headed to her room – but did that mean she had been out? Had she been waiting for him after all?
His heart started to beat faster, and his feet sped up in response. If he hurried, he could catch her before she went into her room.
He was practically running before doubt started to hit him. What if she hadn’t been in the orangery? He could not just accost her in the hallway like this. He slowed, feeling his heart sink.
He found himself staring down the hallway at her closed door. His head told him to go to bed, to leave it until the morning. His heart told him that he could not keep putting off this conversation. He needed to tell Isolde his doubts about their plan. He needed to know if she had any feelings for him.
He had just started toward her door when a figure appeared at the end of the hall.
“Harrow!” Cassian said cheerfully, as though they had not just bid one another good night minutes before. He waved as he charged down the hallways on wobbly legs.
Alarm caused Thaddeus to nearly run down the hall to head off Cassian. He didn’t want to have to explain his best friend’s drunken antics to any of the guests, and least of all to Isolde. He grabbed Cassian and pulled him back down the hall and around the corner.
“What are you playing at?” he hissed at his friend as soon as they were out of earshot of the rooms. Cassian gave him a bemused look.
“What’ver d’you mean?” he slurred, looking offended. His breath stank of whiskey, and Thaddeus wondered if he’d had more to drink since the garden.
“Wandering around the house in the middle of the night, obviously drunk. And earlier, in the garden – implying there was something between Vivienne and me, when you know well that there isn’t.”
As Thaddeus spoke, he felt his face flush with anger. Cassian had been his friend since they were children, but his conduct of late had Thaddeus seriously wondering if he’d been more ignorant than he realized about the sort of person his friend had grown up to be.
In the face of Thaddeus’s anger, Cassian quieted and seemed to sober up a little.
“Sorry,” he said, grasping Thaddeus’s arm and leaning heavily onto him to straighten himself up. “I am a bit drunk, I suppose. But …” he gave Thaddeus a sideways glance, “you do have to admit that you and Vivienne make quite the perfect couple. I always thought so.”
“You’ve made that very obvious,” Thaddeus grunted, pulling Cassian along the hallway back toward his room. “But I am not interested in Vivienne like that, and I feel I’ve made that abundantly clear.”
Cassian was quiet the rest of the way back to his room, and as Thaddeus maneuvered him into an armchair by the fire and helped him take off his boots. As Thaddeus was tucking a blanket around him, he finally spoke again.
“Why?” he asked sleepily.
“Why what?” Thaddeus replied, much of his earlier anger gone now that Cassian was so meek and compliant.
