Penelope glanced up, confusion in her gaze.
“Certain physical responses can happen”—he waited until the tremor in his voice had passed—“without a man willing them to happen.”
Her eyes widened. She bit her lip and looked away.
Unanchored, he trembled.
“Isaidyou would not wish to know.” And now it was too late.
“You misunderstand.” Her eyes flashed with tears of her own. “I’m angry for you. I turned away because...” Her brows drew together. “I was thinking—fearing, really—is what happened to you—isthatwhy it’s too late for you and your love?”
Lord have mercy.“Yes.”
She bent down to look into his eyes. “I cannot imagine what you went through—”
Thank God.
“I cannotknowhow you feel. But you—you cannot let that evil person rob you. You should go to your love. You should not leave her”—her voice broke—“waiting.”
His mind struggled to form words.
“It’s awful, I tell you,” she said. “The waiting, I mean. The desperate hope—”
His heart beat became labored, as if he were climbing a dangerous cliff. “I betrayed my vows.”
“But you aren’t at fault!”
A tear snaked over his cheek, dropped from his chin onto the shirt she’d made. “Aren’t I?”
“No!” She grasped his cheeks again. “Go to her.Pleasego. If there were even a chance my husband—” She stopped speaking abruptly. She released him. “Youshouldgo to her,” she repeated, as if convincing herself. “You will, won’t you?”
He swallowed through a bone-dry throat. “I haven’t decided.”
“Youmust!You must...even if, when you leave, Thaddeus and I...” She shook her head again. “Well, I don’twantyou to go. You realize that, don’t you? But I can’t keep you. Because even if Itrulywant you to be, you aren’t—” Her voice dropped. “Are you?”
Tears welled in her eyes.
“Pen.”
He pulled her down onto his lap. He brushed her hair from her face.
“Look at me, Pen.”
She lifted her eyes. Her lashes webbed with wet.
Sentiments welled up inside him—sentiments he could not name. The cottage shrunk again, very small. Too small.
Suffocating, in fact.
He’d be strangled if he remained indoors.
“I need to go,” he said.
“Now?” she exclaimed.
“Yes, now. I need to go to the sea.”
Irrational. But by the sea, he’d be able to breathe.
