But she could see that her optimism had once again been misplaced.
“Perhaps I should not have broached the subject,” she said, seeking to melt some of his ice. “I was merely hoping we might offer him a better situation than the one he has at Eastlake Hall, either here in London or even at Riverdale Abbey.”
Helping Henry would likely require more time. She would have to be patient, she told herself. Everett was not a heartless monster. Surely at some juncture, he would see the wisdom of removing her half brother from her father’s cruel reach as well, just as they had Mother.
“You absolutely ought not to have done so,” Everett snapped, lip curling as if he had just partaken of something particularly distasteful. “The temerity… Good God, madam. Surely you cannot think to ask to bring that bastard into my own household? Do you have no notion of the insult you pay not just me, but my mother and my sister? Can you possibly believe that I would allow such a thing beneath my very roof?”
“You needn’t be so harsh, Your Grace.” Tears rose to her eyes at his viciousness, and she blinked them away, feeling foolish. “I…I am sorry. It wasn’t my intention to pay you insult. I understand that there is the possibility of scandal, but?—”
“The possibility of scandal,” he interrupted, repeating her words with furious bite. “You, madam, have gone beyond the pale.”
“Please, Everett,” she entreated. “I didn’t think?—”
“You are damned right about that,” he broke in harshly. “You didn’t think. Not at bloody all.”
He rose from his chair as if it had suddenly burst into flame and stalked to the opposite end of the chamber, fury emanating from him. Sybil stood and hovered at the chair, watching his broad back and waiting for him to turn to her.
But he didn’t.
He simply stalked into his chamber and slammed the door behind him with such awful finality that she flinched. The tears she had been refusing to shed returned with vigor then, stinging her eyes. How had she convinced herself that anything between them had changed?
All these weeks of sharing her body with him, living as his wife at his side, doing everything in her power to find whatever measure of happiness she could, convincing herself that she could love him enough for them both, and what had her naïveté garnered her? The same broken heart.
She rose from her chair, dashing at her tears with the back of her hand. The suitor who had charmed her into a hasty marriage had been nothing but a clever lie. He wanted his heir, but he didn’t want a wife.
She couldn’t bear to endure any more of this anguish. Tomorrow morning, she would begin packing for Riverdale Abbey. She couldn’t remain here in London, enduring this sham of a union for one day longer.
Her marriage to Everett was over.
Her love for him wasn’t enough. She understood now that it never would be.
Dressed haphazardly in trousers,a shirt, and a waistcoat, Everett stalked to the library.
She still loved that bloody footman, damn her.
He wanted to tear the fucking plaster off the walls. He wanted to rage and shout and smash things. But he was a civilized man, and the household was abed. He had two elderly women and a sister he didn’t wish to frighten. So he moved to the darkened library with as much quiet and haste as he could manage in his furious state, intent upon finding the oblivion to be had at the bottom of the whisky bottle that awaited him there.
Because he also had a wife who had somehow deemed it prudent to ask him to give the man she loved a position in one of their households.
By God.
After all they had shared. After giving herself to him each night. After marrying him and spending these last few months as his wife, Sybil was still consumed by thoughts for her beau. He hadn’t needed Verity to find an answer for him. Everett had the only one he needed now.
His wife was in love with another man.
He bit back a curse as he crossed the library to the fire, stirring it back into a roaring blaze before he poured himself the whisky he’d use to drown his thoughts. How dare she ask him to take on her lover? Had she no notion of what she requested?
No husband in his right mind would allow his wife to bring her lover into one of their households, be the man servant or guest. She must have gone mad. How could she possibly think that he would accept such an arrangement? Did she think he had no pride, no emotions?
He drank deeply of the whisky, relishing the burn.
“Everett?”
Verity’s voice gave him a jolt. He looked up to find his sister moving soundlessly across the Axminster in slipper-shod feet and a dressing gown.
“Verity.” He frowned at her. “Is something amiss?”
Ordinarily, he was grateful for her company. But tonight, he wasn’t sure he trusted himself. He hadn’t been this furious since the day he had seen Sybil in that arsehole footman’s arms.
