“Do you suppose it’s the roast?” I hoped it was not sitting poorly, I just took a bite a moment ago and I was not interested in experiencing whatever was wrong with Katherine or Michael.
“Hugh, your wife is upset with you.” Tom over enunciated the words, as if I would not comprehend their meaning. I understood the definitions perfectly of course, but there was no evidence that Katherine was unhappy with me. She had said nothing of the sort.
“Why should she be upset with me? I did not cook the roast.” Tom’s hand came up to pinch the bridge of his nose between thumb and forefinger, as though he had one of Mother’s megrims. Another symptom? I set my own fork down and pushed my plate away. I could not risk eating anything further.
My brother dragged an exaggerated breath before responding. “She is upset because you have been married for months and you do not know the name of her dearest friend. The one you met numerous times.”
“Why should she be upset about that? I am a busy man. I meet lots of people. Is it the one with the hair or the one with the brows?”
“Hugh—that’s not the—the hair. But you have met the girl multiple times. I have met her, and I only dine here once a week.”
“I think she’s the one who hides in the library. Scurries out of here with arms full of books as though we will run out if she does not take them all at once.”
“Yes, that’s the one. But Hugh, Kate is upset because you do not take an interest in the things that are important to her.”
“That is not true.”
“When was the last time you spent actual time together?”
If I had not been questioned, I certainly could have come up with any number of times. Once Tom asked the question, all instances escaped my mind. Without permission, time continued to march on, and without giving me a chance to think, Tom crowed his triumph “See?”
“Perhaps I have been a bit preoccupied sorting out these ledgers, but I am a viscount. I have many demands on my time.”
“You spent three hours thrashing me with a sword this afternoon.”
“Clearing my mind.”
“I am just suggesting perhaps you should clear your mind with your wife. I hear wives are good for that sort of thing.”
“What do you know of that?”
“Rumors, nothing more.”
His typically ruddy face flushed even harder at his response. Too much time in the theater district, clearly. Before I could even attempt to explain French Letters to him, Michael and Katherine returned. Probably for the best, as I was not certain how one used them.
Katherine returned to her seat, flushed quite fetchingly, before announcing, “Michael will be joining us in the country as well.”
Tom choked, midsip. I could feel my face twist into what was surely an inane expression.
When words finally returned, they were equally inane. “He is?”
The response was a simultaneous “yes” from both of them. No room to broker discussion. Nothing like a request.
Twenty-Six
THORNTON HALL, KENT – APRIL 15, 1814
KATE
They were at it again.Michael and Juliet, heads bent together over a card table, murmuring softly.
I had never, not once in our lives, seen her so happy. Even worse, now that I knew what her joy looked like, I realized that I had never seen it on her. Gone was that way she had about her, the one I always assumed was just Juliet. The perpetual tension in her muscles, prepared to spring into action in any second, was nowhere to be seen. Instead, there was a new languidness to her movements.
She and Michael were feigning some sort of gaming lesson. There was little in the way of teaching going on. That seemed to be the usual case. Michael, a seasoned gambler, should have found the entire thing dreadfully dull. Instead, he looked at her as though she held the answer to every one of life’s questions.
My favorite moments were the ones I caught when he thought no one was looking. The naked love in his eyes, and it could only be love, was unbearably heartbreaking and sweet to see. He looked at her the way I always wanted a husband to look at me. To see that expression on his usually guarded face… There were times it was all I could do to refrain from squealing in delight.
It was love.
