Blue.
That shade her husband favored. Not because he’d told her, but because he didn’t share parts of himself with anyone.
And she’d affirmed him reason to not trust in people.
Daria wept harder.
She buried her palms against her face, but not before she’d caught the signal the marchioness gave to the footmen.
Rage dripped from the exquisite lines of Lady Rutherford’s heart-shaped face. “Tell me, Daria” she urged pleadingly, as the last of the army of breakfast room servants shut the door behind him. “He must have done something for you to be broken this way.”
That conclusion she’d reached, the same as Daria last eve, ripped a breaking sob from her throat. “No!” she rasped, gripping the other woman’s arm. “He hasn’t.”
“That I do not believe. I will kill him.” Lady Rutherford started to get to her feet, but Daria tightened her grip, keeping her fastened to the floor.
“Why will you not listen?” Daria cried. “I-Iam the one who has behaved a-abominably.”
“You?”
The marchioness’s sheer incredulity broke through Daria’s guilt-filled sobs.
Furious on her husband’s behalf, she wrenched herself from the marchioness’s arms and got awkwardly to her feet. “It is true.”
“I am sure it is not, Daria.”
“Your husband is both best friends and a business partner with Lord Argyll and yet you think so poorly of him?” Daria didn’t let the marchioness a word in edgewise. “Do you have such a poor opinion of Lord Rutherford’s judgement?”
Lady Rutherford stared with stunned, wide eyes. “Uh…” She nodded slowly. “Forgive me, Daria. I am listening.”
She was terribly uncomfortable around people, but she was so painfully alone, and so very, very desperate, and she found herself sharing all her sins with this woman she’d admired from afar, and now shared a home with.
Daria shared all—from the Kearsley Curse to her culminating meeting and now marriage to the Duke of Argyll, and her miseryover having hurt him. And the worst of all—caring for him. Nay, falling for him.
After she’d concluded, Lady Rutherford didn’t move a muscle, not even so much as a blink for a long while.
With a clearing shake of her head, the other woman grabbed Daria’s untouched linen napkin from the table and handed it over.
Thanking her newfound friend, Daria blew her nose noisily into the material.
When she lowered the soiled scrap, she found the marchioness studying her with a smile.
“Daria, I will confess, Lord Argyll has a very dark history. He has done…” she paused. Searched for words.
Daria cocked her head.
Lady Rutherford cleared her throat. “Wicked things. Unforgiveable ones, but…my husband has, too.” She held Daria’s eyes. “Do you understand what I’m saying?”
Daria automatically nodded.
She stopped and shook her head instead.
“I cannot say whether the duke is capable of truly changing—” Lady Rutherford hurried to speak as Daria rushed to defend her husband. “But the things you’ve shared, this lack of control—”
Daria frowned. “I did not say he lacks control.”
“No. No.” A gentle smile eased across the marchioness’s face. “How shall I say this?” She tapped her chin, then stopped. “Where women are concerned, Lord Argyll is a master of restraint. No one has ever roused him to…the emotion you’ve described.”
Something dangerous stirred beneath her breast.
