Very little of the tea was salvageable. Meg dried a saucer, poured what was left into a cup, and handed it to him. It jogged a memory of their mother.Tea will fix almost every problem, she would say, ruffling his hair.If the rest come to pass, then you might as well have a cup in hand because it can only improve an apocalypse.
His mother had been the second-to-last person he’d shared his fears with. His father’s steward had been the last, and then only once.
Meg looked so much like her. She’d aged and their mother hadn’t. Her face had softened; her smile was less bright and more knowing. Since her husband had absconded, she’d looked at everyone differently, with deeper empathy and tolerance born from life’s experiences. His mother had had that same look. He assumed he had it too, just never when he looked in the mirror.
“She does not want me. She does not evenlikeme. She thinks I am the root of all evil. To her, I am merely a title and not in an admirable, flattering way. She thinks I am cold and calculating and cruel.”
Winnie responded exactly as he’d expected. “What poppycock.If she thinks that she is not as intelligent as we thought.” Her confidence was kind, but it was not reassuring because it could not be trusted. She saw only what he’d shown her and the truth was far deeper than that.
“Are you all those things?” Meg ruffled his hair and his throat tightened.
That question had brewed in his belly for weeks. “Am I? I don’t know. Possibly. Society keeps its distance, because I have convinced them to with my churlishness. So I am certainly cold. I feel very little empathy when I am in London, so I am likely that as well.”
He couldn’t face his sisters as he made the admission. He focused his attention on the ugly stag’s head his father had hung proudly. As a child, he’d hated it. It had been a symbol of cruelty. As he’d aged, he’d come to see it as a symbol of necessity. Deer must be killed for people to eat. His preferences did not factor into the matter. That was calculating, was it not?
Lord, he hated that damned stag’s head.
Meg clasped his face, leaving him no choice but to look at her. “But, Peter, is that cold or have you been protecting yourself and I have not noticed? If that is the case, it was badly done of me.”
He closed his eyes, trying to rebuild the seawall that might have washed away for good. This was exactly what he’d been avoiding. Now that she’d seen his uncertainty, his fear, who could she rely on?
“I am perfectly fine.” He took her hands from his face and set them in her lap, patting them in a manner that was supposed to be reassuring. “It will be all right. That was a momentary glitch. Forget it happened. I am not that affected.” The smile he gave was false and he prayed they couldn’t see it.
Winnie’s sudden, damnable perception could not be fooled, and the bit was beneath her teeth now. “You are not without feelings, brother. You may not share them openly and perhaps we’ve not demanded it of you before now, but you have feelings and they are worth something.”
A lump formed in his throat. “She doesn’twantme.”
Jac sighed. “She wanted the Captain, and you are him.”
He had been his most honest self as Captain O.T.N. Eleanorhadliked him. Even when the Captain had failed to meet her, she’d defended him. She might,might, forgive the Captain for his absence, but no one could think that she would forgive Peter for his lie. Wishing for forgiveness was pointless. It would simply drive him mad. Moving on was the only smart choice.
“You three gave me the list of potential brides. None of you included her.” Her current distaste for him was not the sole reason to shake her from his mind.
“Ugh.” It was Jac’s turn to throw a cushion at him. “We expected you to be intelligent enough to come to the realization on your own. We didn’t expect you to be so daft.”
“True,” Winnie said. “Jac, you should probably retract your comment about Peter’s intelligence. I think you give him too much credit.” Her moment of insight and compassion had passed, clearly.
He interlaced his fingers behind his neck to stop them from morphing into talons. “I don’t know what you expect of me.”
Meg rubbed her temples. “We expect you to follow your heart, not run away because she said mean things when you had taken her by surprise and had not given her all the context.”
His limbs turned leaden just thinking of the challenge they wanted him to tackle. Their lips were pressed in mutinouslines. Their tenacity was unmatched. “So, I am not to propose to Lady Anabelle? Damn. Lady Isabelle?”
Winnie threw the last cushion at him, and he swore to have every tossable item banished from the room. “You are a dunderhead,” she said. “Forget Lady Isabelle. Go show Miss Wright who you truly are.”
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Dearest Eleanor,
The night was cool, but beads of sweat clung to his hairline and he could feel them soak through his necktie. He tugged it free and threw it to the floor. What could he possibly say? How could he admit the truth and expect her to forgive him when she’d made it clear that she wouldn’t? She may have been fond of the Captain, perhaps even loved him, but she detested the duke, and he didn’t know which feeling was stronger.
Heart thumping, he wiped his hands so they would not warp the paper.
Before I confess how I know your name, I must tell you a different truth. My affection for you is all-consuming. For months, you have dominated my thoughts. You have haunted my dreams so much that I hold on to sleep when I should face the morning. Your words are fireworks as I read, and the spark does not fade. It stays with me as I go about my days that have not, traditionally, glittered. Every moment, I want you. All versionsof you—the ones you intended to share with me, and the ones you didn’t.
He released his breath. It did not loosen the tension that gripped him. He’d hoped that writing those words would make the rest easier, that admitting his feelings to her would be a relief. Instead, his anxiety ratcheted up. There was no guarantee she’d reciprocate his love. Even if she did, there was every chance she’d react just as he had, casting all affection aside in a state of shock and anger. If that was the case, he deserved the heartbreak that would follow. His actions had been unconscionable.
These past weeks, my world has become smaller again. It is what it used to be but I am no longer satisfied with it. My days have been dull and colorless because you haven’t been part of them, and that is my own fault, and my own regret.
