“I said I was sorry as soon as I realized how terribly wrong I was, darling.”
“I know.”
“You know Phin hardly ever gets angry.”
“I know. Ith why I married you.”
“It wasn’t my tongue?”
She made a sound that might have been a laugh. “When we were in the church, I didn’t think about your tongue. I thought about you.”
He raised her hand to his mouth and kissed her fingers one by one. “You know I can’t promise you never to get angry again.”
“Yeth.”
“But I can promise I’ll never stay angry. I never have. I don’t bear grudges or nurse hurts.”
“I know.”
“And you’re so brave, Caro. You shouldn’t be frightened of your silly husband.”
“You’re not thilly. You’re good.” And then she let out a sound he interpreted as a sob, so he released her hand and cradled her, putting his arms around her and drawing her close. But she did not continue to cry, or if she did, her tears were silent.
“I’m not good, Caro. But I can promise you I’ll always try hard to be good to you.”
Her hand found his head, her fingers brushed his hair.
“Phineath. I get angry, too.”
“You do, darling? What are you angry about? The money?”
“N-no. I told you, the money ith nothing.”
“Then what?”
She tugged on his hair. “I th-think of yy-y-you with other w-w-women.”
“That’s in the past, Caro. You’re my only woman.”
“But l-later, when—”
“No. Wait.”
He turned away from her, breaking her grasp on his hair, and found the tinderbox and a spunk and lit the lamp next to the bed. He had sworn he would never interrupt her, but this was important. She needed to see his face. He needed to see hers. He held his body away from her. Her green eyes, blinking in the lamplight, so anxious.
“I love you, Caro. And I want you to know I took my vows seriously. There are no other women, there will be no other women in my life, ever. I’m flawed and I’m going to do my damnedest to be better. But this assurance I can give you. I promise. I will never bed another woman. Ever.”
He couldn’t tell if she believed him. His quiet wife did not say she loved him back. But she came into the circle of his arms when he held them open, and for the first time in their life together as man and wife, she fell asleep before he did, and he thought he might have put some of her worries to rest.
Thirty-Four
She did not leave her husband’s bed when she woke the next morning. She waited for him to open his eyes and reach for her and when he did, she repeated her actions of the night before, but this time she tried to suffuse them with care for him.
They made love. She was willing to name it as love. Her husband, the very bad liar, had told her last night he loved her. He had slipped it in among his promises of fidelity, but she had heard it and clutched at it and used it to soothe the part of her that had been so scared, so rattled by his unfair accusation and his anger.
And those words had comforted her far more than the release she had sought last night.
I love you.
