“Guess I’m happy to see you.”
Suddenly, she’s pulling me into her silky embrace. “Let me help you to bed.”
“Like before, Katia?”
“On our wedding trip after we’d consecrated our vows. Or the bath when you recovered?”
“Which one to choose? But things will change when I fall ill and can’t pretend. That changes everything.”
“You’re not sick. And if you were sick, there’s no reason to pretend that you aren’t.” She waves her hands. “Enough of the past. Tomorrow, a drive in the sun will be good for us.”
“Unless Scarlett finds a cure, I will be sick again. Cossack vows say nothing of sickness and health.”
“Then we should marry again in London with English vows. Or you could just admit that we are still married.”
“So what was Tavis? The wedding I failed to stop at St. George’s—some laudanum dream?”
There’s something on her face, a look that makes my whole soul ache. I sit on my bed, reach for the Palmerses’ latest note, demanding I admit that Katherine committed bigamy, and hand it to her. “That would mean you are or were indeed married to two men at once.”
“If I’d known we weren’t divorced, I would not’ve married him.”
My brow goes up, and I squint at her. “Truly? He was safe, somewhat. Healthy for the most part. And he did love you.”
“He loved me?” She hugs me, holding me as I lean against the edge of my gilded headboard. “Thank you for saying that, Jahleel. I don’t remember anymore. His parents’ anger, and now their demands, make me forget the friendship we all had.”
Wedidn’t includeme. “Tavis’s parents are even less friendly now.”
She reads the note and crumples the parchment. “They’ve written me at the office. They want Wilcox Coal and my father’s house, too.”
“What are you going to do?”
“Make love with you and not think of anything else.”
My heart pounds. “Be serious, Katia.”
“Well, I can’t give them my father’s legacy.” Her gaze sweeps to the mattress. “But with all that’s going on, perhaps it would be enough to be at peace. To sit in Anya’s library with Lydia. To be here with you and not think about people hurling insults at coal wagons.”
This isn’t Katherine. She’s not this defeated creature. “Command me to fight for you. Let me solve the problem.”
Her fingers are in my hair. “Nyet. This is my fault. It’s more I have to pay.”
“But Wilcox Coal is not just yours. Scarlett and Georgina and Lydia are all heirs.”
She shakes her head. “None of them care for it. They remind me of how I’ve wasted my life defending it. My stubbornness almost cost them their happiness.”
“Then let me intervene.”
“You’ve done enough. I have to see this through.”
“Just like my fight here in London?” I smile at her, thankful that this talk has cooled the heat in my blood. “We are at cross-purposes again. One of us will always decide what the other should or shouldn’t do.”
She gulps air like my words have trampled her breath. But that is what truth does. Its light exposes our strengths and weaknesses and the awful facts of why our feelings will never overcome the things that divide our souls.
Sitting at my table far from the bed, Katherine examines the list of potential spouses compiled by Mr. Steele that I’d handed her.
“Mrs. Delrine has been widowed. She’s younger than me and has two young sons. She could be an excellent broodmare for you.”
I sit back against the headboard, looking up at the painted ceiling. “Are the boys older than Lydia or younger?”
