“And with her, decisions we must make,” she pointed out.
Julian nodded. He did not say anything further, and the silence that followed was not the comfortable kind they had found in the library two evenings ago. It was the other kind. The kind that had too much in it.
“You kissed me without asking,” she said.
“I know”
“In front of a hundred people.”
“It was effective.”
“You keep saying that.” She turned to look at him. “As though effectiveness is the only thing that matters. As though I am simply a piece on a board that you move when it suits the game.”
“That is not what I think of you.”
“Then what do you think of me?” she said. “Because I confess, I cannot work it out. You are warm, and then you are cold. You are present, and then you are distant. You held me in Dover and then came home and spoke to me as though we had never been to Dover at all.” Her voice stayed level. She had promised herself it would stay level. “I am tired of it, Julian. I am tired.”
“I was trying to keep us both focused on what matters. Arabella. David. The danger that Devereau’s presence tonight confirms we are still in.”
“That is a very tidy explanation.”
“It is the truth.”
“It is part of the truth,” she said. “The part you are comfortable giving me.” She looked back out over the street. “You became cold the moment things between us began feeling real. I noticed it. I noticed exactly when it happened, and so did you, and we have both been pretending otherwise
He said nothing.
“You look at me,” she said, “as though I am still the girl I was before. The one who wrote terrible poetry and nearly fainted over a ball gown and thought herself in love with a man who did not deserve it.” She turned to face him fully.
“I am not her. I have not been her for some time. Scotland saw to that rather thoroughly.” She held his gaze. “I am not weak simply because I once believed in love. I am not fragile simply because it cost me something when I was wrong about it. I survived a great deal on my own, and I did not need rescuing, and I do not need protecting now, least of all from you.”
“Clara…”
“I need you to stop confusing me,” she said. “That is what I need. I need you to either admit that you regret this marriage and leave me to manage my feelings in peace, or I need you to stop pulling away every time we begin to understand one another. What I cannot bear is the middle. The warmth and then the cold and then the warmth again.”
“I know it. It is my weakness, not yours.”
He had stepped closer. She was not sure when. The balcony was not large, and he was close enough now that she could see his expression clearly in the low light from the street below, and what was on his face was not pity, and it was not the careful politeness he had been wearing all evening.
“Why is it weakness?” she asked. “Why do you pull back every time? Why does it have to go cold the moment something real passes between us? Why can you not simply…”
He reached out and took her face in his hands and kissed her.
She gasped against him. The shock of it went through her completely, every argument dissolving at once. His hand tightened at her waist, and she stopped being shocked and kissed him back.
When they finally broke apart, she was breathing hard. His forehead came down to rest against hers, and for a moment, neither of them moved.
Below, a carriage rattled past.
“Well,” she said at last. Her voice came out steadier than she had any right to expect.
“Yes,” he said.
Neither of them said anything further. But he did not let go of her waist, and she did not step back. And the silence between them was, after weeks of being the wrong kind, entirely the right one.
CHAPTER 31
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