“It was so very long ago, my wedding to Julius. I was but a girl myself, if you recall. And ours was an arranged marriage at first.” She continued brushing. “And as you know, my memory is not the best, since after my accident I lost many of those details. Some of them have never returned, but I find that for the best. It is not that time that is of importance. It is in the past, and what matters is the present. Was it very awkward, you ask? Here in Vienna, when Julius insisted I was his wife and moved into our home, yes, for as long as I considered him a stranger, it was rather awkward indeed. But from the moment I realised I loved him, and that a part of me had never stopped loving him, the awkwardness passed very quickly.” She gave a soft laugh. “Now I cannot bear to be separated from him for more than a few hours.”
“You are so very lucky,” Evie sighed.
“But Evie.” Catherine set down the brush and looked at her intently. “You love him. Do you not?”
Evie worried her lip with her teeth. She had never confessed it to anyone, and only recently to herself. Then she looked up at Catherine, tears gathering in her eyes once more.
“I do,” she said in a choked voice, and threw her arms around Catherine’s neck. “I do, so very, very much.”
Catherine patted her back and held her, saying nothing for a long moment. “Well, then. That is good. You will do very well, indeed.”
But Evie’s relief at having said it aloud lasted only as long as it took for the next thought to find her. “But I do not think he loves me in return,” she said, her voice muffled against Catherine’s shoulder. “He is fond of me, yes. Maybe he respects me a little, even. But I think that is all.” There was to be no grand, epic passion. He had made that clear enough.
Catherine untangled herself and looked into Evie’s face. “Has he actually said so?”
Evie sniffed. “No.”
“Well, there is hope then. Oh come, child.” She took a handkerchief and wiped Evie’s cheeks.
“What should I do, Catherine?” Evie crumpled the handkerchief in her hand. “Should I simply ask him outright? When he has already declared he does not believe in love?”
Catherine considered for a moment, the brush still in her hand. “When Julius and I were first married, he could not have told me what he felt if his life had depended upon it, and the truth is, back then, he was too blind to even recognise love when it screamed in his face. I had to be the one to love him enough for the both of us until he finally learned how to lower his walls.” She smiled. “Hartenberg strikes me as much the same. He will not find his way to it on his own, Evie. You will have to lead him there.”
Evie nodded slowly. “I have no idea how to do that. But it is good advice, indeed.”
Feeling considerably better, the two women rejoinedthe remaining company. As Evie entered the room, Hartenberg looked up and a smile escaped him before he could school his face back into composure, and her heart skipped.
She stepped towards her husband, who took her hands. “Ready?”
When he looked at her like that, she found it so very easy to believe that maybe, just maybe…
She opened her mouth.
Just then, the door slammed open and an officer burst into the room.
“Your Grace,” he gasped, not entirely certain which duke he was addressing, Wellington or Aldingbourne. “Your Excellency. I am the bearer of terrible news.”
Wellington stepped forward. “What has happened, man? Speak!”
The officer opened his mouth, once, twice, as if incapable of uttering the words.
At last he stammered, his voice cracking, “He has returned.”
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Evie was cross.
She was sitting in the drawing room of her new home, an elegant baroque town house not far from the Imperial Palace.
Alone.
She had more servants than she could possibly need and was running out of creative ways to keep them busy.
Two footmen were standing by the door, as they had the entire day. She considered sending them on a fool’s errand throughout Vienna to get rid of them. Anything to keep them from hovering there, throwing pitying looks at her.
The housekeeper kept asking her on a regular basis whether her ladyship needed anything. No, she did not, she replied with gritted teeth.
Now was not the time to throw fancy tea parties, nor soirées.
