Sophia had retired early after the feast, and now the house was quiet, and there was only his bride.
She sat fresh and pretty in a gown he didn’t recognize, ivory satin gone soft with age, wine-red hair coming loose from its pins in gleaming spirals. When she caught him looking, her throat moved and her eyes fled elsewhere.
Shyness.Of course.A virgin bride delivered right to her wedding night.
He shot the thought down before it could take root, then nodded to her gown. “I don’t recognize this.”
“Oh.” She blushed from beneath her lace collar as he watched it spread up the pale column of her throat, warm rose over cream. “It-it was my mother’s. I apologize I didn’t wear the gown made for me. I—” She cleared her throat and looked away. “I intended to, I mean… until this morning.”
“Did your aunt force the change?”
“No, not at all!” She shook her head hastily and met his gaze with part desperation, part defiance that took him off guard each time. “It is my Mama’s. I wished to wear this for my—well, last time. Instead, my aunt purchased the one from you. I suppose she dislikes sentimentality. But this time, the decision was mine.”
He strolled over to the opposite chair and sat, visibly making himself smaller so she didn’t think he might launch himself at her. What had her family been like if she constantly assumed contradicting him would result in losing his temper? Or worse, even; violence. “I see.”
“You are not… angry?” she ventured.
Overherwedding gown?
The satin poured over her like cream from a pitcher, clinging snug at the waist, at the sweet flare of her hips, and the lowsun had turned the loose curls at her temple to burning copper. One pin. That was all that gown was—a dozen tiny buttons and one breath of resolve—and every inch of that cream-and-rose skin would be his to uncover, slowly, by candlelight, if he were a different man and this a different marriage.
“I merely wanted you to have something of your own to wear. I suppose you beat me to that point.” He shrugged, keeping his eyes fixed on her face. “Who am I to stand between a woman and her sentimentality?”
She pursed her lips. “You went to such effort, I thought—”
“It was hardly any effort. And the gown looks good on you, besides.” He rose, restless again, knowing they ought to speak more, but unable to look at her, let alone speak about her dress, without contemplating what ought to come next in any good marriage.
Theirs was not, of course, agoodmarriageby any margin, but he could not be a man without imagining what his wife might be like on their wedding night. And that was not part of their agreement, nor had he wished it to be at the time.
“W-where are you going?” she asked.
“To my study. I have some work to do. If you’d excuse me.” He gave her a quick bow and left the room before she could object. There were several hours to kill before the evening came, and he had to face the reality of what he had done.
Isadora retired to bed early that night, letting the maid take her to her rooms, which she discovered had an adjoining door into what she could only presume were Nicholas’s rooms. Her heart gave a little lurch at the discovery.
Would he visit her?
They had never spoken of consummating the marriage. He had not mentioned his intentions, and she had not dared to ask. But now it begged the traitorous question of whether she would be sleeping alone tonight, after all.
“Would you like me to help you out of your clothes, Your Grace?” asked Anna, the head housemaid.
Isadora glanced at her reflection. The bedchamber was warm and generous—two armchairs by the fire, a long mirror, a writing desk, and a large canopy bed that dominated one wall. It was a cozy space she could envisage spending a lot of time in.
But should she remove her clothes and prepare for bed? Or should she wait for Nicholas to arrive—if he would? Or even, did the removing of clothes anticipate his arrival? She hadn’t been taught much of anything regarding the wedding night, she realized glumly.
The uncertainty chewed her down to bone, and she frowned at her reflection. Her mother’s gown. The first decision she had made forherin a long time, and she was pleased with it. What was more, the duke had seemed pleased with it too. He didn’t seem to mind that she hadn’t wornhisgown for the wedding. All her dark little theories about him dressing her up like a china doll for company had quietly come apart soon after.
Obviously appearances were important to him—just not more than a small girl’s pride in a crooked cravat, or another girl’s sentimentality toward her mother’s wedding gown.
Well. If he wished to undress her himself, he ought to have come upstairs sooner. No one had told her the rules of this; if she got it wrong, she had a right to make mistakes.
“Yes, please,” she said to Anna at last. The maid had already laid out her nightdress—the plain cotton one from her aunt’s house, washed thin at the elbows. If she wanted finer nightclothes, her aunt had sniffed, she could buy them herself; her new husband had money enough.
Most brides came with bride clothes, but Isadora didn’t mind. Finally, she was free.
Her heart lifted as the familiar worn cotton settled over her, and while she waited—for sleep, or for the door, she refused to decide which—she set about making the room her own. Her mother’s miniature went on the bedside table. Her few books took up their posts on an empty shelf. She moved the ink and paper towhere a left hand wanted them, and dragged the writing desk in front of the window, where the morning light would fall.
Before she could do any more, a knock interrupted her thoughts, and Anna emerged again, holding a letter between her hands.
