Nothing in his bearing confessed to the night before. His coat was pressed to knife-edges, his hands as loose and easy as ever, and not so much as a shadow smudged beneath his eyes.
Yet he had most certainly stayed out late.
Isadora had fought sleep until somewhere around three in the morning, and while remnants of last night’s exhaustion clung to her bones, here he sat, fresh as new milk.
“Did you sleep well?” she asked as she poured herself some tea.
“Tolerably.”
The teapot throttled a little. Conversing with him was like paying calls on a brick wall. More silence stretched between them. She longed to ask where he had been, but if she did that, she would have to admit to spying on him.
Perhaps I should have taken the stroll with Sophia after all.
Or perhaps she would simply follow him next time. No small feat when they shared one roof and every servant in it, but she was a resourceful woman. She had married a duke with nothing but a carpet bag after all; she could manage a little espionage.
Gregson swept into the room bearing a silver salver held aloft, upon which lay a fresh pile of letters. He placed the correspondence first before Nicholas, who thumbed through it without much interest until he reached the fourth. His hand froze.
It was only for a second. Then he turned the letter facedown, slipped it beneath the others, and resumed as though nothing had happened.
Isadora watched the small motion out of the corner of her eye, wanting to pry, but she had her own post to attend to. Flicking through absently, humming, her own attention snagged on a letter with now-familiar handwriting.
She glanced sidelong at Nicholas, waiting until he was absorbed in another letter of his own before using her knife to break the seal and open the note.
Isadora (I hope I may still have the liberty of addressing you so),
I beg you would grant me a few moments of your time, that I might at least attempt to set matters right between us. If there is any kindness left in your opinion of me, and you wish to know the truth of why I was unable to attend our wedding, meet me beside Mrs. Ellwood’s Tea Gardens, where your Uncle Vernon first introduced us.
I shall wait for you there this afternoon through to the evening.
Yours,
NW
Careful to avoid the duke’s eyes, Isadora folded the letter along its creases, small and smaller, and buried it beneath the rest of her post. Nicholas would never know, and while part of her was a tiny bit curious to know what Mr. Windham could possibly think would make this right—especially when she had ostensibly the happy ending she had always hoped for—she had no intention of meeting him.
Nothing good could come of a rendezvous like that. And although Nicholas’s lack of interest in her stung more than she cared to admit, she would never repay coldness with betrayal.
She was better than that. His sister’s enigmatic words came back to her, ‘He is not always perfect, but he will try.’
Yes, their marriage was far from perfect when he carried so many secrets and hid so many demons, but growing up as the overlooked middle child in her family and the unnoticed niece with her aunt and uncle, Isadora was nothing if not patient.
Nicholas glanced up as she gathered her letters to her bosom and rose to leave. His mouth opened, as though he wanted to say something to her. A line appeared between his brows, and for a moment, he looked almost anguished. Then the calm slid back over his face like ice sealing a pond, and he looked down and took a slow, deliberate bite of toast.
She left the room.
Sophia had been talking about the ducks for the better part of ten minutes.
“—and Betsy said we couldn’t feed them the good bread, so we had the heels, and the big one, the cross one, he took it right out of my hand. Betsy screamed.” She was lying on the library carpet with her feet on the fender, sighing at the memory. “He didn’t bite me, though. Betsy said he would but he didn’t. His head’s green like the bottle glass in the still room.”
“Mm.” Isadora turned a page. “The cross ones never bite. It’s the quiet ones you want to watch.”
“That’s what Papa taught me about people.” Sophia wiggled her toes at the fire. “Can we go again tomorrow? Betsy won’t come, she says her boots are ruined, but they were ruined before, I saw them. And I want to show you where the swan nest was. Mama fed the swans, I think that’s why there’s no picture of her on the stairs anymore, Papa had it taken away because she’s holding the bread basket in it, Mrs. Perry said—anyway, there might be eggs by now. Betsy said July but I think sooner.”
Isadora went very still at the mention of the former duchess.
Her portrait was removed? Why?She had been led to believe Nicholas had loved his last wife. Was that not the reason he’d remained unmarried?
She looked at Sophia, sprawled on the carpet, who was now examining a hole in her stocking, entirely unaware she had said anything at all.
