Chapter 6 #2
As he had the night before, her husband sauntered into the room in bare feet and a dressing gown, his nonchalance an insult when her hands were trembling at her sides and her body was coming to life with remembered warmth of all that had passed between them and all that would yet again.
“Madam,” he greeted her with the selfsame icy courtesy, offering a half bow. “You enjoyed dinner, I trust?”
She had been seated far from him at dinner, but she hadn’t missed his gaze, stealing over her like a caress at almost every opportunity. For his sake, she had flirted madly with every gentleman at her end of the table. Her bodice had been daringly low yet again as well.
“I enjoyed it greatly,” she lied.
“Excellent.”
He stopped before her and frowned. “Why is your hair bound?”
“It seemed the most expedient means of keeping it confined. It was last night as well, and you didn’t find fault.”
“Undo it,” he ordered her.
She eyed him, unwilling to do as he demanded when he was so thoroughly rude in his request.
“Please,” he added, his tone gentling.
“Why?”
“Because your hair is lovely, and it delights me to see it unplaited.”
The compliment was wrapped in barbs. Barbs that pricked and drew blood. She had been ordered about before, subject to the whims of one man. To his mercurial moods and his iron-edged control. She had escaped.
“Delighting you is not a part of my duty, Your Grace,” she pointed out to her husband. “My hair will remain as it is.”
“Then I shall play lady’s maid.” He reached for her hair.
Sybil sidestepped his touch. “I prefer to keep it thus.”
“Ah, of course.” His nostrils flared. “To spite me.”
She compressed her lips, her earlier frustration and anger toward him returning in ample measure. “Because this is how I wish for my hair to be, and it is my hair.”
“Next, you will lie on the bed once more and begin praying whilst you stare at the ceiling.”
“I already told you that would be sacrilegious, but I can do that if Your Grace prefers it,” she suggested sweetly.
His icy eyes narrowed. “So now you are concerned with what I prefer, in all matters other than your hair.”
“You don’t concern me in the slightest, Your Grace,” she said.
It was a bitter lie. Everything he did concerned her.
She had been dreadfully jealous at dinner, watching him bestow his conversation and attention upon others.
He had been charming and relaxed. The handsome, debonair rake.
But for her, he was cold and aloof, emitting an anger that was palpable, issuing orders as if she were a servant instead of his wife.
She would never understand what she had done to suffer such ill treatment. He had duped her with such ease.
“How reassuring to hear,” he said, his voice as forbidding as his expression had become.
“Am I meant to reassure you? Forgive me. Perhaps I should unbind my hair and then tear off all my garments and drape myself over the bed for you like a willing sacrifice.”
“You go too far, madam,” he growled.
She longed to push him. To slap him. To do him violence. The urge shocked her, but his cold demands had taken her to the brink. She no longer recognized herself. Perhaps she was more her father’s daughter than she had previously been willing to admit.
Sybil clenched her jaw instead. “On the contrary, it is you who has gone too far.”
“Not far enough, it would seem,” Riverdale said, reaching for her hair.
Pins fell to the carpet as he plucked them free. The heavy mass of her braid fell loose down her back and then spilled into waves.
He had touched her more intimately yesterday, and yet somehow this infraction felt far more intimate. Far too familiar. Before she was even aware of what she was doing, Sybil’s hand shot out, and she slapped Riverdale across the face.
The sound rang through the chamber just as her voice had.
For a moment, she could do nothing more than stare at the rapidly blooming pink of his cheek, stunned at herself. She clapped her palm over her mouth, shock sending a tremor through her.
And still, Riverdale just stared.
He moved toward her suddenly, and she flinched, backing away, raising her arm and hiding her face to defend herself from the blows about to rain down upon her. No blows came, however. Nothing but an icy, heavy silence.
“Sybil.”
His voice cut through.
Slowly, she lowered her arm, releasing the breath she’d been holding. He was staring down at her with an expression she couldn’t decipher.
“Did you think I would strike you?” he asked with deadly calm.
“I…” She faltered, not knowing what to say.
Her reaction had been instant, instinctive. A mistake for how much it had obviously revealed.
“Has someone raised his hand to you?” Riverdale pressed.
She stared, stricken, not wanting to answer. Her mother had begged her to never say a word.
Riverdale took her arm in a gentle hold.
She tensed. “What are you doing?”
“Bringing you into the light so I can see your eyes when I speak to you,” he said grimly, guiding her to the nearest sconce on the wall. His pale gaze searched hers. “Now answer me honestly, if you please. What man has hurt you?”
Still, she couldn’t bring herself to speak.
“There’s no need to defend him now,” Riverdale added. “You’re in my protection. He can’t hurt you ever again.”
“It was my father,” she blurted.
He stared at her. “Your father?”
There was a deceptive calm in his voice, one that frightened her. “Yes, but you mustn’t say anything to him, please. It will only make matters far worse for my mother.”
“He strikes Lady Eastlake as well?” Riverdale demanded.
She thought of her mother’s whimpered cries from another room, the plum-colored flesh she had caught glimpses of that she hadn’t been meant to see. Then of the day her father had raised a hand to her for the first time.
“Yes.”
“How? You have witnessed this?”
“Occasionally. He doesn’t often allow his rage to show unless he’s in private. But he has slapped her. I’ve seen him pull her hair. Pulling at her arm in a harsh and angry grip. It’s when he is in his cups,” she added.
“That doesn’t excuse his actions,” Riverdale said, taking her chin in his thumb and forefinger and tilting her head. “Look at me, Sybil.”
She couldn’t do it.
Tears were burning, threatening to fall, shame rising, acidic and choking in her throat. Her lashes lowered.
“Look at me,” he insisted.
She opened her eyes at his bidding, his gaze burning into hers.
“I will never strike you,” he said. “You have my word as a gentleman.”
Sybil wasn’t certain she believed him. But then, although he had shown her anger, he had certainly never done her violence. She was the one who had struck him, much to her everlasting shame. She was no better than her father.
“Forgive me,” she blurted. “I shouldn’t have struck you, Your Grace.”
“Call me Everett, if you please. And I accept your apology, though there was no need to issue one. We have both been at our worst this evening, I expect.” His pale eyes had thawed.
There was no longer ice in them but a depth of warmth she hadn’t seen since the day they had met under the wide blue skies, when everything had seemed so much simpler. The warmth, she suspected, was deceptive. And she didn’t want his pity.
“Try it.”
She frowned at him, intensely aware of his touch still on her chin, the way he held her face as gently as if it were made of fine porcelain. As if one wrong move would make her chip or shatter.
“Try what?” she asked, the air between them shifting again.
Danger and anger no longer swirled. Instead, a heaviness had taken their place.
“My name,” he murmured. “Say it.”
She wanted to deny him, and yet she also wanted to try his given name. Even if doing so felt dangerous. Yet another intimacy broached from which there could be no return.
“Everett,” she said.
He stared at her, saying nothing. For a moment, she thought he would kiss her. That he would lead her to the bed and at last take what he had come for this evening.
But instead, he nodded slowly, then leaned into her, pressing a chaste kiss to her cheek.
“I’ll bid you good evening, Sybil.”
And then, just as quickly as he had come, Riverdale withdrew from her chamber, leaving her alone once more.