Chapter Eighteen #2
But he was lying, wasn’t he? She looked away, unable to look at the man who was her husband. ‘You kept this secret, this true purpose for marriage—Montague, how could you?’
When Calliope turned around to look at him, forcing herself to behold the man who had broken her heart, she had expected to see a man bereft, chagrined, upset he had hurt the woman he purported to love. Oh, she had been so blind.
Instead, it was to see Montague standing straight, tall and handsome, damn him, with a look of anger in his eyes.
‘I am not the one keeping secrets,’ he shot back, his voice strong. ‘Am I?’
Calliope stared. What on earth was the man talking about?
Montague’s laughter was bitter and he shook his head as he took a step towards her. ‘Yes, not so pleasant when one is forced to accept you are the one who has been keeping secrets here!’
‘Secrets?’ True bewilderment was audible in her voice as it filled her very lungs. ‘What are you talking—?’
‘You are the artist Glenarm!’ Montague crowed the words as though he had scored points, a great victory. ‘Try as you might, you cannot hide the truth. You are the mysterious artist Glenarm everyone is searching for. Admit it!’
Montague discovered to his surprise he was breathing heavily—but it was not a surprise to see Calliope astonished.
Yes, she had never believed anyone would guess her true identity. That was, the false identity which she had undertaken to paint as the mysterious Glenarm. Well, he was far cleverer than that. He was not going to ignore the truth any longer! He was…
He was looking at a woman who looked absolutely dazed.
‘Glenarm?’ his wife repeated, wrinkling her nose in clear confusion. ‘What on earth has he got to do with it?’
‘You’re Glenarm! Your secret is that you are the artist posing as Glenarm, selling your art. It is obvious!’ Montague did not understand why she was not just admitting it. ‘Declare it. I worked it out!’
‘I have absolutely no idea what you are talking about,’ Calliope said slowly, talking to him as though he had been hit on the head. ‘My name is Calliope. Calliope Oliver—at least, it was before you tricked me into—’
‘It was not a trick—’
‘I am not this mysterious Glenarm!’
‘How else has your family survived without funds? Why else are you here, where Glenarm paints so many of his—your—pieces?’ A strange sort of giddiness was roaring through Montague’s mind and he could not help but continue, this time with a pointed finger.
‘All that money, where is it? Spending it on cerulean blue?’
Calliope was shaking her head slowly, her beauty a momentary distraction, but he did not allow himself to be so unfocused.
He would make her reveal the truth.
‘Why won’t you admit you are Glenarm?’ It did not make sense. Montague had thought she would be delighted to finally claim the glory. After all, had she not said herself how desperately she had wished to see her own art on gallery walls?
Just for a moment, a flicker of doubt assailed him. Was it possible that—? No, he was right. He had to be!
‘I won’t admit to a name that is not mine, nor have I ever claimed to be such a thing,’ Calliope said, her face a picture of frustration.
‘And this is just a trick to distract me from the fact you do not love me but see me as a useful woman to have about the place, bearing your children and looking after your ward!’
Montague growled in his throat and turned away. Good God, she was frustrating! The woman just had to admit to the truth and then he could explain why his sister had the wrong end of the stick.
That was, the right end of the stick after he’d written her that letter…it felt like a different man who had written that letter. A different man, with a different soul.
He did not think, did not feel, that way any longer. That man had retreated from the world, avoided any true connection at all cost and he… He craved it. He knew now, perhaps for the first time in his life, that he deserved it.
But Montague did not deserve Calliope. She was not a prize. She was the prize—or rather being in her presence was the prize he so desperately wanted.
And yet somehow, despite all his efforts… Montague should have known. He should have known that once again, he would reach out for affection and have his hand pushed back.
When he turned back to his wife, the woman he loved but who was also infernally irritating, it was to discover she was crying.
She was crying?
‘Calliope,’ he said weakly.
‘I cannot believe I have married a man who sees me not as a woman, or companion, or even an artist, but as nothing more than another type of servant in his home,’ his wife said bleakly. ‘Have your children, care for John. It’s a job description you truly sought.’
‘No, Calliope—’
‘I thought you cared. I thought you respected me as an artist, as a woman,’ Calliope said through her tears. ‘And you just wanted this Glenarm!’
Oh dear God.
‘All my life—all my life I have been ignored and forgotten. You try being the middle of three sisters!’ she continued, her eyes sparkling with tears.
‘You try entering art galleries only to be told that it is for real artists—for male artists, they mean! You try attending art classes and being forbidden, merely because you don’t have a—’
‘Calliope, I never said—’
‘And I thought you saw me, appreciated me for who I am, for what I am,’ Calliope said, her voice cracking. ‘But this…this was never about me, was it?’
Now that wasn’t fair.
He couldn’t speak in time, for she continued, ‘It was about finding a mother for John and then it was about Glenarm. Glenarm! The man probably doesn’t even exist!
You managed to convince yourself I was some mysterious artist, and you goaded me into matrimony.
You trapped me. Why? Because you wanted Glenarm’s art? ’
Montague swallowed, but unfortunately the movement did not undo the knot in his throat. ‘It wasn’t—it isn’t like that.’
Wasn’t it?
The horrendous little voice in the back of his mind was most unwelcome, but Montague could not utterly deny it.
He had wanted someone to provide him with heirs, to disinherit the boy.
He had wanted someone to take charge of John, that being far easier than facing up to the fact that the child was his responsibility.
He had wanted a Glenarm, almost at any price.
But that wasn’t— His feelings for Calliope were true.
Calliope started towards the door. ‘I need to think.’
‘No—Calliope, wait—’
‘Why? To have you throw in my face that I was a spinster, one of the women in Brighton apparently throwing herself at you?’ she shot back.
Montague grabbed her arm and winced at the way she struggled out of his grip. ‘Please, just listen, I can explain—’
‘I don’t want to hear explanations—’
‘Fine, I can apologise,’ he said swiftly.
Panic was starting to roar through him. Calliope was going to walk out of that door and she would not come back. How he knew he was not sure, but he was as certain of it as he had been certain Miss Calliope Oliver as was simply had been Glenarm.
Where had it all gone wrong?
‘I love you, for you,’ Montague started to say.
But his new bride was stronger than she looked.
Tugging her arm free and rubbing at it fiercely, she spat, ‘Do not follow me, Montague, and do not try to convince me to stay. I’ll return to my aunt’s house and we will spend the rest of our lives apart.
If I bear you a child, I will care for it, but I never want to see—’
‘Calliope,’ Montague said desperately. ‘No, please!’
The very idea of never seeing her again, the woman he loved, the woman he adored. To be sure, it had all started so differently but there was no crime in that, was there?
He lifted his attention to her face and saw pain, betrayal and…the truth.
She was not the artist Glenarm.
What the hell had he done?
Calliope opened the door to the hallway. ‘I’ll send for my things.’
Five words, that was all, and then she was gone.
Footsteps. The front door opened. The front door slammed. Silence.
Montague slowly slid down onto the armchair his beautiful wife had so recently vacated. He could still smell the scent of jasmine on its fabric. Her sketchbook lay to the side, a pencil behind it.
Half in a dream, half unable to believe this was reality, he picked up the sketchbook. It fell upon at a page which had obviously been opened frequently.
It was a sketch of himself. True, and uncompromising, Calliope had not been kind enough to remove that freckle or smooth back the skin tugging at his eyes. It was him, Montague Donovan, Marquess of Laidley, as he truly was.
His wry smile was pained. She had seen him. But he had not seen her.
And now he had lost her.