Chapter 23
The accusation was glaring enough that it could not be mistaken for wit.
Loretta had smiled over the rim of her wineglass and wondered aloud whether country air encouraged old attachments to grow bolder. Then she had glanced toward Theodore and laughed as though the thought were harmless.
Nothing explicit had been said, which was precisely why it had worked.
By the time Adelaide rose from the table and excused herself, Eric could no longer taste the wine in his mouth.
The room had narrowed around the empty chair she left behind, while Atlas said something low to Loretta that sounded reproving enough to preserve appearances and not nearly firm enough to mean anything. Theodore sat rigid at the far end of the table.
All he could see was the assembly. Theodore’s hand at her elbow. Their laughter. The ease between them that Eric had tried to dismiss as brotherly because she had told him it was, and because he wanted very badly to deserve the trust she had placed in him.
Then the paddock at dusk.
Adelaide looking up at him with her lips parted.
Theodore calling her name.
Loretta’s insinuation found every weak place he had failed to guard. He pushed back his chair before good sense could intervene.
“Eric,” Atlas said quietly.
“I’ll return.”
He did not know whether that was true.
The corridor beyond the dining room lay dim beneath wall sconces turned low for the evening. Adelaide had already crossed half its length, moving quickly enough that the ivory silk at her heels whispered against the runner.
“Adelaide.”
She stopped but did not turn immediately, which should have warned him. When she faced him, her expression was composed in a way he had come to understand meant she was anything but calm.
“Have you come to apologize on Mrs. Sullyard’s behalf?”
“No.”
Her brows lifted. “Then I cannot imagine what remains to be said.”
He approached until only a few feet separated them. The corridor seemed too narrow for the amount of silence between them, too intimate for what he was about to do.
He knew that but continued anyway. “You left rather abruptly.”
“I thought leaving preferable to answering her in a moment of anger.”
“I might have preferred candor in place of absence. Whether in challenge or defense. This is your home and she was rather… blunt.” The words came colder than he intended.
Adelaide’s eyes sharpened. “ You wish me to defend myself?”
“From anyone .”
She studied him for a moment, and something in her face changed as understanding began to take shape. “Oh.”
The quietness of it unsettled him more than anger might have.
“Have I said something wrong?” he asked roughly.
“Why must I defend myself against such inappropriate behavior?” she shot back quickly.
He could have ended the conversation where it stood then.
He could have told her Loretta’s remark had been beneath notice, that he knew Theodore was her friend, that the real wound had nothing to do with impropriety and everything to do with how close he had come to kissing her before another man called her away.
Instead, pride found jealousy waiting and mistook it for courage.
“You do spend a considerable amount of time with him.”
The sentence settled between them. And Adelaide did not move.
“With Theodore,” he said, feeling the need to continue.
“I understood you without the clarification.”
“He seeks you out.”
“ Again, he has known me since childhood.”
“He interrupts us frequently.”
Her lips parted, then closed.
Eric pressed on because retreat now would require admitting how small he had become. “You vanish into rooms with him. You walk the grounds together. You speak in half sentences no one else understands.”
“He is my oldest friend.”
“So you have said and I believe you.”
The disappointment in her face arrived slowly, and it made him want to take every word back… but it also made him crueler. “But perhaps,” he continued, “you have grown accustomed to assuming that explanation should satisfy everyone.”
Her color rose. “Everyone?”
“The household clearly notices.”
“The household notices when the wind changes direction.”
“Society will notice more … Starting with the village, and anyone else Loretta runs into whether here in the country or down in London.”
“There it is.” Her voice had gone very quiet.
“What?”
“The concern for appearances. The concern of what others might think or say… hundreds of miles away.”
“That is not unreasonable. I have responsibilities— ”
“So do I!” She folded her hands at her waist, though one thumb worried at the edge of her glove. “Tell me plainly, Eric. Do you believe I have behaved improperly?”
He should have said no, the answer existed inside him, immediate and absolute.
No, I do not believe that.
But what he said instead was, “I believe you have been careless.”
The words struck her with visible force. And while he had learned that Adelaide never offered pain so cheaply. He knew his words had met their mark when she simply became still.
Eric heard his own breathing in the hush that followed. Regret pulsing through his veins, but he had gone too far already… Best to let it all out rather than let it sit inside of him and fester.
“Careless,” she repeated.
“With boundaries,” he said quickly.
“With whom?” Her gaze held his. “I would like to hear you say it.”
He looked away first, which should have ended it, but again, it did not. “Theodore’s familiarity with you exceeds what most husbands would tolerate.”
“Most husbands?” The disbelief in her voice sharpened into anger. “You have spent weeks telling me you are not most husbands.”
“I am still a man.”
“I had noticed.”
“And you are still my wife.”
He despised the sentiment the instant it left him, and Adelaide stared at him, furious. “My wife,” she said, each word controlled. “Is that the whole of it?”
“Do not twist what I said.”
“I have no need. It arrived twisted.”
He clenched his jaw. “I have asked for very little.”
“You have asked for friendship, honesty, independence, and trust.”
“I have given you all of those.”
“Have you? Truly?” The question landed cleanly.
“You know I have.”
“Well… I thought I did, but now I am no longer certain.” She took a step closer, and despite everything, his body registered the nearness before his mind could stop it. “I told you what Theodore is to me.”
“I remember.”
“You said you believed me.”
“I did —I do…”
“Then what exactly are we discussing?”
He could not answer without exposing his jealousy and fear and wanting her so badly that Theodore’s presence became an affront even when reason insisted it was not. Silence answered for him.
Adelaide’s anger cooled into recognition. “This is not about my conduct at all.”
He looked toward the darkened windows. “Do not presume to tell me what concerns me.”
“It concerns you that I have a life you did not create.”
“That is not what I said.”
“It concerns you that another man knows me well.”
“Any husband would —”
“Stop hiding behind other husbands.” Her voice remained low, but the words cut through the corridor with more force than a shout. “You are not angry because I have done something wrong. You are angry because you do not know what to do with wanting something you cannot command.”
His gaze snapped back to hers because she had found the truth too easily and somehow shaped words around it when he had not been able to.
“That is absurd,” he nearly hissed.
“No. It is humiliating.”
“For whom?”
“For me.” The answer hollowed him out. Adelaide drew in a careful breath. “I defended you to myself when you withdrew. I excused your silences because grief had taught you to live inside them. I trusted you when you said friendship could be enough, even after I began wishing it were not.”
Her voice caught only slightly, and the slightness hurt more than seeing her tears would have.
“And now Loretta Sullyard tosses a filthy little suggestion across your own table, and you follow me into the corridor to prove that beneath all your courtesy, you think no better of me than she does.”
He straightened. “That is not true.”
“Then why does it feel exactly true?”
He took a step toward her. “Adelaide —”
“No.” She lifted one hand between them. The gesture stopped him more completely than any command. “You do not get to wound me and then soften your voice as though tenderness afterward makes the cut smaller.”
She had never spoken to him like this —no one had.
“I was angry,” he said and hated how inadequate it sounded.
“I am angry still.”
“I did not mean —”
“You have been clear as to what exactly you meant.”
He flinched, and of course she saw it. For one moment, compassion almost returned to her face, and then it left, as if she remembered that she was angry with him. “I thought you were becoming brave,” she said. The words were quiet now, almost gentle. “That was my mistake.”
His chest tightened.
She stepped back, putting distance between them with deliberate care. “You asked me once whether I could be content with a husband who offered respect but not love.”
He could barely breathe.
“I believed respect would be the safer promise.” Her eyes shone, but she did not look away. “Now I see you were wise not to offer more. You have not yet learned how to hold even that without crushing it when you are frightened.”
The blow landed exactly where she intended, and Eric stood motionless. Adelaide inclined her head with all the composure of a duchess dismissing an acquaintance. “Good night, Your Grace.”
She turned and walked away before he could answer, and he remained alone in the corridor, listening to the diminishing sound of her steps until even that was gone.
The house carried on around him with maddening discretion. Somewhere beyond the closed dining room doors, glass touched china and someone attempted to revive the conversation Loretta had poisoned.
A footman crossed the far end of the passage, saw him standing there, and changed direction with admirable speed. Even the lamps seemed to burn more quietly than usual, as though Wolverton itself had learned not to intrude when its master was making a ruin of something.