Chapter 26

CHAPTER 26

“Dance with me, wife,” Arthur murmured in Isolde’s ear as the orchestra struck up a waltz. “You’ve been avoiding me all evening.”

She started at his touch—an unusual reaction, given how naturally she’d melted into his embrace these past weeks. Something was different tonight, though he couldn’t quite place it.

“I haven’t been avoiding you,” she said, but her smile didn’t reach her eyes. “You were discussing business.”

“And now I’m discussing dancing.” He drew her into his arms, noting how she slightly held back despite taking the proper position. “Though I can think of far more interesting things to discuss later, in private.”

Usually, such suggestions earned him at least a blush, if not a playful retort. Tonight, she merely nodded, her gaze fixed somewhere over his shoulder.

“Isolde.” He tightened his grip on her slightly as they turned. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing’s wrong. Why would anything be wrong?”

But there was a brittle edge to her voice that he’d never heard before. The confident, passionate woman who’d teased him at breakfast seemed to have vanished, replaced by this distant stranger in his arms.

Before he could press further, Lord Winthorpe’s voice rang out across the ballroom.

“My dear friends!” The Earl raised his glass, beaming at Lady Langhall. “I cannot express the joy in my heart enough tonight. To find love once in life is a blessing. To find it twice…” His voice caught with emotion. “Well, that is nothing short of a miracle.”

Arthur felt Isolde tremble in his arms.

“Some might say a man in my age is foolish to speak about love,” Lord Winthorpe continued. “But love knows no season, no proper time or place. It simply is, transforming everything it touches with its grace.”

Isolde’s fingers tightened on Arthur’s shoulder, then abruptly relaxed as she stepped away from him. The loss of her warmth felt like a physical blow.

“Isolde—”

“The dance is over,” she said quietly.

Indeed, the final notes were fading away, but that hadn’t stopped them from lingering in each other’s arms before.

The ride back home passed in uncomfortable silence. Arthur watched his wife stare out the carriage window, the moonlight painting her profile in silver and shadow. The distance between them felt as vast as the ocean.

When they arrived at Meadowell House, she moved immediately toward the stairs, but he caught her hand.

“Enough. Tell me what’s troubling you.”

She turned around slowly, and the pain in her eyes made his chest tighten. “Do you love me, Arthur?”

The question hit him like a physical blow. “Isolde⁠—”

“It’s a simple question.” But her voice shook. “Do you love me? Could you ever love me?”

His father’s voice echoed in his head. “Love is for fools and poets, boy. A duke needs heirs, not tender feelings.”

“I…” The words stuck in his throat. “I cannot promise that.”

She made a small sound in the back of her throat. “Cannot or will not?”

“Does it matter?” He reached for her, but she stepped back.

“It matters to me.” Tears rolled down her cheeks. “I was such a fool, wasn’t I? Letting myself hope that this could be more than convenience, more than duty.”

“Isolde, please⁠—”

“No.” She wrapped her arms around herself as if trying to hold together something that was falling apart. “I knew what this marriage was from the beginning. I was the fool who forgot, who let myself believe.”

The sight of her pain was unbearable, yet he couldn’t find the words to ease it. Couldn’t voice the feelings that threatened to choke him.

“I need to be alone,” she whispered, turning away. “I cannot… I just need to be alone.”

He watched her flee up the stairs, every step feeling like another crack in the walls he’d built around his heart.

“Love is weakness,” his father’s voice whispered in his head.

But as he watched Isolde disappear upstairs, Arthur wondered if perhaps the real weakness was being too afraid to love at all.

Arthur swirled the brandy in his glass, watching the firelight dance in the amber liquid. How many nights had he spent like this before marrying Isolde? Yet, now the study felt cavernous, empty without her presence.

He couldn’t stay in their chambers tonight. Couldn’t bear to see her side of the bed cold and untouched, the pillows still smelling like her. These past weeks, he’d grown accustomed to her warmth beside him, the way she’d curl into his embrace, the way she’d wake him with gentle kisses…

The brandy burned his throat but did nothing to erase the memory of her taste, the soft sounds she made when he touched her, the way her body welcomed his with such perfect trust.

Trust he’d somehow shattered tonight.

He rose to stoke the fire, his movements restless. Something had changed in her between their playful morning and that damned party. But what? She’d seemed triumphant after some encounter—he’d glimpsed her walking away from Lady Wexford with her head held high—but then…

The fire’s warmth did nothing to thaw the cold weight in his chest. He should go to her, try to explain that while he couldn’t promise her love, he felt something. Something that terrified him with its intensity.

His hand actually moved toward the door before he caught himself.

What would he say? That his father had beaten any notion of love out of him before he could walk? That he’d spent his entire life building walls to protect himself from exactly this kind of pain?

No, better to let her have this night to herself. Better to maintain some distance before he ruined things further with his clumsy attempts at reconciliation.

Still, as he poured himself another measure of brandy, Arthur couldn’t shake the image of tears sliding down her cheeks, the way her voice had broken on that simple question.

Do you love me?

The words echoed in his mind, mocking him. Such a simple question with such an impossible answer.

He sank into his chair, the leather creaking in the silence. Dawn would break, eventually. Perhaps in the light of day, he’d find the words to bridge this chasm between them.

But for now, he would sit here alone, haunted by memories of softer nights and the ghost of what might have been.