Chapter 26

Isabella didn’t sleep a wink that night. She sat in her window seat, trying to sort out her emotions about the kiss. Trying to understand everything that had happened, and to piece together the reasons why it had happened. And perhaps, if she was very lucky, to think of a way to make it happen once again.

Now that she’d had a kiss, she longed for another. She knew, too, that she had been wrong to think that Arthur had no interest in her. He might think it was wrong for the two of them to be that close—though why he could have thought so, she wasn’t sure. They were husband and wife, weren’t they? This was what was supposed to happen between them. But Arthur had always been full of mystery, and it was clear that he didn’t want to permit himself to experience happiness. Their marriage wasn’t the only way in which he was depriving himself, either. He had kept all the mementos of his parents locked away in an attic, refusing to visit them for years and years. Maybe he was doing the same thing with his heart. Maybe he had locked his feelings away and was refusing to acknowledge them for some reason. And just as she had persuaded him to return to the attic, maybe it was her duty to help him find the way back to the feelings he’d locked away as well. Maybe she would be the one to guide him in that way.

It would be a privilege if that was true. She would be thrilled to have the opportunity to help him trust himself again.

As dawn broke, she felt excited and confident. He would join her for breakfast as he always did, and the two of them would talk about what had happened last night. Isabella was no fool—she knew that he wouldn’t be likely to want to talk about it at first—but she would convince him, just as she had convinced him that it was right to go into the attic. She would get him talking, and eventually, he would have to admit that the kiss had been lovely, and that another one would be lovely as well. She knew he felt that way. It wasn’t possible to share a kiss as passionate as the one they had shared last night if you weren’t enjoying it. She was confident of that fact.

She dressed in one of her nicest everyday gowns, a blue one that she knew he admired her in—she had caught him looking at her a little bit longer the last time she’d worn it. She took her time with her hair, making sure her appearance was perfect. There could be no flaws today. She needed him to look at her and understand at once what he had found so appealing about her yesterday. She needed him to be drawn in.

Isabella paused before the looking glass for one last moment before going down to breakfast. She had done as well as she could on her appearance, she thought—the best thing she could do now was to go down to breakfast and approach the conversation they needed to have with confidence.

She thought she might get there before him—even though she had taken her time getting ready, she was early because she had been awake all night—but to her surprise, Arthur had beaten her to the table. Seeing him there gave her a little shock of pleasure. Had he been similarly disturbed last night? And he looked so good—perhaps he, too, had made a special effort today. Maybe this conversation would be easy. Maybe he was also eager to say the things she wanted to say.

She took her seat and helped herself to bread and chocolate. Now that she was here, sitting across from him, she found herself almost impossibly nervous. She had known what she wanted to say—she’d rehearsed it in her head—but the idea of saying it out loud now was intimidating. She swallowed hard. Perhaps he would be the one to speak first. After all, what had happened last night had to be addressed. To simply ignore it was not an option.

Arthur cleared his throat. “How did you sleep?”

“Very well, thank you.” An utter lie, but she didn’t want this turning into a conversation about her physical well-being, and if he knew that she hadn’t slept at all, that could very easily happen. She wanted to talk about the feelings that the two of them had for one another and the kiss they had shared. Nothing else. “And you?” she asked. “How did you sleep?”

“Well, thank you.”

Perhaps tonight, he would ask her to share his bed! Oh, that was a thrilling idea if a bit frightening. Isabella found that her hands were trembling at the thought, so she tucked them into her skirts. She didn’t want him to know how nervous she was.

He looked at her across the table. “Are you sure you’re all right?” he asked. “You’re not eating.”

“I’m not very hungry this morning,” she replied. “I had plenty to eat last night.”

He nodded. “All right,” he said. “As long as you’re getting everything you need.”

It was the perfect opening—the perfect chance to discuss the fact that she wasn’t getting everything she needed. At the very least, she wasn’t getting everything she wanted. She opened her mouth, ready to say so.

But Arthur spoke first. “I’m going to be going away for a while,” he said.

Isabella was startled. “Going away?” she asked. “What do you mean?”

He wasn’t looking directly at her, she saw—perhaps he had anticipated that this announcement would trouble her. “I’m going to stay at one of my other estates,” he explained. “Out on the far side of the city.”

“Well, I’ll come with you,” she said at once. “I would love to see your other estates.”

“No,” he said, “it’s my wish that you remain here, Isabella.”

“But truly, I would rather be with you,” she said. “I don’t mind traveling if that’s what you’re worried about. In fact, I rather enjoy it, and I’d like to see new places.”

“I told you no,” he said, his tone sharp. She was shocked—he sounded almost angry. How could he be angry with her? She’d done nothing. Unless this was about the kiss they had shared—but it made no sense to be angry with her for that when he was the one who had initiated it! If anything, he ought to be angry with himself, not with her. But even that made no sense to Isabella, for it had been a pleasant event. Thrilling, even. She was certain he had enjoyed it every bit as much as she had. Why would he act like this now?

“You can’t go,” she said.

Now, he looked at her, raising his eyebrows. “I beg your pardon?”

“You can’t go,” she repeated, feeling bold. “You can’t go away and leave me here all on my own. What about the things we discussed? You know how lonely I’ve been feeling. You seemed as though you cared about that. I think you do care about that. But now you’re going to go away and leave me, and you’re not even telling me when you mean to come back? You can’t do that. You could never be so cold.”

“I have the right to go where I want to go and to do as I please,” Arthur informed her. “And my intention right now is to go to my estate on the far side of the city as I’ve just explained to you. You will remain here.”

“But Arthur?—”

“No more arguments,” he said firmly. “We’ve had enough arguments, you and I. I’ve been too lenient. I’ve given you cause to think that you can negotiate the rules I put in place for you, and that’s unfair of me. That’s not the way things are going to be.”

Isabella’s heart sank. She understood what he was saying—that there would be no second kiss, that the one they’d already shared had been an anomaly. He wanted her to understand that it wouldn’t be repeated. She understood, all right, but what she didn’t understand was why. Why was he doing this? Why would he change everything between the two of them just as it had been starting to get good?

“Please don’t go,” she said, knowing as she spoke the words that there was no hope. It was clear from the look on his face that his mind was already made up about this.

He shook his head. “I’m leaving right after breakfast,” he said. “If anything, you ought to be relieved.”

“And why would I be relieved? I’ve told you how lonely things are for me here, and your solution is to leave me even more alone than I have been? And you expect me to feel relief about that?”

“You’ll be able to do whatever you like here in my absence,” Arthur explained. “You’ll be able to go anywhere you want to go in the house. I know how important that is to you.”

“Arthur, that’s nothing. Do you honestly believe that I care about what rooms in the house I go into? That means nothing to me. What matters is that you have been keeping me at a distance by keeping me out of certain rooms. It isn’t the rooms I care about! You could tell me I wasn’t allowed into half the house if you would only let me into your life a bit more, Arthur. If you would only allow me to be your wife. But I can see now that it’s nothing but a fantasy. You will never allow me to get that close to you, will you? You’ve never cared enough about me to let me in that far. I really thought, after last night, that things were going to change between us, but they weren’t. Nothing will ever change between you and me. I’ve been a fool to hope for it.”

Arthur’s face was impossible to read. “I’ve been honest with you right from the very beginning,” he said.

“And you’re a fool if you believe that,” she replied sadly. “Do you really think you’ve done nothing to give me any reason to hope for change, Arthur? That it’s nothing but my own foolishness making me believe in the possibility of a husband who loves me and wants to keep me close? You’re the one who keeps changing—not me. You’re the one who kissed me last night and then greeted me in the morning with the news that he was leaving me all alone. So don’t act as if I’m the one who doesn’t have a head on her shoulders.”

She rose from the table. “I hope you enjoy your stay in your other estate,” she said stiffly, forcing herself to hold back the tears that threatened. “I’m sure you will, for you’ll have the thing you want most of all—solitude. You never wanted a wife. Not really. All you wanted was to be able to say to your business partners and the ton at large that you had a wife. All you wanted was to protect your reputation. You can do that now, and never mind the cost to anyone else, I suppose.”

She turned away before she had to see the look on his face or hear what he had to say and hurried back up the stairs to her room. With any luck, he would be gone before they had to see one another again.