Chapter 5

Charmian’s mind reeled after the revelations of the last half hour. The churning mix of emotions in her stomach made her feel sick. Anger was there. And sorrow. And astonishment and guilt. Definitely guilt. Guilt as gnawing and powerful as a disease. She’d promised to trust Roland when she married him, yet she never had. And she’d been wrong.

Roland stepped forward to take her arm. “Sit down before you fall down.”

It was the first time that he’d touched her since she’d left him. The contact slammed through her like gunfire, cut through her roiling confusion. She caught her breath, and her eyes fixed on his face. “How could they do that? It was so cruel.”

Roland’s lips flattened. “I suspect they thought they were protecting you.”

“That’s…that’s a very generous view of their actions.”

“Oh, I’m not feeling generous. I’m not feeling generous at all.”

Charmian believed that. She heard the controlled rage in his voice.

Her gaze searched his features. She wanted to know what he was feeling. About their situation. About her. Did his anger extend to his wife? It had, she had no doubt. Had what they learned tonight changed that?

She’d been angry with him, too. Furious and resentful and hurt. Hurt to the depths of her soul. But now, now only one question mattered. “What do you want to do?”

A grim smile lengthened his lips. “Apart from push your aunt into a snowdrift?”

She shouldn’t laugh. Nothing about this debacle was funny. But a huff of bleak amusement escaped her nonetheless. “Can I help?”

His smile broadened, and for a charged moment, they stared at each other without animosity creating a wall between them. For a fleeting instant, she was the girl who had married him, who had adored the ground he walked on, who had been convinced that she’d found the other half of her soul.

Whether that was true or not, her soul had been in bleeding tatters since the day she’d left him.

The shutters fell back over his eyes. He couldn’t have said “keep out” any more clearly. “Sit down, Charmian.”

In a haze of misery, she let him settle her on the edge of the bed. His hand on her arm felt like the only warmth in the entire cosmos. As if to confirm that winter had conquered the world, a gust of wind rattled the windowpane.

When Roland released her, she wanted to howl like that icy wind. She’d been cold for three long years. She didn’t want to be cold any longer.

Instead of sitting beside her – it was humiliating quite how much she wanted him to stay – he crossed the small room and sank into the Windsor chair near the fire. Without speaking, he lowered his head and studied his linked hands. She stared at his untidy dark hair and wished with futile but piercing longing for a chance to do everything all over again and make different decisions this time.

Charmian prepared for him to rage at her, to blame her for the disaster that their marriage had become. Now that she knew the facts, she couldn’t help but think she deserved it. Yes, her family had interfered. Unforgivably so. But she’d allowed it to happen. She’d gone along with her mother and her aunt’s plans for her with no word of complaint. She just assumed that they were making the best decisions, when in fact their meddling had transformed a hiccup in a new marriage into three wretched years.

But when he spoke, his tone was gentle. He didn’t look up at her which was something of a relief. Those dark eyes always saw too much.

“When I met you, I thought you were the most wonderful girl in the world.”

She tried not to wince at his use of the word “were.” What else did she expect? Whatever he’d done since they’d parted, and she couldn’t imagine he’d slept alone every night like she had, it was clear that the estrangement with his wife had taken a toll on Roland, too. Contrary to her aunt’s predictions.

“Everyone at Celia’s house party admired you. All the girls wanted your attention. Heavens, even all the boys treated you like a hero. I couldn’t believe you noticed me, let alone fell in love with me.”

Slowly he raised his gaze, although she couldn’t read his expression. Charmian supposed that he must be asking himself the same question. She was well aware that she looked a mess. She’d started work before dawn, and her dress was crumpled and stained. Not that it came anywhere near fashionable when it was clean. It certainly wasn’t fit for a baronet’s wife.

She looked, she was bitterly aware, like the peasant she was. And Roland would recognize that, which stung more than it should. After all, they had worse problems to sort out than her smarting vanity. But, oh, how she wished that he’d found her rosy-cheeked with health and wearing silks and satins and sipping tea in a salon. Instead of tired and worn and heartsick and wearing a frock marked by a day’s physical labor.

Charmian struggled not to raise her hand to wipe her face or smooth her hair. She felt vulnerable enough already without revealing to Roland how her shabby appearance made her cringe.

So often, she’d fantasized about meeting him. The dreams that had hurt the most had him opening his arms and saying he’d always loved her and their separation was a tragic mistake. In other dreams, she was dressed to the nines and the toast of society, and he was crushed to realize what a glorious woman he’d lost.

None of her fantasies had involved her frazzled after a chaotic day and trying to make sense of a heinous betrayal from those closest to her.

His smile was reminiscent and surprisingly sweet. “How could I not fall in love with you? You were beautiful and vital and…real. All the other girls there were paper dolls in comparison.”

The sadness in his answer undercut the compliments. The implication, Charmian was well aware, was that she was none of those things anymore. Too late to wish that she’d never left Roland at that inn in York. Too late to wish that she’d stayed and fought for her future. Too late – and pointless as well – to wish that she knew then what she knew now.

Charmian had met Sir Roland Destry at a house party at Lord Hibberd’s Yorkshire estate. Her father had made a fortune as a brewer in Bristol and had ambitions to move up in the world. Ambitions that both his wife and his sister had derided, Charmian now recalled. After all, her aunt’s favorite saying was “You can’t make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear.”

Nonetheless Harry Barton had bought himself a pretty little manor near Wells and set up as a gentleman. He’d raised Charmian, his only child, to be a lady and sent her away to an expensive school near Bath, where the gentry educated their daughters. There she and Lady Celia Hibberd, whose father had hosted that fateful house party three years ago, had become friends.

The rambling old house in the Dales had been crammed to the rafters with eligible young people. Charmian mightn’t be as blue-blooded as her friends, but she was her late father’s heiress. When it came to marriage prospects, all that gold made up for any shady origins in trade.

But the moment that she met Sir Roland Destry, those other gentlemen might as well not have existed. He was four years older than her nineteen and had the polish of Cambridge and a couple of London seasons. More than that, he’d been sweet and funny and kind. And handsome enough to make any girl dream of winning his heart.

For Charmian, the dream had become reality because he’d fallen in love with her just as swiftly as she fell in love with him.

She hadn’t thought back to those first golden weeks with Roland in years. The pain of comparing that euphoric idyll with the loneliness of life since was too excruciating. But seeing him again – still handsome – brought back a tidal wave of memories.

Within a week they’d decided to marry. Within another week, they’d hatched a plan to elope together in secret after the house party finished.

“Why did we run off together? We could have called the banns.”

A bleak smile twisted his lips as he shifted in the wooden chair. “By heaven, you really have forgotten. I was mad for you, and we’d come very close to losing control a couple of times. Lord Hibberd wasn’t much of a chaperone. You and I managed to spend a lot of time alone.”

She hadn’t blushed in ages. Roland’s reappearance in her life seemed to have her blushing every five minutes. “The summerhouse.”

“And the boatshed, and the woods near the lake.”

“And that little room off the dining room.”

“You were lucky you came to the wedding a virgin.”

And, oh, that first night together after their dash to the Scottish border and their quick wedding, conducted by the village blacksmith at Gretna.

After all their naughty escapades on the Hibberd estate, Charmian hadn’t been afraid, but she’d certainly been nervous. Roland had been careful and patient with her, and soon she’d been flying among the stars.

To her shame, when she left him, she hadn’t just missed him, she’d missed having a man in her bed. Roland had awoken a volcanic passion inside her, shown her a dazzling new world of sensual pleasure. Then that glorious discovery was snatched away from her with agonizing abruptness.

Self-disgust flattened her lips. “I couldn’t keep my hands off you.”

“That’s nothing to be ashamed of. I couldn’t get enough of you either, if you recall.”

She could most definitely recall. She’d recalled for three desolate, solitary years.

“We were in love,” he said. More of that heartbreaking past tense.

She stood and sent him a direct look. “Then we had that terrible fight.”

His expression was stark. “And you went away.”

She made an apologetic gesture. “The things we said…”

“We could have come through.”

“If I’d stayed and hadn’t been such a coward,” she said in a dull voice. “I ran for home faster than a rabbit runs for its burrow.”

He didn’t smile. “I should have followed straightaway. I was a fool, too bullheaded to know what I was losing.”

“I thought you would come after me,” she mumbled, looking down at her hands performing a distressed dance at her waist.

She couldn’t endure looking at Roland. She’d spent all this time convinced that he hadn’t suffered. Sometimes she’d been convinced that he didn’t spare her a thought. How else to explain the long silence? In her imagination, he transformed into an unfeeling monster who had forgotten their marriage as easily as he’d forget a rainy day a year ago.

But much as she’d liked believing that she was in the right during their long separation, it was impossible when she looked into his face and read the marks of weariness and remorse and misery. The same things that she saw in her own eyes when she could bear to look in a mirror.

“I did,” he said grimly.

Yes, he had, after her mother sent her away to work at the Spotted Fox. “I was in such a taking, my mother said I needed something to keep me busy. She was sick of me staring out the window all day or curling up on my bed and crying.”

“Charmian…”

Hearing about her grief upset him. He turned waxen, and those deep lines between his nose and mouth sharpened, making him look suddenly older.

She made a helpless gesture, wondering where her pride had gone, but not missing it. “I couldn’t eat and I couldn’t sleep. I was in tatters after we parted. My mother was genuinely afraid that I might do something desperate.”

“I’m sorry.” She couldn’t doubt that he meant it.

“So am I. Especially when—”

“The cause of the argument was so petty.”

She straightened and sent him a direct look. “No, it touched on something important, something we needed to sort out.”

“You wanted to travel south to see your family before we settled at Leeder Hall. I could have agreed.”

She shook her head, as her hands twined together. “Yes, you could. But the fight was really about how fully I was committed to you.”

“It seemed to me—”

“That I put my loyalty to my family ahead of my loyalty to you.”

He sighed and ran his hand through his hair. The familiar gesture made her heart squeeze in painful longing. “I should have been kinder. You were very young and an only child.”

He was trying to ease the load of blame on her, when he really shouldn’t. Both she and Roland had been wronged. She hadn’t forgotten that. She never would. But she was sickly aware that the sin lay heaviest on her, not on her intrusive family. “We were both young, but that was no excuse. You told me I needed to grow up and decide I was a wife before I was a daughter.”

He winced. “I told you a lot of things that I’ve had time to repent since.”

“You were right. I’d pledged myself to you and our marriage. That should have come first. I wanted to be Lady Destry, but I also wanted to be pampered, spoiled Charmian Barton. Our separation is mostly my fault.”

He looked devastated. “You’re being too harsh with yourself. We could have sorted things out.”

“If I hadn’t run home to Mamma, like the stupid little girl I remained at heart. I can’t blame you for hating me.”

In a fit of temper, she’d hired a chaise from the inn at York and paid a maid to accompany her for the sake of appearances. She’d rushed back to Somerset and a useless attempt to retreat to her childhood. She’d cried the whole way.

“I don’t hate you,” he said in a dull voice.

“You should.” She felt so weighted with guilt, she feared that she was likely to sink through the floor.

“No, I shouldn’t. I should have put my pride aside and begged you to stay.”

“But you did chase after me.”

A bitter smile twisted his lips. “I was so desperate for a kind word from you. I was ready to crawl over broken glass for your forgiveness. But your mother treated me with such coldness.”

“I should have realized that there was something in the wind. She was utterly appalled that I’d fallen into a seducer’s clutches. I don’t think I’ve ever seen her so angry. It took me forever to convince her that we really were married. Then she was sure that I’d fallen prey to a ruthless fortune hunter. She was so relieved when there was no baby.”

Sorrow weighted his gaze. “I’d hoped there might be. I thought if you carried my child, you might come back to me.”

“You have no idea how I grieved when I discovered that I wasn’t pregnant. It was as if I’d lost all my links to you.”

His smile didn’t reach his eyes, but at least it was a smile. “Don’t be a goose, Charmian. Didn’t you listen to the words of the marriage ceremony? We’re united until death do us part. Even if I never saw you again, you’d be my wife.”

The warmth of his voice when he called her a goose swept her straight back to their first meetings. He’d been the kind of lover who teased the object of his affections with silly nicknames and absurdly extravagant compliments. Every time that he said something ridiculous, she’d melted. She still did. A shaft of agonizing regret sliced through her as she realized anew what she’d tossed away.

“You could have involved the law. You had a right to get me back. You had a right to claim my fortune.”

He shook his ruffled dark head and gripped the arms of the chair. “I couldn’t do that without the risk of alienating you forever. How would you have felt if I’d hauled your mother up in front of the magistrates? I might be a fool, but I’m not such a fool as that. I wanted the girl who loved me to come back. I wanted us to build on the joy that we’d already found.”

More past tense. How she detested it. “So you were content to let things drift?”

Her dismissive tone made anger flare in his eyes. “I kept writing.”

She gestured toward the stuffed satchel. “So did I. Little good it did me.”

“When I didn’t receive a reply, I thought you wanted nothing to do with me.”

“And I thought you felt the same.” The enormity of her family’s wrongs against her staggered her. She had an inkling that when she came to terms with what her mother and aunt had done, she’d be even more livid than she was now. “We should be grateful that chance brought us together to sort things out.”

His hands opened and closed on his thighs. “I didn’t expect to find my wife working as a skivvy in an obscure country inn.”

“You must have been appalled,” she said, starting to bristle. “I was never good enough for the noble Sir Roland Destry.”

A decisive wave of his hand swept aside her remark. “Stop it, Charmian. You were perfect. Then and now. Seeing you so strong and capable makes me want to cheer – and weep like a lost child, because you always had that strength inside you, but it took unhappiness to bring it out. I’d give my right arm to have seen you come into your own.”

She missed most of his explanation. Her longing heart had snagged on one word. Her hands drifted to her sides and she stared at him, as she struggled not to make too much of what he said.

Yet her voice cracked as she spoke. “Perfect, Roland?”