The necklace was of diamonds, not the huge, ostentatious type, but a web of tiny, sparkling, delicate drops of tight strung on a golden thread. He held them out to her but she did not take them. She shook her head slightly.
"It is not right for me to have these. I have plenty of paste jewelry."
Marcus frowned. "It is appropriate for my wife to wear the Stockhaven jewels."
Isabella pushed his hand away gently, and with it the bag and the necklace. "Appropriate. How you like that word, Marcus. I do not think it appropriate for your estranged wife to wear this. It is so exquisite that it should be worn with love."
Estranged.
It was a very lonely word.
Marcus struggled. "India never wore them. She did not care for them."
He had not meant to tell Isabella that; had not meant the words to come out at all. He owed India his loyalty, even if it was the only thing he could now give her.
He thought Isabella would look pleased that her cousin and rival had not worn the jewels. He was already proffering the necklace to her again when she turned aside from him.
"That was not what I meant." She swung round so suddenly that Marcus was startled. "Give them to someone you care for, Marcus. They are too good for anything else."
She took the cloak from him. It swirled about her as she crossed the marble floor to the door, her evening slippers clicking sharply on the stone. She did not even pause to see if he was following her.
"Are you acquainted with Mr. Henry
Belsyre
?" he asked as they seated themselves in the carriage.
Isabella did not look at him. "The ambassador of the United States of America? Yes, I have met him before. I did not know that the
Belsyres
had returned to London, though. They served a term of office here before, did they not?"
"They returned just this week, so I understand," Marcus said, "hence the short notice for tonight." He looked at her. "If you know the
Belsyres
, you will know that they are very influential. They move in the first political circles."
Isabella stifled a yawn. "Politics! How boring!"
Marcus cast her another look. "Tonight is important to me, Isabella. I have been doing some work for the Admiralty and the Home Office, and I may wish to pursue a political career in the future. The contacts I make this evening—" He broke off, wishing that he had not said anything. It felt as though he was exposing a weakness to her and he had already learned the hard way that Isabella would exploit any opportunity he gave her. His nerves tightened with a curious mixture of anticipation and enjoyment. He was actually
relishing
this battle with his wife. The challenge of it was addictive.
"I understand," she said neutrally. "This evening must go smoothly for you."
"It sounds as though you know Henry
Belsyre
well," Marcus said. "Did you meet him and his wife abroad?"
Isabella was looking out at the darkening streets. A flambeau flared on a corner as a link boy guided a couple along the pavement. A laughing group of young men jostled one another as they crossed the road. Isabella allowed the curtain to fall back into place, enclosing them in darkness.
"I have known the
Belsyres
for many years," she said. "Mr.
Belsyre
was my—" She broke off. Marcus waited but she offered no further information. He felt frustrated. He had the numbing feeling that he could never discover her deepest secrets. He was feeling none of the satisfaction he had expected to feel when he wrested her life away from her and imposed his own rules on her.
"One of your former lovers, I suppose," he said.
Her blue gaze pinned him like a shard of ice. "You suppose incorrectly," she said coldly. She did not speak again until the carriage arrived at their destination.
One glance was sufficient to tell Marcus that the rooms were packed with the luminaries of the political and diplomatic worlds. Henry
Belsyre
, American ambassador to the Court of St. James, was as influential a diplomat as one could find—statesmen, soldiers and politicians flocked to his soirees. Marcus's hand tightened on Isabella's arm as they approached their hosts.
Belsyre
was chatting to Lord
Sidmouth
and Princess Esterhazy, but broke off with a word of apology as he saw them and strode forward, beaming.
"Isabella! We had no notion you had returned to London! What a splendid surprise!" Under Marcus's bewildered gaze, he kissed her soundly on both cheeks, then held her at arm's length. "Rose, Isabella has arrived!"
"Good evening, sir," Isabella said, smiling. "This is wonderful! I thought you still in Washington."
"No need for the formality,"
Belsyre
grumbled. "There was a time you called me
Uncle Henry
rather than
sir,
if you recall."
Isabella laughed. "I was about six years old then, sir, and you were not an ambassador."
Uncle Henry?
Marcus stared. It was not the type of previous relationship that he had imagined between them. Rose
Belsyre
was actually
hugging
Isabella. Marcus was left standing unnoticed, like the plain debutante whom no one asks to dance.
"You look enchanting, my dear," Mrs.
Belsyre
said, smiling. She turned to Princess Esterhazy. "Maria, you have met Princess Isabella Di Cassilis, have you not?"
"Of course," Princess Esterhazy said. Her smile was warm. "My dear Isabella, I heard a rumor that you were back in Town. Why did you not call?"
"She was too busy getting married,"
Belsyre
said, smiting broadly.
Isabella turned slowly to look at Marcus. For one dreadful moment he thought she was going to announce the entire story of their marriage to the assembled company. He looked at her and she looked steadily back at him. He knew she could read his mind. He waited for the ax to fall, and all his future plans along with it.
"I beg your pardon, Marcus." Isabella spoke with perfectly judged charm. "I was so delighted to see Mr. and Mrs.
Belsyre
again that I quite forgot to perform the introductions. Ladies and gentlemen—" she turned at the surrounding company "—this is my husband, Marcus Stockhaven."
It was a perfect put-down because it could not be faulted for courtesy. Marcus had a sudden and extraordinary insight into what it might be like always to be a wife in her husband's shadow, greeted second, of lesser importance. He remembered telling Isabella in the Fleet that he disliked the idea of being married for his money and then discarded, and she had told him sweetly that now he knew what it was like to be a woman. . . .
"Stockhaven!" Henry
Belsyre
gripped Marcus's hand in a firm handshake. "Delighted to see that Isabella has made such a sound choice for her second match. Many congratulations."
Suddenly everyone was looking at him. It had never previously troubled Marcus when he had been an outsider. He had experienced something similar when he had joined the navy with no man's patronage to support him, and again when he had gone to Lord Standish to ask for Isabella's hand in marriage and had been received with such disparaging lack of interest. He had never cared before. It had amused him. He had made his own luck and his own prospects. Now, however, he felt as though someone had pulled the carpet out from beneath him. He looked at Isabella as she stood with Mr. and Mrs.
Belsyre
on each side of her, Princess Esterhazy looking down her nose at him in that way she had of examining something not quite pleasant on her shoe, the Prince de
Lieven
and Lord
Sidmouth
on the sidelines. Here was a group of people whose view of his wife was very different from the spiteful tittle-tattle of the
Ton.
Here was a group who could make or break his ambitions and at their center was Isabella. The balance between them had shifted dramatically.
He cleared his throat. "I had not realized that you were all so well acquainted," he managed to say.
Isabella smiled faintly. "Mr.
Belsyre
was an old friend of my father."
Oh, hell. Marcus remembered her words in the carriage, the way she had fallen silent and the way in which he had leaped to a fairly large conclusion, driven onward by his anger and possessiveness.
He caught her arm, drawing her toward him. "Why did you not tell me?" He kept his voice very low.
Her eyes were cold. She shook him off, but gently so that no one could see the repressed anger in her. "Why should I tell you anything, my lord? You never had that right. Just be grateful that unlike you, I do not stoop to shoddy revenge."
Marcus could not believe her. He remembered the way that she had bartered with him in the Fleet. "There must be something you want. What is your price? Money?"
She whitened. "You should learn that not everything can be bought, Stockhaven."
"That is rich, coming from you, madam."
They stared at one another for what seemed forever, locked in each other's eyes.
"Dinner,"
Belsyre
said, making them both jump. "If you could escort Lady
Sidmouth
, Stockhaven. . ."
The event was stuffed with high-ranking nobility and it had not occurred to Marcus that since Isabella was retaining her tide of princess, she would be seated considerably farther up the table than he would. He was obliged to watch the Prince de Condé lavish attention on his wife in what Marcus considered to be an insufferably familiar manner. And yet the rational man who was still somewhere within him was obliged to admit that Isabella dealt with the prince's offensive overtures very neatly. Since he was watching her all the time, Marcus saw the exact moment when Condé bent close to her, as though merely emphasizing a point in the conversation, and brushed his lips against her bare shoulder. Isabella said one word—a word that made Condé bite his tip—and turned away to talk to the Duke of Hamilton on her other side.
Marcus found that he was already halfway out of his seat, ready to ram the man's roast pheasant down his throat.
"Sit down, Stockhaven,"
Belsyre
urged, catching his sleeve. He gestured for some more wine to be served, smoothing over the awkward moment. "Isabella can deal with Condé," he added under his breath. "She has had plenty of experience dealing with churlish foreign
princelings
." His tone softened. "Not that I blame you, man. Isabella has had a difficult time of it. Don't mind admitting that if dueling had not been outlawed, I would have taken a shot at Di Cassilis myself. Surprised the man survived as long as he did."
"Did you know him, sir?" Marcus asked, surprised at the ambassador's frankness.
"Unfortunately I did,"
Belsyre
said. "Shocking match to make for Isabella. I was her father's oldest friend. Could barely bring myself to speak to him afterward." His blue eyes appraised Marcus shrewdly. "Still, I imagine you know all this, Stockhaven. Old history. Glad you and Isabella were able to put it all aside. She once told me that she would rather have been the wife of a sea captain than Princess of Cassilis."
He turned back to Lady Cowper on his right, and Marcus was left staring at his congealing pheasant with a certain degree of perplexity. What was it about Isabella Di Cassilis that seemed to inspire such loyalty in family, friends and servants alike? She had Pen, to whom she was clearly devoted, and Freddie, who would overcome his natural diffidence to stand up for her., She had Churchward, who would do what a lawyer should never do and actually rebuke Marcus for his behavior because he felt so strongly. And then there were these eminent people whom she had met during her years abroad, people who evidently held her in high regard.
She once told me that she would rather have been the wife of a sea captain than Princess of Cassilis. . . .
The message was not difficult to read. There had been a time when he had been a sea captain and Isabella had accepted his proposal of marriage. It could merely have been a figure of speech on her part when she was speaking to
Belsyre
, but suddenly, Marcus wondered.
Isabella was tired. Reentering the sophisticated political world, so very different from the fashionable
Ton
ballrooms, had been an ordeal of another sort. Even though they had spent much of the time apart, she had been achingly conscious of Marcus throughout the evening. She knew that he had been watching her.