Lord of Regrets (24 page)

Chapter Thirty-Four

Marcus rose from the bath into the pleasant shock of slightly cooler air. Italy, he had found, was infernally hot. Water sluiced down his bare skin, splashing back into the full bath as he reached for the large towel Pell had left for him. Carefully, he stepped out of the tub, dried himself, and entered the bedroom. Even after two months, much of which had been spent bedridden, the room still looked unfamiliar. But it might very well be his home for the foreseeable future, at least for as long as he felt compelled to keep himself away from England.

His clothes had been laid out upon the bed, and he dressed slowly, still wincing from the occasional ache. It was easier now than it had been even a week earlier, when he had still relied upon Pell for many of the simplest tasks.

Finally, he stood before the mirror to tie his cravat. There, too, in the reflective glass, he found an unfamiliar view. A beaten-down wretch of a man. There were shadows under his eyes, and his skin looked as dry as he felt inside. His tousled hair needed a cut. In all, he looked––he looked like hell, but for a man who had seen the other side of death and returned, he supposed he looked lively indeed.

Although not all of him had returned. His heart and his soul remained dust. He was a hollow man, as sunken as those shadows under his eyes.

He heard Pell’s footsteps, heavy and quick on the wood floor of the hall. Then the expected scratch on the door. He turned, leaving the stiff cloth around his neck. It was just as well that he should leave the tying of it to his valet.

“My lord.” Pell appeared alarmed, as if his news would draw anger.

“What is it?”

“Lady Templeton is downstairs and I don’t think she’ll wai—”

His words were broken off by the sound of insistent footsteps on the stairs. Marcus pulled the door open and stepped into the hall just in time to see Natasha round the corner and stop abruptly, staring.

As he was staring, filled with joy, filled with wonder. He caught himself and forced his foolish, startled emotions into a slow, indolent perusal. Even though inside, he was shocked, amazed, that after all this time, all his dreams and fantasies, she was here, vivid and beautiful as ever.

It hurt him. Physically. Far more than the few injuries he still felt when he moved. And clearly he did still have some shadow of a heart, because it ached.

Tasha
.

“I thought…” She stopped, as still as her body. Hesitant, not at all like a woman who had been taking the stairs two at a time. She looked like a countess now, yet she looked nothing like his wife. Her dress was exquisite and tailored perfectly to her body. She carried herself like a woman who had been out in society, with a polish and sophistication she had never before had.

At what price had she earned that polish? A sneer twisted his lips, and hated himself for even the weakness of that visible emotion. He should feel nothing for her. Everything, his heart, should be ash.

“That I am on my deathbed?” He laughed, the sound harsh, guttural. She started toward him with slow, measured steps. He took a step back himself and leaned against the wall, crossing his arms over his chest. “As you can see I’m recovering, if not quite up to snuff, so there was no need to travel.”

“I’m relieved,” she said stiffly.

She kept approaching, and he couldn’t stop the anger that rose up within him as she neared. It was hard to continue to affect such a dispassionate display toward her, especially when she was only an arm’s length away and he could see her expression more clearly.

Those dark eyes, those lush pink lips. Lips that had kissed another man, eyes which had bathed another man with passion.

As he had given her permission to do. As if that action could make the infidelity hurt less.

“I won’t give you your divorce. And here I am still alive. So my apologies, you won’t quite have your entire freedom yet.”

“That’s not why I came.”

As if he didn’t know how desperately she wanted to be free of him.

Why
was
she there? Guilt, perhaps. Some dormant sense of compassion. It hurt to look at her, and he’d have to leave Florence now, find somewhere else, where there was no memory of her.

“Why did you come?”

They stood there silently.

Finally, Marcus spoke. “Travel is still not safe. I should feel flattered that you braved the danger to tend to me.” Indeed, he was flattered, hopeful even. He squashed the feeling down cruelly. “Though, I suppose not finding me convalescent and unable to weep by my prone form, you are at a loss.”

“I’m glad you’re well.” She stared at him, forcing him to acknowledge her, and he met her gaze. The shocking awareness of her eyes terrified him, made him feel bare and vulnerable. Anger, resentment, none of that mattered. He’d never be able to forget her. She could tear his heart out and feed it to him for breakfast and still he’d dream of her. “Marcus.”

He broke the thick, invisible bond between them, pushing off away from the wall and letting his arms fall to the side.

“As we have ascertained that I am well, and that you are not eager for my death, then… I thank you for your concern. Pell!” His valet stepped into the hallway, exhibiting an impressively blank expression.

“My wife will need a room. Please see––”

“No,” Tasha interrupted him. “That won’t be necessary.”

Marcus looked back at her, raised his eyebrow in question. What did she want from him?

Natasha seemed to shrink back into herself, and that physical reaction made him loathe himself even more. “I mean, that is if it isn’t inconvenient for you.” She flushed, and he suddenly understood the import of her words.

“Not for that reason,” Marcus said with a sneer, unable to keep the bitterness from his voice. “I’ve kept my vows.”

Their gazes locked again for a moment, this time in challenge. He closed himself off. He wouldn’t let her catch him off guard again. He studied her, her luminous skin, the dark fringe of her lashes, the pink lips that––the room shuddered and he sighed, knowing, relieved yet exhausted––that no other man had tasted. He might have been able to convince himself of her perfidy with thousands of miles between them, but not now.

“Pell, my wife is correct. See to everything.”

His valet left, inching by them, as if he wanted to hear how the rest of this reunion played out. Marcus watched the heels of his valet’s shoes recede. Then the hallway was silent. Thick with it.

“I kept my vows as well,” she said softly.

He sighed again at the words that teased at him, made him yearn for something impossible. The door to his bedroom stood open and he looked through. The bright Italian afternoon light illuminated the room in oranges and yellows.

“How is Leona?”

He felt her move closer, her heat, her scent drawing near, and then she was next to him, looking as he was looking, at the play of light over the room.

“She’s well. This last month she’s grown so much. But she misses you. She doesn’t understand.”

Anger burned through Marcus, a fierce need that had him moving before he even realized it. His breath came hard and rasping as he looked down at her, between his outstretched arms, trapped between him and the door.

“
I
don’t understand,” he said. “You hate me.
You, you, you
, as you said.” Her voice, those words, pushing at him, were still imprinted in his mind, in his heart. He could see the image, hear her voice, so vividly. “It was perfectly clear, Tasha. Why torment me like this?”

“I…” She hesitated and licked her lips, and he groaned at the sight, his hips pressing forward before he caught the involuntary action. “I waited and waited for you to return. Then when you left Paris, I realized you didn’t intend to come back.”

Marcus broke away, stalking into the bedroom, his hands grasping at his hair.

“I did hate you,” she admitted, and he knew she followed him. “You––”

“Stop,” he cried, whirling around again, and seeing her so close, he grabbed her hand. “I am who I am. I’ve come to terms with that, and I don’t expect you to love me.”

Through the fury of his need, he watched her swallow, watched the softness of her neck work through her own emotions. He hoped––a wild, desperate sort of hope––and he exchanged her hand for the silken lines of her jaw, as if he could help the words out of her.

“I’m only a man. Tell me what you want from me.”

His fingers were lost in the upswept hair at the back of her neck, and his thumbs played along her neck, her cheek. He searched inside her eyes for her soul, for the answer he wanted. And when he saw what he wanted, he hardly noticed that her lips had started to move. He bent down, drew her close, and took––she tasted of pleasure and hope and future and all the things he had denied himself these past months––hungrily. Just as he had always taken.

It didn’t matter what she wanted, what she was offering. It didn’t matter that she had been faithful at the end, for he was still the same, and eventually her hatred for him would win out over whatever softer emotions she now felt.

He pushed himself away from her, his breath ragged, his heart torn.

“You have it, Tasha, your freedom, your divorce. Now leave me, go. Go!”

…

Natasha watched him leave. The air, the world, her life, left with him. She didn’t understand him. What made him leave her then, just as she had been ready to melt under his touch, to give in to his desire, to revel in it as she had never before?

She’d had weeks to think about Marcus, to try not to think about Marcus. Marcus was her entire world. She bore his name; she lived in his home. She’d had his child.

Tell me what you want from me
, he had demanded. She had said nothing. What did she want from him?

When the letter had come with news of his injury, the decision had been easy––go to the man, this man she had once loved, who was the father of her child, for whose return she even then awaited. Go to him because he might not survive and, at the very least, he should know that she had––

He had asked her what she wanted of him. And she knew. She wanted all of him, without the agony of saying no. They were married already. She had no doubt of his faithfulness and never had. No lingering reason existed not to leap into this life with him.

She
wanted
a life with him.

She took her shoes off, laid them on the floor by the foot of the bed. Then she climbed atop the mattress and lay down, enjoying its softness and the freedom of stretching out her stockinged feet. It had been a long journey from London––two weeks in which she hadn’t let herself think about
what if
. What if in the nearly six weeks between Marcus’s injury and her arrival, he hadn’t made it? What if he had made it but didn’t want to see her ever again?

But now she was in Italy, and he was whole, that much was clear. And he was not indifferent. Angry, yes, but not indifferent.

For once, his anger did not scare her. She understood it now, had compassion for him. She had seen his grandfather in action, had imagined what it would be like to be the heir of such a man, burdened down by a wastrel father’s legacy. It didn’t excuse Marcus’s actions toward her, or his continuing manipulations, but it explained them.

She was still lying on the bed when he returned. Natasha sat up immediately, drawing her legs under the folds of her dress. He didn’t come to her. He kept his distance, watching her warily from the doorway. Finally, he shut it behind him. Still he avoided her eyes, but took a seat in the chair.

“Why Carslyle?” Of all the things he would say, she hadn’t expected that. Though she should have expected it.

He might accept nothing irrevocable had happened, but he would still seethe at the flirtation, at the idea of another man thinking she was willing and eager to trade Marcus’s bed for his. Marcus was not just this great immovable beast, this villain who forced her, badgered her, manipulated her to his will. He was also––he was also a man, a person. With emotions and wants and needs. Like her. Like Leona.

Jealousy was one thing, but pride was another. His had been woefully injured.

“Why him?” Marcus leaned forward in the chair, as if he were barely keeping himself under control, and it was perverse, she knew, but the tension that made his body taut and his eyes tortured thrilled her.

Because it meant he did care. Still. Even if he had walked away.

“Because,” her own voice was strained as she forced the words out on a ragged edge of trust, “he wasn’t
you
.” The last push, the last exhalation of air fell, and with it her chest collapsed and her breath caught. “He didn’t threaten me. I didn’t fear him. I didn’t need to worry that I would be hurt again.”

She was frightened, yes, to entrust him willingly with her heart and her life. But he needed to understand that that was exactly what she was willing to do. At last.

And it couldn’t be too late. Because…if there was no going back in life, if there was only the future, they needed to make that future. Together.

He said nothing, his expression shifting again and again, the muscles of his face working. Her heart ached. Ached for him, ached for causing him pain.

“Don’t you understand, Marcus? He wasn’t you.” Words wouldn’t make him understand, but maybe if she touched him, kissed him, wrapped him in her embrace, maybe then he would feel what she couldn’t perfectly say. Maybe he would then understand. Reciprocate.

She slid off the bed, reached out to touch his clasped hands.

He jerked away so that only air met her fingers. Then he was standing, pacing the room. His emotions raged so loud she could feel them like screams pounding her body. But still he was silent. Her anxiety rose. She couldn’t touch him. She couldn’t reach him. She needed to know he wasn’t going to walk away.

“Say something.”

“Say what?” He turned on her, his anger making the words more a grunted hiss. “That I feel better knowing you had an affair with a man because he wasn’t me? Of course he wouldn’t be me. If you wanted me, you wouldn’t have turned to him.”

“I––”

“No. You’ve had your chance to speak. Do you know what it is like for a man? To be a laughingstock, to know that in that man’s eyes, I couldn’t keep you. In all of society’s eyes.”