Persephone stepped out of her dressing room, grateful for her warm wool dressing gown now that winter had begun to make itself known. She stopped not a single step inside, surprised by what she saw.
Adam was pacing in her bedchamber.
“Adam?”
His expression concerned her. Something was on his mind, something that did not seem pleasant.
“Linus leaves for Shropshire in the morning,” he said, continuing to pace, not looking at her.
“Yes, I know.” The visit had been far too short, but Linus had only three weeks of shore leave.
“You will be going with him,” Adam said decisively.
Going with him?
“I don’t understand.”
“Your maid can pack your bags, and you can leave with Linus after you break your fast.” Adam stopped his pacing abruptly. He seemed to be struggling for a moment, as if a word lodged itself in his throat. “I am certain your family will be pleased to see you again.”
“Adam—”
“I will let you rest before your journey.” With that he left.
Persephone stood alone in her room, heart pounding even as it dropped to the pit of her stomach.
After all that had happened between them, Adam was sending her away.
Chapter Thirty-Seven
“I do wish you would consider coming to London for Christmas,” Mother said once more as she climbed into her traveling carriage.
Adam had no intention of going anywhere. He would spend the rest of the winter seeing to Falstone as he always had. “I am certain your holiday will be perfectly fine.”
“But will yours be?” Far too much empathy filled her voice. “How you must miss her.” She looked at him like a little boy who’d lost a playmate.
“I never miss anyone.” He turned and took the steps back up to the castle.
Persephone had been gone for a week. He’d told her to go, released her, as it were. He’d never done anything so difficult in his life. But part of him had believed she wouldn’t actually go or that, at the very least, she would promise to return on a given day.
She hadn’t. Persephone had eaten her breakfast in heavy silence and offered little more than an awkward, stuttered farewell before climbing into her carriage.
“Adam?” Mother called behind him.
Adam stopped just inside the Falstone doors and waited.
“Adam,” she repeated, now directly behind him. “Please may I say something before I go?”
He nodded. Mother eyed the footmen on either side of the doors with wariness.
“In the drawing room?” she requested.
Adam crossed the entrance hall and stepped inside the drawing room, preparing himself for an outpouring of pity over his lonely state and promises to reassure society that her “poor boy” was fine despite the disastrous outcome of his marriage.
“You’d best not keep the horses standing, Mother.”
“This will only take a moment.” She took a fortifying breath. “Your father and I had an arranged marriage.”
Adam turned away. He did not want to hear about his father, not from the woman who had, through her continued absence, caused him as much pain as Persephone was causing him.
“No accounting was made for the differences in our dispositions,” Mother continued. “I was raised in Town, among society. London, the
ton,
was what I knew and needed. Your father was raised here, in quiet and solitude. We wanted very different things in life.”
He paced to the window.
“Your father was a good man, and we cared for each other.” The conversation seemed as awkward for her as it was for Adam. “We did try to compromise, to blend our preferences. There were lavish balls at Falstone. Your father allowed them, even took part in planning, then spent the entirety of each event in the book room. He never made calls with me nor accepted invitations to gatherings away from Falstone.”
Adam shook his head. “He wouldn’t—”
“I was away during your convalescences and found in the company of my childhood friends and family the companionship your father seemed unable to provide. They went about in society the way I wished to. For a time the occasional trips from Falstone were enough.”
“I do not wish to hear this—”
“Resentment grows quickly, Adam. He did not wish me to leave, and I found myself staying away longer.”
Was Mother predicting Adam’s future? Did she think Persephone was gone for good?
“Do you know why I stayed away?” she asked.
“Because you didn’t love—” Adam bit back the
us
“—him.”
“Oh, Adam.” Mother spoke with such sadness that Adam turned to look at her despite himself. The slightest sheen of moisture clouded her eyes. For the second time in two weeks, and the second time in all of Adam’s life, Mother was crying. “Of course I loved your father. He was a good man, despite his implacableness.”
“Then why did you go? Why did you stay away?”
She produced an utterly sad smile. “I was waiting, in my foolishly romantic heart, for him to come for me.” A tear streaked down her face. “He never did.”
“Did you ever tell him—?”
“Of course not. I was certain that if he truly cared, he would miss me enough to meet me partway. I should have—
we
should have spoken of this, but neither of us was willing to.
“I saw you at your wedding ball, Adam. You are more willing to compromise than your father ever was. And Persephone is more suited to quiet and solitude than I will ever be. She is your match, Adam.” Mother stepped to where he stood at the window and laid her hand on his arm. “Do not throw away this chance by making her guess at your feelings.”
Mother kissed Adam on the cheek, an affectionate, maternal kiss. She had never kissed him before. If she had offered such a heartfelt gesture during his childhood, Adam might have grown up feeling quite differently about his mother.
“Good-bye, Adam.” For the first time in more than twenty years, she made her farewells without a single “poor boy.”
“Have a safe journey, Mother.”
“And you as well,” she replied mysteriously before sweeping from the room.
Adam stood at the front windows, watching as her carriage pulled away.
You as well.
What had she meant by that? He would not be wandering from Falstone grounds for months yet. Not until Parliament required he return to London. He didn’t want to be anywhere else. It was his home. Where he belonged.
“She has a point, you know.”
Harry.
Adam spun from the window to find his friend sitting quite at his leisure not far away, feet crossed at the ankles and propped up on a footstool.
“You’ve taken to listening to private conversations? Haven’t you any other forms of entertainment?”
Harry shook his head and smiled mischievously.
“Every other guest has left the castle, Harry. Why haven’t you?”
“I am here to be your conscience, Adam. To save you from yourself.”
“No, thank you.” Adam made to leave the room.
“She’ll come back, you know,” Harry said behind him.
Adam stopped at the threshold.
Harry continued. “I know Persephone well enough to be certain that, when Linus returns to his ship, she will return to Falstone. And I know you well enough to predict that you will act as though you couldn’t care less whether she came back or not. Do you really want her to wonder about that?”
“This is none of your concern, Harry.”
“You miss her, Adam.” Harry did not seem at all concerned about Adam’s reprimand. “Persephone deserves to know that.”
“She is happy with her family. I would only interfere.”
“So go be part of her family,” Harry replied as though the answer ought to have been obvious. “Go to Shropshire.”
“That isn’t how it works, Harry,” Adam muttered and stepped out of the drawing room.
Harry followed him. “How what works, Adam?”
“Persephone receives her reprieve, and Hades stays in the underworld waiting for her to return,” Adam grumbled. “Waits to see if the seeds worked.”
“Obviously you were sleeping during
that
lecture at Harrow.” Harry shook his head as he stepped past Adam and made his way up the stairs.
“What do you mean, sleeping?” Adam called after him.
“Adam.” Harry turned back to face him, an unmistakable scold in his tone. “Hades did not sit back and wait for Persephone. When the time came for her to return, he went after her.”
Adam stared back. He did not remember that.
Harry chuckled. “Hades was not the sort to sit around and fret, Adam. When the time came, he slipped past the hellhounds—” A howl outside sounded as if on cue. Harry raised an eyebrow in mock salute to the irony of that noise. “—and ventured into the realm of the living to reclaim his bride.”
“I do not remember that.”
“Look it up. Hades was no pambsy fribble, Adam. And I’d bet a pony
his
Persephone knew exactly how her husband felt about her.” Harry gave him a very pointed look.
By the next morning, Harry was gone, off to make holiday visits to relatives before returning to Falstone for Christmas. Adam remained behind, alone.
* * *
“Are you sure you are warm enough?” Athena asked for the hundredth time that afternoon.
“Athena.” Persephone spoke as patiently as possible. “I am dressed as warmly as I am at home, and it is far colder there. I assure you, I am perfectly comfortable.”
“Well,
I
am cold,” Athena said.
“Why don’t you go in and warm up.”
“I wouldn’t want to leave you out here alone,” Athena said. “Your leg is not fully healed yet.”
Persephone smiled. “I doubt I will be accosted in a walled garden behind my childhood home.”
Athena returned the smile. “I suppose not.”
“And I am perfectly able to get about. I am simply not as fast as I will be in another week or two.”
Athena nodded her agreement. “Very well.” She rose from the seat she had shared with Persephone. “But do not be too long. The Uptons are coming for dinner tonight.”
At last she was alone. There had been precious little time for reflection since leaving Falstone. She and Linus had spent most of the journey recalling events from their childhoods and catching up on their lives since they’d been apart.
Once arriving at the family home, life had included a constant influx of people. Persephone had forgotten how a large family in a small house could create chaos on a constant basis. She loved being at home with her family but found herself longing for the tranquility of her new home.
Thoughts of Falstone inevitably brought Adam to mind. She’d had such hopes for the two of them and still clung to a few. If only he’d given her some indication that he would miss her while she was away or some reason for his sudden insistence that she go.
Instead he’d been stubbornly quiet the entire morning of her departure. He’d not appeared the least bit upset at their separation, merely impatient for her to go. She, on the other hand, had almost brought herself to beg him to go along. But Adam did not like society or mingling with strangers. He never left Falstone if he could help it. Adam had told her that more than once. Asking him to accompany her would have been a pointless endeavor.
Brooding in the garden was not precisely productive, either. Persephone rose to her feet with the help of her walking stick. Her leg was still a bit sore but improving every day. Papa insisted the Shropshire air had speeded her recovery.
She walked through the back door to the house and moved slowly up the corridor. The house sat oddly quiet. Artemis was far too recovered from her bout with chicken pox to be as quiet as she was being. Daphne was perpetually quiet, illness or no. Had the girls gone out? It was too late in the day for a picnic.
Persephone made her way closer to the front of the house. The door to the sitting room stood ajar. She stepped closer. She could hear footsteps inside but nothing else, heavy footsteps, like boots instead of slippers.
A gentleman caller? Athena was of age, Persephone reminded herself. Was Papa making the prospective suitor wait? More likely he had completely forgotten about the unfortunate young man’s existence.
Determined to see this beau herself, Persephone stepped inside. She had every intention of making her own assessment, knowing Papa’s could not always be counted on.
Persephone stopped just past the threshold, her breath suddenly impossible to catch.
“Adam,” she whispered.
He opened his mouth to speak, but closed it again without saying a word. There was an awkwardness to him that was entirely foreign. Vulnerability touched every inch of his face.
“Have you come to take me home?” Persephone hoped he had and yet also hoped he hadn’t. She’d missed him terribly but was enjoying visiting her family as well.
“When you’re ready,” he answered after a moment. “But I . . .” He let out a breath. “I wanted to see Shropshire,” he said. “To see where you grew up.”
“You did?” His explanation proved somewhat disappointing.
“And get to know your family.”
That was a little better.
“And, I . . .” He shook his head, letting the thought dangle. Adam moved closer to her, a sudden intensity in his look. “Hades always went after Persephone.”
“Yes, he did.” She stepped closer to him.
“He waited as long as he had to,” Adam said, “then he left his kingdom and didn’t come back until he found her.” He stood close enough she could have reached out and touched him.
Persephone’s lungs tightened inside her. “I think Hades must have missed his wife,” she said, her heart suddenly pounding.
Adam didn’t look away, didn’t step back. “I think he knew to the very minute how long she had been gone. But was Persephone as anxious to return as he was to have her with him again?”
“I think she was.”
Adam reached out his hand and softly touched her cheek. Persephone closed her eyes, determined not to be distracted from the sensation of his touch. She could hear him, feel him close the distance between them.
Her heart soared with newfound hope, and she clung to it desperately.
Adam pressed a kiss to her forehead. “Why did Hades go after her?” he asked in a low voice, his lips still brushing her face.
She barely managed to keep breathing. “He must have loved her,” she whispered.
Adam’s response emerged breathless. “He must have.”
His other hand joined the first, and he cupped her face in his hands. Persephone opened her eyes to look at him.
Adam met her gaze. “But did his Persephone love him in spite of his flaws, in spite of all he’d done to her?”
“Oh, Adam.” Tears fought for release, her voice quivering with emotion.
Adam pulled her to him, his arms wrapped firmly and protectively around her. “Am I too late?” he whispered against her hair. “Is there nothing I can . . . nothing to . . .”
Persephone cut across his stumbling attempts at expression. Any speech even slightly tinged with emotion would be difficult for Adam. Persephone understood that. And she didn’t need flowery speeches. The fact that he had come for her, that he was holding her so tenderly and trying so desperately to express himself, was enough. “I have been falling in love with you for weeks, Adam. I was certain you would never return those feelings.”
“What can I do, Persephone?” He tightened his hold on her. “How can I prove . . . show . . .”
She gazed up at him. “You are here.”