The Secrets of Sir Richard Kenworthy (30 page)

“Iris!” he yelled once again, and this time he was rewarded with the tiniest sound, a cross between a sniffle and a sob. “Thank God,” he breathed. His relief was so quick and sudden he couldn't even manage regret over the fact that she was obviously trying not to cry. He rounded a long, shallow corner, and then there she was, sitting on the hard-packed dirt, huddled like a child, her arms wrapped round her knees.

“Iris!” he exclaimed, dropping to her side. “Did you fall? Are you injured?”

Her head was buried against her knees, and she did not look up as she shook it in the negative.

“Are you certain?” He swallowed awkwardly. He'd found her; now he didn't know what to say. She'd been so magnificently cool and composed in the breakfast room; he could have argued with
that
woman. He could have thanked her for agreeing to mother Fleur's child, he could have told her that it was past time they made plans. At the very least he could have formed
words
.

But seeing her like this, forlorn and curled up tight . . . he was lost. He brought a tentative hand to her back and patted, painfully aware that she'd hardly want comfort from the man who had made her so miserable in the first place.

She didn't pull away, though, and somehow that left Richard feeling even more awkward. He set the lantern down a safe distance away and rested on his haunches beside her. “I'm sorry,” he said, aware that he had no idea what he was apologizing for—there were far too many transgressions to choose just one.

“I tripped,” she suddenly said. She looked up at him with defiant eyes.
Wet
defiant eyes. “I
tripped
. That's why I'm upset. Because I tripped.”

“Of course.”

“And I'm fine. I'm not hurt at all.”

He nodded slowly, holding out his hand. “May I still help you to your feet?”

For a moment she didn't move. Richard watched her jaw set defiantly in the flickering light, and then she put her hand in his.

He stood, nudging her along with him. “Are you certain you can walk?”

“I said I wasn't injured,” she said, but there was a rough, forced quality to her voice.

He did not respond, just tucked her hand in the crook of his arm after reaching down to retrieve the lantern. “Would you like to return to the drawing room or head outside?” he inquired.

“Outside,” she said, her chin quivering through her regal tone. “Please.”

He nodded and led her forward. She did not seem to be limping, but it was hard to tell for sure; she was holding herself so stiffly. They had walked together so many times during that brief period he had come to think of as their honeymoon; never had she felt like this, all glassy and brittle.

“Is it far?” she asked.

“No.” He'd heard the swallow in her voice. He didn't like it. “The exit is near the orangery.”

“I know.”

He didn't bother to ask how. It had to be the servants; he knew she hadn't spoken to either of his sisters. He'd meant to show her the tunnels, he'd been looking forward to it. But there hadn't been time. Or maybe he hadn't made time. Or forced her to take the time.

“I tripped,” she said again. “I would have been there already if I hadn't tripped.”

“I'm sure,” he murmured.

She stopped hard enough for him to stumble. “I would!”

“I wasn't being sarcastic.”

She scowled, then looked away so quickly he knew her ire was self-directed.

“The exit is just up ahead,” he said, a few moments after they resumed their pace.

She gave a terse nod. Richard led her along the final stretch of the tunnel, then released her arm so that he could push open the door in the ceiling. He always needed to crouch in this part of the tunnel. Iris, he noted with a wry amusement, could stand straight, the top of her blond head just skimming the ceiling.

“It's up there?” Iris asked, looking up at the hatch.

“It's at a bit of a slant,” he replied, working the latching mechanism. “From the outside it looks a bit like a shed.”

She watched for a moment, then said. “It latches from the inside?”

He gritted his teeth. “Could you hold this?” he asked, holding out the light. “I need two hands.”

Wordlessly, she took the lantern. Richard winced as the latch pinched his index finger. “It's a tricky thing,” he said, finally snapping it free. “You can open it from either side, but you have to know how to do it. It's not like a regular gate.”

“I would have been trapped,” she said in a hollow voice.

“No you wouldn't.” He pushed the door open, blinking as the sunlight assaulted them. “You would have turned around and gone back to the drawing room.”

“I closed that door, too.”

“It's easier to open,” he lied. He supposed he'd have to show her how to do it eventually, for her own safety, but for now, he was going to let her think she'd have been fine.

“I can't even run away properly,” she muttered.

He held out his hand to steer her up the shallow steps. “Is that what you were doing? Running away?”

“I was making an exit.”

“If that's the case, then you did a fine job.”

Iris turned to him with an inscrutable expression, then deftly pulled her hand from his. She used it to shade her eyes, but it felt like a rejection.

“You don't need to be nice to me,” she said bluntly.

His lips parted, and it took him a moment to mask his surprise. “I don't see why I shouldn't.”

“I don't
want
you to be nice to me!”

“You don't—”

“You are a monster!” She put a fist against her mouth, but he heard the choked sob all the same. And then, in a much smaller voice, she said, “Why can't you just act like one and let me hate you?”

“I don't want you to hate me,” he said softly.

“That's not your choice.”

“No,” he agreed.

She looked away, the dappled morning light playing along the intricate braids she wore like a crown. She was so beautiful to him it hurt. He wanted to go to her, wrap his arms around her and whisper nonsense against her hair. He wanted to make her feel better, and then he wanted to make sure no one ever hurt her again.

That, he thought caustically, was his honor.

Would she ever forgive him? Or at least understand? Yes, this was a mad thing he'd asked of her, but he'd done it for his sister. To protect her. Surely Iris, of all people, could understand that.

“I would like to be alone right now,” Iris said.

Richard was quiet for a moment before saying, “If that is your wish.” But he didn't leave. He wanted just one more moment with her, even in silence.

She looked up at him as if to say,
what now?

He cleared his throat. “May I escort you to a bench?”

“No thank you.”

“I would—”

“Stop!” She lurched back, holding her hand out as if to ward off an evil spirit. “Stop being
nice
. What you did was reprehensible.”

“I'm not a monster,” he stated.

“You
are,
” she cried. “You have to be.”

“Iris, I—”

“Don't you understand?” she demanded. “I don't want to like you.”

Richard felt a glimmer of hope. “I'm your husband,” he said. She was supposed to like him. She was supposed to feel so much more than that.

“If you are my husband, it is only because you tricked me,” she said in a low voice.

“It wasn't like that,” he protested, even though it was
exactly
like that. But the thing was, it had
felt
different, at least a little. “You have to understand,” he tried, “the whole time . . . In London, when I was courting you . . . All the things about you that made you seem a good choice were the things I liked so well about you.”

“Really?” she said, and she didn't sound snide, just disbelieving. “You liked me for my desperation?”

“No!” God above, what was she talking about?

“I know why you married me,” she said hotly. “You needed someone who would need
you
even more. Someone who could overlook a suspiciously hasty proposal and be desperate enough to
thank
you for your hand.”

Richard recoiled. He hated that those very thoughts had once sounded in his head. He could not remember thinking them specifically about Iris, but he had certainly thought them before he met her. They were the reason he'd gone to the musicale that first fateful evening.

He'd heard about the Smythe-Smiths. And
desperate
was the very word he'd heard.

Desperate
was what had drawn him in.

“You needed someone,” Iris said with devastating quiet, “who would not have to choose between you and another gentleman. You needed someone who would choose between you and loneliness.”

“No,” he said, shaking his head. “That's not—”

“But it was!” she cried. “You can't tell me that—”

“Maybe at the beginning,” he cut in. “Maybe that's what I thought I was looking for—No, I'll be honest, that's what I
was
looking for. But can you blame me? I had to—”

“Yes!” she cried. “Yes, I blame you. I was perfectly happy before I met you.”

“Were you?” he said roughly. “Were you really?”

“Happy enough. I had my family, and I had my friends. And I had the possibility that I might someday find someone who—” Her words shattered, and she turned away.

“Once I met you,” he said quietly, “I thought differently.”

“I don't believe you.” Her voice was small, but her words were tight and perfectly enunciated.

He held himself still. If he moved, if he so much as extended a finger in her direction, he did not know that he would be able to contain himself. He wanted to touch her. He wanted it with a fervor that should have terrified him.

He waited for her to turn around. She did not.

“It is difficult to have a conversation with your back.”

Her shoulders tensed. She turned to face him with slow intensity, her eyes gleaming with fury. She wanted to hate him, he could see that. She was clinging to it. But for how long? A few months? A lifetime?

“You chose me because you pitied me,” she said in a low voice.

He tried not to flinch. “That's not how it was.”

“Then how was it?” Her voice rose in anger, and her eyes somehow darkened. “When you asked me to marry you, when you just
had
to kiss me—”

“That's exactly it!” he cried. “I wasn't even going to
ask
you. I never thought I might find someone I could ask in such a short time.”

“Oh, thank you,” she choked, clearly insulted by his words.

“That's not what I meant,” he said impatiently. “I assumed I would have to find the right woman and put her in a compromising position.”

Iris looked at him with such disappointment it was almost too much to bear. But he kept talking. Because he had to keep talking. It was the only way he might get her to understand.

“I'm not proud of that,” he said, “but it was what I thought I had to do to save my sister. And before you think the worst of me, I would never have seduced you before marriage.”

“Of course not,” she said with a bitter laugh. “You couldn't very well have your wife and sister pregnant at the same time.”

“Yes . . . No! I mean, yes, obviously, but that wasn't what was going through my head. God!” He raked his hand through his hair. “Do you really think I would take advantage of an innocent after what had happened to my own sister?”

He saw her throat work. He saw her fighting her own words. “No,” she finally said. “No. I know you wouldn't.”

“Thank you for that,” he said stiffly.

She turned away again, hugging her arms to her body. “I don't want to talk to you right now.”

“I'm sure you don't, but you will have to. If not today, then soon.”

“I already said I would agree to your ungodly plan.”

“Not in so many words.”

She whipped back around to face him. “You're going to make me say it out loud? My little announcement at breakfast wasn't enough?”

“I need your word, Iris.”

She stared at him, and he couldn't quite tell whether it was with disbelief or horror.

“I need your word because I trust your word.” He paused for a moment to let her reflect upon
that
.

“You are my husband,” she said without emotion. “I will obey you.”

“I don't want you to—” He cut himself off.

“Then what do you want?” she burst out. “Do you want me to
like
this? To tell you I think you're doing the right thing? Because I can't. I will lie to the entire world, apparently, but I won't lie to you.”

“It is enough that you will accept Fleur's baby,” he said, even though it wasn't. He wanted more. He wanted everything, and he would never have the right to ask her for it.

“Kiss me,” he said, so impulsively, so suddenly that even he did not believe he'd done it.

“
What?
”

“I will make no more demands on you,” he said. “But for now, just this once, kiss me.”

“Why?” she asked.

He stared at her in incomprehension. Why?
Why?
“Does there have to be a reason?”

“There is always a reason,” she said with a quiet choke in her voice. “More fool me, for letting myself forget that.”

He felt his lips move, trying and failing to find words. He had nothing, no sweet poetry to make her keep forgetting. The light morning wind swept across his face, and he watched as one lonely tendril of her hair broke free of its braid, catching the sunlight until it sparkled like platinum.

How was she so lovely? How had he not seen it?