While You Were Spying (Regency Spies Book 0) (41 page)

He grasped her by the shoulders, and though he didn’t hurt her, had no intention of hurting her, he saw her flinch and whip her head to the side in order to avoid the full force of the blow she obviously expected.

“I’m not Victoria, Ethan,” she said, opening her eyes when the slap didn’t come. She was sobbing and shaking, terrified. Terrified of him, Ethan realized. With one outburst, he’d undone the weeks of trust they’d built.

He wanted to take her in his arms, hold her, soothe her, tell her he was sorry. But then Templeton began to sidle away, and all of Ethan’s anger returned. Instead of taking her into his arms, Ethan thrust her away and turned on his heel.

“I’m sending for the carriage,” he said, striding from the room. “If you would come with me, fetch your wrap.”

He threw the door open, not caring that it slammed against the wall or that a shower of plaster fell to the floor, and walked away without a backward glance.

It was obvious to Ethan as he strode to the door that he’d allowed himself to get too close to Francesca, to trust her too much. This was why he could not fall in love with her. This was why he must fight it.

Whether or not she’d violated his trust tonight was beside the point. She
would
eventually violate it, and perhaps it was better to simply accept the inevitable. If he could distance himself from her, stop himself from thinking of her every minute, from wanting her body next to his, from wanting her to want him as much as he desired her—if he could stop himself from loving her so much, then perhaps they could make this marriage work.

Perhaps then, when the betrayal came, he wouldn’t care.

“N
ot a word,” he said when the carriage door clicked shut. The daggers she saw in his gaze cut her to the quick, the scathing look he threw her stifled her far more effectively than his words.

She had words of her own. How dare he accuse her of infidelity? How dare he compare her to Victoria!

The chill of his silence seeped into her heart. It seemed that as the miles between the carriage and Bellerive grew, so did the distance between her and Ethan. She wanted him to scream at her, lecture her, demand answers. She would scream right back.

Instead, with each bend in the road, a wall grew between them. It had always been there, she realized now, just camouflaged by climbing vines of ivy and sweet honeysuckle—her foolish hopes that he would come to love and trust her. It was an old wall but effective, raised from the pain of his past and supported by the bitterness of the years. Francesca now doubted she would ever breach it.

He would never trust her. This would never be a true marriage.

She stared out the window when they turned onto the drive for Winterbourne Hall. With menace, the house and grounds closed in on her. She imagined the gazebo to be a hunched, brooding ogre and the castle ruins as jagged claws rising from the ground. The house, when they finally reached it, was a ghostly phantom projecting garish, flickering light.

The carriage halted and, though she wore gloves, she could feel that Ethan’s hands were icy when he took hers to assist her from the coach. Before her feet were firmly on the ground, he thrust her away and started for the house. She followed him, listening as his steps echoed on the hard marble of the gallery and staircase, as hollow as she felt inside. Accompanied by a footman, they reached her room first, and Ethan paused to give her a frozen kiss on the cheek. “Good night, madam.”

She winced, his formality another slap in her face.

“Good night,” she finally managed and then only because the footman was still standing behind him holding the lamp.

With a stiffness she’d never seen, Ethan turned, opened the door to his bedroom, and disappeared inside. Francesca watched as the sliver of lamplight dimmed until it was extinguished, and the door shut behind him.

“Is there anything you require, your ladyship?” The footman’s voice in the oppressive silence startled her.

Francesca realized she stood motionless in front of her bedroom door, her hand on the knob. “No, Daniel. Thank you for asking.”

She turned the knob and entered the empty room.

She rarely called on her maid to help her prepare for bed anymore, but tonight there was no Ethan sprawled on her sheets with a wicked grin. No reason for Helen not to assist her. Perhaps there would never be a reason again.

She shut the door and leaned against the frame with all the weight of her pain. She felt heavy with an aching that grew in size until she could hardly bear its burden. Looking around the room, she saw that a fire had been lit in the white marble hearth and several lamps were burning, awaiting her arrival, but the chamber seemed colder and darker than she remembered it.

The refurbishment, so pristine white, made her shiver. Frosty and foreboding, the room lacked warmth and passion. Without Ethan, the chamber felt so bare, so empty. With a sinking feeling, Francesca realized it might never again seem vibrant and alive to her. All that was life to her now, all that mattered, was in the room next door.

Her gaze traveled from the low fire in the fireplace to the door that adjoined her room to Ethan’s. Strange, she thought, dragging her feet and all the heaviness of her sorrow forward, but she’d never had more than a passing glance inside Ethan’s room. They’d never spent so much as one night there. It had seemed natural that they share her room. Knowing that Ethan had it redecorated for her made it and the time they spent there together, making love under the white satin bed curtains, special.

But now she stared at the shared door and wondered. Had he been shutting her out in little ways even before this incident at the Nitterling’s? Had keeping her from his room been a way of shutting her out? Had he been taking precautions in case he found that, in the end, she was not so different from Victoria?

On the other side of the door, silence reigned. She laid her hand on the polished white paneling, smooth and cold under her fingers as she curled them into a fist. Ethan had never trusted her, she realized now. He’d been waiting for something like the incident with Templeton to happen. He’d reacted tonight almost as if he’d expected it. He hadn’t even wanted her explanations.

Not that they would have mattered
had
he listened. She might convince Ethan that she had been looking for him tonight, that she had asked Templeton to take her to her husband, and that she had been offended and angry when the man led her to the remote print room and tried to kiss her. Ethan might even believe she hadn’t wanted or encouraged Templeton’s advances. But it wouldn’t matter. He would simply wait until next time because Ethan was certain there
would
be a next time.

He was waiting for her to betray him as Victoria had. She ground her teeth together, furious. She wouldn’t allow him to do that—to sit in his private sanctuary and bide his time until she turned traitor. How dare he refuse to give their marriage even a chance? He owed her that much: a chance.

She threw the door open and plunged through Ethan’s dressing room, her gaze fixed on the bedroom door. Fury bubbled inside her, threatening to erupt, as she shoved his door open.

Across the room, Ethan sat slumped in his chair, drink in hand, staring at the fire. His head shot up when the door banged open. “Go back to your room, Francesca.”

She huffed, curling her lip in contempt. The rich, burgundy carpet gave sensuously under her green slippers as she stepped into his sanctuary—his sanctuary from her, she reminded herself, looking around.

“So this is your room.” She gestured needlessly with one hand.

“Precisely. It’s
my
room.” Setting down his drink, he stood.

She wondered if his dishevelment—coat thrown on the floor, cravat dangling sloppily, shirt hanging open—was any indication that he was as tormented by this division between them as she.

“Go back to
your
room, Francesca.”

“Not yet.” She was intrigued by what she saw now and took three additional steps inside. In contrast to her own, his chamber was lush and vivid, dominated by deep reds, blues, and browns. The fabrics were heavy and thick, the woods dark and burnished. The room oozed heat and sensuality. She gaped at it in wonder, then turned to glance in the direction of her room.

“Is that how you really see me?” she asked, staring at the adjoining door.

“What do you mean?” Ethan’s eyebrows came together.

She rounded on him. “Is
that
how you see me?” She jabbed her finger at her chamber. “Pure and pristine? Virginal white? Like I’m a princess you’ve put on a pedestal, and you’re just waiting for her to fall.”

Ethan narrowed his eyes. “What the devil are you talking about? It’s late—”

She nodded, cutting him off. “It is late, and it will be later still. Look at your room, Ethan, and look at mine.” She took a step toward him, gesturing wildly. “You set me apart from you. You put me in an ivory tower in your snow-white castle, and then you sat here, waiting for me to”—sarcasm laden with bitterness welled up in her—“besmirch its purity.”

She was directly in front of him now, could feel the heat from the fire behind them. But no heat came from him. He was as indifferent and inhospitable as his home.

“Doesn’t this marriage mean anything to you?” she finally demanded, exasperated by his silence.

“You dare ask
me
if this marriage means something?” He leaned down, his stance intimidating. “Need I remind you, madam, that barely three hours ago I found you in another man’s arms?”

He turned from her with a look of disgust, but she grasped his arm. “Stop it! You know that’s not true.”

“Do I?” He arched a callous eyebrow.

“Yes, you do.”

He snorted, but she ignored it and went on. “I didn’t encourage Templeton. I told him in no uncertain terms to take his hands off me before you opened that door. But I’m wasting my time. None of it matters, does it, Ethan?”

His stare met hers. His eyes were so cold, so cruel—fossilized amber made hard by the years of bitterness and resentment. She wished for just one moment she could see them heated with passion and love again.

Love? She wanted to laugh, to cry. He didn’t love her; he didn’t even
trust
her. And he never would. He turned his back on her, facing the fire, and all the anger drained out of her, replaced by a crippling sadness.

“Why can’t you trust me?” she said softly. “I’m not her.”

He whipped around violently and she cried out, taking a step back. Out of habit, she’d thrown her hand in front of her face, and when she lowered it, he was shaking his head.

“And I’m not
him
, Francesca. I’m not Roxbury. You say I don’t trust you.” He closed the distance between them, and this time she didn’t shift away. “But you don’t trust me. Every time I make a sudden movement, you flinch. Do you know what that does to me?” There was a flash of pain in his eyes, and Francesca felt the faintest glimmer of hope that he did care for her. “I would never hurt you.”

She grasped his hand, pleading. “I know, Ethan. I know, and I’m sorry. I—I can’t help it.”

“And I can’t help comparing you to Victoria.”

She threw his hand down. “It’s completely different.”

“How?” He locked his arms across his chest. “How is it different?”

“Roxbury hit me. He hurt me physically. It happened so often and for so long that it’s almost become second nature for me to react as I do.”

Sorrow replaced the pain in his eyes, and he reached for her.

“Don’t!” She darted out of his arms. “I don’t want your pity.” She backed away from him, edged toward the adjoining door. “It’s bad enough that you see how weak, how pathetic I was to allow Roxbury to do that to me, to put up with it for so long.”

Tears streamed down her face, but she didn’t care. They would blur the contempt she knew would be in his eyes.

“I’ve wanted—wanted so many times—to explain it. I felt like I was
nothing
.” She pressed her fist to her heart, held it there. “I wanted to break it off sooner, but I was afraid. I believed him that no one else would ever want me.”

She’d revealed more than she’d intended, and the stark truth behind her words sent hot, crimson shame crashing through her. With a sob, she turned to flee, but Ethan’s arm came around her waist. “Let go.” She tried to twist away, but he only pulled her more tightly against him.

“Francesca,” he whispered in her ear.

“Let go!” she cried, desperate to escape.

“Shh,
cara
,” he murmured and she shivered, sagging against him. She hated herself for giving into this small measure of comfort he offered. Hated her body’s traitorous reaction to his touch. In spite of everything, she still wanted him, ached for the feel of his hands on her.

“I don’t pity you,” he said, lips close to her ear. “If anything, I admire you.”

“Why?” She was afraid to move, to look at him.

“Because you had the courage to escape him. Deep down, you knew you were something.”

She felt his lips graze the hollow below her ear.

“You
are
something.”

A tremor coursed through her as his breath skimmed her skin, and she realized he did not sound in the least disgusted by her. She turned to face him. Sliding around in his arms, she stared into his eyes. The amber was warm and liquid once again, the heat and softness telling her he’d meant every word. He didn’t pity or detest her.

“You broke your engagement to Roxbury even though you knew it was what your parents wanted,” he continued. “Even though you knew you’d be the subject of gossip throughout the
ton
. And then that night at our engagement ball.” He put a hand to her cheek, wiped a tear away. “You stood next to me and looked him in the face, not in the least afraid. Not flinching. I know what it took for you to do that.”

He cupped her chin. “If you could just trust me, just give me a chance, I can make you forget him.”

She knew it was true. She’d fought and struggled to make herself whole again, and she’d succeeded. But with Ethan’s love, she could go so much farther.