Trial by Desire (Carhart #2)

The intervening time had washed the youth from her husband’s features. His jaw was no longer set in awkward apology; now it was square, and he looked at her in clear command. His nose no longer seemed too sharp, too piercing. It fit the look of canny awareness he’d developed.

Once, he’d seemed clumsy, constantly tripping over feet that were too large for the rest of his body. But over the past years, he’d grown into those feet. What had once seemed a surfeit of bumbling motion had transmuted into a restless economy, a sheer vitality highlighted by the sun-darkened gold of his skin.

Her husband had stopped being safe.

“Shall we go in together?” he asked, holding out his elbow.

Even that slight motion tweaked her perverse memory. Where once he’d apologetically claimed the space he needed, constantly pulling his elbows into his side, now he seemed to fill an area far beyond his skin. It seemed an act of bravery to reach out and set her fingers in the crook of his elbow. He radiated an unconscious aura now—as if he were more dangerous, more intense. Give this man a wide berth, her senses shouted.

Instead, she closed her hand about his finely woven wool coat. She could feel the strength of the arm underneath.

“I don’t think we’ll fool any of them, coming in together.” She forced herself to look up, to meet the intensity of his gaze. “If anyone knows the truth about our marriage, it’s the people in the room in front of us.”

His head tilted to one side. “You tell me, Kate. What is the truth of our marriage?”

He did not smile at her, nor did he waggle his eyebrows. His question was seriously meant. As if somehow, he did not know. His ignorance, Kate supposed, must have been bliss for him. For her, however, it sparked a deep ache beneath her breastbone.

“Our marriage lasted a few months. Once you left, what remained faded faster than the ink on the license. And what’s left…well, it could blow away in one tiny puff of wind.”

“Well, then.” He spoke with an air of certainty. “I’ll try not to exhale.”

“Don’t bother. I stopped holding my breath years before.”

Even when he’d been a young, deferential boy, he hadn’t truly been safe. He’d hurt her when he left. Now she felt a stupid surge of hope at his words. A damnable, irrepressible whisper of a thought, suggesting that something might yet come of her marriage.

The real danger wasn’t the strong line of his jaw or the powerful curve of his biceps under her fingers. No; as always, the real dangers were her own hopes and desires. It was that whisper of longing, a list that started with, step one: find a night rail….

Those old girlish wants would return unbidden if she gave them the least encouragement. It wouldn’t matter how lightly he breathed.

And nowadays, she had far more important secrets to occupy her worries than a little scrap of silk.

“Well,” he said, “let’s give it a go anyway. Our guests expect us.” Without waiting for an answer, he set his hand over her fingers, clasping them to the crook of his arm. The gesture was strong and confident. He didn’t know what awaited them. Kate ignored the queasiness in her stomach and walked with him into the room.

After the dimness of the hall, blinding white morning light filled her vision. All sound ceased, swallowed up by an immense shocked silence. Then fabric rustled; a flurry of lavender blurred across Kate’s vision, and before she could blink and get her bearings, a silk-clad form cannoned into Ned beside her, breaking Kate’s contact with her husband.

“Ned,” the woman said, “you ridiculous man. Not a word of warning, not one hint that you’d arrived. When were you planning to tell us?”

“I just landed,” Ned said. “Late last night. You’ll find the missive on your return.”

The woman was Jennifer Carhart, the Marchioness of Blakely. She was Ned’s cousin’s wife, and as he’d explained to Kate after their marriage, also one of Ned’s dearest friends. “I missed you,” Lady Blakely was saying.

Lady Blakely was pretty and dark-haired and clever, and Kate felt a prickle of unworthy resentment arise inside her. Not jealousy, at least not of that sort. But she envied the easy friendship Lady Blakely had with her husband.

When the marchioness pulled away, her husband, the marquess, took her place. “Ned.”

“Gareth.” Ned clasped the offered hand. “Congratulations on the birth of your daughter. I know my good wishes are much delayed, but I only just had the news from the solicitor this morning.”

“My thanks.” The marquess glanced at Kate, briefly, and then looked away without meeting her eyes. “Lady Kathleen.”