Andrew Lord of Despair(83)

Felicity interrupted at that point, calling all hands to the table, though all too soon, luncheon was over and Fairly taking his leave. The coach was ordered around from the stables, and the time for Andrew to bid his wife farewell—yet again—drew nigh. He chose the library for that purpose.

Astrid watched him close the door the way another might watch a physician who could only bear bad news. “I feel as if by complying with this scheme of yours, Andrew, I am somehow abandoning you, and thus I am going to cry.”

Abandoning him. She offered the sweetest, most daft sentiments. “Come here, then,” he said, holding out his arms. “You needn’t cry all by yourself over there.” Astrid went to him, but she’d doubted her welcome in his embrace, and that was nobody’s fault but his.

“Andrew, why does it have to be like this?”

He rested his chin on her crown—she fit him perfectly, in so many ways.

“It has to be like this, Wife, so you may be safe, and that is all that matters for now.”

“What about after this now you speak of? Why must we have this awful distance between us? Oh, don’t answer me,” she said, sniffing into his handkerchief. “You will give me some drivel about expectations and happiness, and more nonsense than I can stand.”

An accurate summation. Andrew wasn’t going to admit to her that her husband was a conscienceless bastard who would betray his brother, his honor, his birthright, and his own child. Not yet, and maybe not ever. Better she hate him on general principles than have the burden of that knowledge.

He kissed her temple and tried for something—anything—honest. “I did not set out to make you unhappy, please believe that.”

“And I,” she said, stepping back, “did not set out to love you, Andrew, but there it is. I will miss you.”

She delivered that observation like the slap that conveys a challenge, then ruined the effect by wrapping herself against him again, clinging fiercely.

Andrew, despite his best intentions, was gratified by the desperation in her embrace. It nearly matched his own, and so he held on to her just as tightly, until long moments later, when she again found the strength to step back.

“I love you,” she said, tears spilling down her cheeks.

Andrew caught a tear on his index finger and brought it to his lips.

“Be well, Wife,” he said, bowing, “until next we meet.”

***

“He told me,” Astrid fumed, “to be well. Well, Lissy, and I let him walk away while I cried like the greatest fool God ever created from the rib of Adam. How can I be well when he leaves me to hide in your house while Douglas skulks about Enfield, lying in wait?”

Felicity threaded an embroidery needle with purple thread as Astrid paced the library where only hours earlier, she’d bid her idiot husband farewell.

“Gareth says Douglas is not the only suspect, Astrid,” Felicity said, knotting the thread. “Douglas does not appear to have the requisite dishonorable character, though he certainly has motive and opportunity.”

Astrid whirled in a swish of skirts, paused to assay her balance, and glared at the sister who sat so serenely behind Gareth’s desk. “I am talking about my husband here, and you are going off about Douglas and his schemes. You are as bad as the men in this family.”

Felicity looked nonplussed. “That bad?”

“That bad,” Astrid said, unwilling to be teased. “Worse, because you are my sister, and I expect you to support me in my marital difficulties.”

Felicity fastened her hoop onto a pillowcase that was acquiring a border of hyacinths the same color as Gareth’s eyes. “I do support you. When Gareth told me you and Andrew were marrying, my first reaction was glee, because I love you both, and I know you had a great tendresse for Andrew before he went traveling. But upon reflection, the idea troubled me, Astrid, for this very reason you allude to. Andrew is…”

“Andrew is lost,” Astrid finished the thought, plopping down into a reading chair far too large for her. “He always was, I think, but compared to Gareth, who was even more lost, Andrew appeared the more reasonable of the two. I believe Andrew merely became more adept at hiding his true nature. Gareth, bearing the title, was allowed and even expected to behave outrageously.”

“And look at him now.” Felicity scooted forward to adjust a pillow at her back. “My dear husband is nigh unmanned to see me this gravid. He is full of talk about waiting at least two years to have more children, if even then, and so forth. I argue with him that one of the pleasures of marriage is the conjugal bed, and I will not be denied my husband’s affections because nature takes its course. Sometimes, I even win this argument.”