The Laird Takes a Bride(88)

“That is so.”

“It’s a lie. It’s not that you can’t love me. It’s that you won’t. There’s a world of difference, Alasdair.”

She knew. She knew. Her words were like a brilliantly aimed sucker punch to his solar plexus, hard and painful, but he willed himself not to show it. “You think yourself very shrewd.”

“But I’m right, aren’t I?”

No matter what he said next, he was doomed. If he told the truth, that she was right. If he denied it—he would be lying. He was many things, but not a liar. Which meant he had nowhere to turn, nowhere to run. Savagely he ran a hand through his hair. And to think that lately he’d felt so confident, so buttressed by his certainty it was all going to be easy. It was all going to be fine. Smooth sailing. He’d laugh at himself if it wasn’t so bitter a humor that now took hold of him. Oh yes, very smooth sailing. His wife was staring at him as if she’d like nothing better than to throttle him. Or worse.

“Answer me,” she hissed.

All at once Alasdair wished there was a cattle meet somewhere he could sneak off to in the middle of the night. But weariness swept over him then, weighty and hard, implacable, as if pinioning him to the bed. This, he thought, is what Sisyphus felt like, after being made to push a boulder up a steep hill all day long. It almost seemed like a boulder was on top of him. Would this excruciating, pointless exchange never end? “Oh, for God’s sake, Fiona, have done,” he said heavily. “I’ve had enough.”

He heard her sharply indrawn breath. Then she said, “I’ve had enough also.”

“Good. Let’s go to sleep. And if you like—” He exerted himself; he wanted to be generous. He wanted to at least offer her something; said, “If you like, we can talk more tomorrow.”

“No. No more talking. Enough.”

“It’s up to you.”

“Is it? How nice.”

Alasdair didn’t know what to say to that, so he only replied, “Good night then.” He slid back down, feeling with intense relief the pleasant sensation of his head resting against his pillows. But he realized she hadn’t moved. “Lie down, Fiona, under the blankets. You must be cold.”

She was still staring at him. “Yes. I am cold.”

“Come under the bedcovers, then.”

“It’s apparently escaped your notice that I’m still wearing my evening-gown.”

“Does it matter?” He could hear how he was almost slurring his words with drowsy fatigue. His eyelids were impossibly heavy. Sleep, like an irresistible sorceress, beckoned.

Did it matter? For the life of her, Fiona didn’t know how to answer him. Why not crawl underneath the warm bedclothes, still in her gown and jewelry and blue silk slippers? What possible difference would it make?

She thought about it.

Somehow—it came to her in slow realization—somehow it would seem like giving in.

Involuntarily she shuddered. She really was cold. Her fingers were starting to feel numb. Alasdair, she saw, was already deeply asleep; his set, shuttered expression had given way to an unguarded relaxation.

Well, there’s added insult to injury, Fiona told herself with a kind of wry desolation. He had slammed a door in her face and then promptly fell asleep, while she sat ramrod-straight, exhausted yet wide awake, feeling utterly alone.

Blearily, hopelessly, she got off the bed and eased from it one of the heavy blankets, then took one of her pillows and went quietly into the dark, high-ceilinged passageway off the bedchamber. She meant to go into her dressing-room, but somehow her steps led her to that mysterious locked door and she found herself standing in front of it with her hand on a doorknob that turned but did not yield.

An actual closed door, and not simply a metaphor for her life, Fiona thought with that same bleak amusement. She gave the doorknob a last futile twist and made her way into her dressing-room where she lit a single candle.

Without haste she folded the blanket into a makeshift bed, changed into her heaviest nightgown, took off her jewelry, brushed and braided her hair, cleaned her teeth. She did all this methodically, like an automaton. And finally she blew out the candle, lay down, and snugged the blanket around her.

Ha, I’ve made my bed and now I must lie in it, she thought, staring into the obliterating darkness. She couldn’t even make out the shapes of the armoires, the dressing-table, anything. She did catch a whiff of the rose perfume she had, earlier in the evening, dabbed with joyful anticipation behind her ears. That seemed a lifetime ago. She had been reasonably happy then.

And now?

Now she was—nothing. Empty. With nothing to say, nothing to talk about.