He had neglected the guests during the day. Most of them had not been up before noon, and he had made an excuse about business keeping him at home during the afternoon rather than join them on their walk. Confound it, he had a right to some privacy.
But they were his guests.
Of course, he owed something to Pamela too. She was a child and entitled to his time and company. He had been giving her both while Sybil was preoccupied with entertaining her guests and enjoying herself. At least, that was what he had told himself earlier.
He was going to have to stay away from her more often. Or else he was going to have to take her out more—it was high time she learned to ride, though she had always shown a reluctance to do so.
What he was really going to have to do was stay away from the schoolroom. If he was strictly honest with himself, it was not just—or even mainly—Pamela who was drawing him there, or to the library at the crack of dawn each morning lest he be too late and miss her.
Sidney had commented only that morning, as the duke rose from bed, yawning after the late night, that he must be touched in the upper works to rise so early. Perhaps Sidney was right.
And he had woken up suddenly in the night and caught himself in the act of dreaming about waltzing on a deserted path with a woman whose eyes were tightly closed and whose fire-gold hair was loose and spread like a silken curtain over his arm.
It would not do. It just would not do. He should have had Houghton send her elsewhere. It had been madness to have her sent to Willoughby.
The door of his dressing room opened suddenly, without warning, and the duchess stood there, one hand still on it, looking lovely in pale pink lace and considerably younger than her twenty-six years.
“Oh,” she said sweetly, “are you still busy? Is it possible for Sidney to leave?”
The valet looked to his master with raised eyebrows, and the duke nodded.
“If you please, Sidney,” he said, rising to his feet. “What may I do for you, Sybil?”
She waited for the door to close. “I have never been so humiliated in my life,” she said, looking at him with large hurt eyes. “Adam, how can you do this to me, and in front of our guests, too?”
He looked steadily at her. “I gather you are referring to the incident with Miss Hamilton,” he said.
“Why did you bring her here?” she asked, clasping her slim white hands together at her bosom. “Was it to hurt me beyond endurance? I have never complained about your long absences in London, Adam. And I have always known why you must go there. I have borne the humiliation without reproach. But must I now endure having one of your doxies in this very house? And in close communication with my daughter? You ask too much of me. I cannot bear it.”
“It is a shame you have no audience beyond me,” he said, his eyes fixed on her. “Your words are very affecting, Sybil. One might almost believe that you cared. We were coming from the long gallery into the great hall. Does it not seem peculiar to you that we would have chosen such a very public setting for a clandestine rendezvous?”
“It pleases you to use sarcasm,” she said, “and to walk roughshod over my feelings. I suppose it will please you to lie too. Do you deny that you are having an affair with Miss Hamilton?”
“Yes,” he said. “But you have already labeled me a liar, Sybil, so your question was rather pointless, was it not? Would it be so surprising if I did take a mistress?”
“It is what I have learned to expect of you and to accept,” she said. “But though your love for me is dead, Adam, I thought there would have been some remnants of respect left for the fact that I am your wife.”
“Wife.” He laughed softly and took two steps toward her. “I would not need a mistress if I had a wife, Sybil. Perhaps you would like to protect your interests more actively.”
He set one hand beneath her chin and kissed her lips. But she turned her head sharply to one side.
“Don’t,” she said. “Don’t, please.”
“I didn’t think that idea would have much appeal to you,” he said. “Don’t worry, Sybil. I have never forced you and am unlikely to start doing so now.”
“I feel unwell,” she said. “I still have not recovered fully from that chill.”
“Yes,” he said, “I can see that you are right about that. And you have lost weight, have you not? Did your visit have any other purpose?”
“No,” she said, her light, sweet voice shaking. “But I know you are lying, Adam. I know you have been with Pamela’s governess. No matter how much you deny it, I know it is true.”
He had a sudden and unwelcome mental image of blood—on Fleur’s thighs and on the sheet where she had lain.