Page 30 of A Tale of Two Dukes

Eventually, they had to talk about it, in these their last moments alone together.

They had barely slept, and it was close on six, almost time for her to creep away, when he spoke at last, his breath brushing her hair.

‘When should I leave? I know Edward might easily not come back till late today or even tomorrow, and God knows I want nothing more than another night in your arms, but it seems to me to be a great risk to take, to linger here with you, however precious every moment in your presence is to me. I swear I am not concerned for myself – he has no power over me unless he attempts to call on the memory of our past closeness, and our relationship as cousins and friends is already irrevocably broken by his actions, by his heartless treatment of you. I am quite prepared to tell him so. But you have no such freedom…’

‘I know,’ she said, her voice a little muffled in his chest. She could feel his heart beating under her cheek, and she pressed closer to him.

It felt so safe and permanent and right, but it was all an illusion.

‘I hate the picture that my mind presents – of him entering some room and finding us together, however innocently we might be sitting reading or talking. If I saw a sort of avid, hopeful expression on his face as he looked at us, I swear I would cross the room and slap him. How dare he manipulate us so, as if he were one of the Olympian gods on the ceiling downstairs, and we mere helpless mortal pawns? If it ever occurred to him that we might develop feelings for each other, I am sure he brushed the idea aside as quite irrelevant. And so, much as it hurts me to say it, I would rather you were gone before there is any chance of him coming back. Write your letter to him and leave it in his study, and I will arrange for one of the grooms to drive you into Bedford or Cambridge – wherever there will be a stage or mail coach soonest that you can take to London. That is what would normally be done when you departed, is it not? And the servants will know what is best, and when you should leave.’

‘Probably Cambridge,’ he murmured dully. ‘That’s how I came. But it does not matter. It feels as though it were months ago since I came here and first saw you, so beautiful and so unhappy, but it is only weeks. Oh, my love…’

‘Don’t,’ she told him fiercely. ‘Don’t, or I will break down and cling to you and beg you to take me with you again, when I already know the dozens of reasons why you cannot.

I don’t want your last memory of me to be in helpless tears.

Don’t tell me you love me when it’s all so hopeless.

Make love to me again; make me forget everything. ’

She left him a while later, and was back in her own bed, pretending to sleep though she was unable to, long before the maid came to light her chamber fire and bring her tea.

When her abigail came to help her dress, she said casually, ‘Jennings, Mr Armstrong said yesterday that his correspondence was preying on his thoughts and that he thought he should leave as soon as possible and return to London. Perhaps he may have changed his mind this morning. But in case he has not, can you ask Fletcher where it would be best for one of the coachmen to drive him so that he can conveniently catch the next stage or mail?’

Mary said sedately that she would, not appearing to think anything odd at all about the request. In a short while, Viola had her answer, and the thing was set in motion with an ease that made her want to scream, to find some way to stop it because it was all so wrong.

A couple of short hours later, she stood bundled in her warmest coat in the coach-house yard, watching her lover climb up into Edward’s curricle beside the waiting driver, his meagre baggage stowed behind him, his face pale and set.

He’d bowed over her gloved hand a moment earlier, and they had spoken commonplace words of thanks, farewell and Godspeed that came nowhere near to the truth of what they both felt.

It was as well that they were observed by the people around them, she thought, and therefore obliged to maintain the strictest propriety in their speech, appearance and actions – if she’d been alone with him, she’d surely have disgraced herself by falling sobbing to the cobbles.

Her heart was shattering into thousands of tiny, sharp pieces in her chest, and she felt cold and sick and desolate.

He raised his hand in final goodbye, the coachman set the two horses in motion and the vehicle swept out through the gateway in a creak of wood and a rattle of harness. She was left alone.

She turned and walked back into the house, and its chilly walls closed about her like the grandest of prisons.