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“Are you sure? It’s actually very clever.”
“Are you planning to teach our hounds?”
“We have hounds?”
“Of course.”
Iris wondered what else she didn’t know about her new home. Loads, probably. She tugged him to a halt in the middle of the hall, gazed up into his eyes, and solemnly said, “I promise not to teach any of our dogs how to fire a weapon.”
Richard hooted with laughter, prompting more than one servant to poke his head into the hall. “You are a treasure, Iris Kenworthy,” he said, guiding her once again toward the front door.
A treasure, Iris thought with a touch of angst. Really?
“Do you like your new name?” he inquired idly.
“It does roll off the tongue with a bit more ease than Smythe-Smith,” she allowed.
“I think it suits you,” he said.
“I should hope so,” she murmured. It was difficult to imagine a name more unwieldy than the one she’d been born with.
Richard pulled Maycliffe’s heavy front door open, and a chilly burst of wind swirled forth. Iris immediately hugged her arms to herself. It was later than she’d thought, and the air had a bite to it. “Let me run up to my room for a shawl,” she said. “It was silly of me to wear short sleeves.”
“Silly? Or optimistic?”
She laughed. “I’m rarely optimistic.”
“Really?”
Iris was already halfway up the steps before she realized he was following her.
“I don’t believe I’ve ever heard someone declare themselves a pessimist with such a merry laugh before,” he mused.
“I’m not that, either,” she said. At least she didn’t think she was. She didn’t live her life anticipating disaster and disappointment.
“Not an optimist or a pessimist,” Richard said when they reached the top of the stairs. “What, then, I wonder, are you?”
“Not a wife,” she muttered.
He went still. “What did you say?”
Iris gasped at the retort that had escaped unbidden from her lips. “I’m sorry,” she blurted. “I didn’t mean . . .” She looked up, then wished she hadn’t. He was regarding her with an inscrutable expression, and she felt awful. Embarrassed and angry and sorry and wronged and probably eight other things she really didn’t have the inclination to discern.
“I beg your pardon,” she mumbled, dashing off to her room.
“Wait!” he called out.
But she didn’t.
“Iris, wait!”
She kept going, her feet moving as fast as they possibly could without switching from a walk to a run. But then she tripped—over what, she did not know—and just barely managed to catch her balance.
Richard was at her side in a heartbeat, his steadying hand at her arm. “Are you all right?”
“I’m fine,” she said in a clipped voice. She tugged at her arm, but he held firm. She nearly laughed. Or maybe she nearly cried. Now he wanted to touch her? Now he wouldn’t let go?
“I need to get my shawl,” she mumbled, but she no longer wished to go for a walk. All she wanted to do was crawl into her bed and pull the covers up tight.
Richard regarded her for several seconds before releasing his grip. “Very well,” he said.
She tried for a smile but couldn’t manage it. Her hands were shaking, and she suddenly felt ill.
“Iris,” he said, concern evident in his eyes, “are you sure you’re well?”
She nodded, then changed her mind and shook her head. “Perhaps I had better lie down.”
“Of course,” he said, ever the gentleman. “We shall take our walk another time.”
She tried for that smile again—and failed again—and instead made do with a jerky curtsy. But before she could escape, he took her arm again to guide her to her room.
“I don’t need help,” she said. “I’m fine, really.”
“It would make me feel better.”
Iris gritted her teeth. Why did he have to be so nice?
“I shall send for a doctor,” he said, as they crossed the threshold.
“No, please don’t.” Good God, what was a doctor going to say? That she had a broken heart? That she was mad to think her husband would ever care for her?
He let go of her arm and let out a sigh as his eyes searched her face. “Iris, clearly something is wrong.”
“I’m just tired.”
He did not say anything, just looked at her with a steady gaze, and she knew what he was thinking. She had not seemed the least bit tired in the drawing room.
“I’ll be fine,” she assured him, relieved that her voice was starting to sound more like its usual matter-of-fact self. “I promise.”
His lips pressed together, and Iris could see that he did not know whether to believe her. Finally, he said, “Very well,” and he placed his hands gently on her shoulders and leaned down—
To kiss her! Iris’s breath caught, and in one deluded moment of bliss she closed her eyes, tilting her face toward his. She longed for this, for his lips on hers, for the hot touch of his tongue on the soft skin at the corner of her mouth.
“Richard,” she whispered.
His lips touched her forehead. It was not the kiss of a lover.
Humiliated, she wrenched herself away, turning toward the wall, the window, anywhere but him.
“Iris . . .”
“Please,” she choked out, “just go away.”
He did not speak, but nor did he leave the room. She would have heard his footsteps. She would have felt his loss.