A Forbidden Love (37 page)

Anthony wasn’t entirely certain his conviction wasn’t misplaced, but he held onto the hope nonetheless, that one day his family would forgive him.

The sight of a pale Ashley standing at the far end of the corridor roused within Anthony a brutal instinct for survival. If
she
abandoned him too, he would be lost. It would break his heart to never see her or his beloved nieces again.

“Don’t say it!” Anthony barked the moment he reached her and she opened her mouth to speak. “Don’t you dare tell me you will never see me again!”

A sob bubbled to the tip of her tongue, and she bit her trembling bottom lip to quell the sound of her sorrow. “I have my girls to think of, Anthony.”

He grabbed her by the upper arms. “The girls are too young to bear any scars from this event. By the time they reach marriageable age, this will all be forgotten.”

“But your wife will always be a gypsy. That will never change. Not even in fifteen years. Oh, why did you do it, Anthony?”

“Ash, please, trust me. I had to do it. There was no other way to save…”

“To save what? Our family name? Your pride? Did you think of any of these things before you married the girl? Were you foxed, is that it? There is a way to end the marriage, Anthony. A procedure you could initiate.”

“No.” He released his hold on her arms. He was numb and cold and he couldn’t take much more of this. “I have to go, Ashley. But I
will
see you again.”

He moved toward the entrance, not sure he had the strength to make it back to his own townhouse. His brother-in-law met him at the door rather than the butler. Daniel held out his hand, which Anthony silently accepted.

“Give it some time,” Daniel said in a hushed voice. “It might all work out in the end. I don’t know why you did it, but I’m sure you had your reason.”

Anthony mustered a silent nod of appreciation before he left the building. He remained on the front stoop for a while, just staring at the storm clouds brewing in the distance.

As the fog lifted in his mind, he became more aware of the passing whispers and looks of disdain.

He had known Sabrina would be subjected to those very looks and whispers, but he had not anticipated he would be the recipient of them as well.

By taking an outsider for his wife, he had become an outsider himself.

And Anthony wasn’t so sure he could live with that.

Dark clouds whirled, as a fork of blue light stabbed into the earth, followed by the distant groan of thunder.

Sabrina was traveling to her new home. And she had been traveling to it in silence. Anthony spoke scarce a word to her, with reason, though. The confrontation with his family had been ghastly. That they’d abandoned London in such haste told her so plain enough.

She looked over at her husband. A brooding faerie king, lost, and bewildered at his loss. He had once had everything and everyone at his beck and call, and now such certainty was gone.

Her heart ached for him. She understood the turmoil swirling in his soul. She understood the time he’d need to come to terms with all that he had lost. She, too, had fretted in silence. Anthony was no different in that respect. And yet, he
was
different.

Something about him had changed. Perhaps his grief had altered him. Or perhaps it was just the jitters of a naïve wife making her imagine such a thing.

But in truth, that fledging hope of marital joy she had nurtured in her heart seemed to be dwindling.

Such tenderness he had shown her on the night before their wedding. Such devotion…such love. Had it all been in her mind? She’d not had a kind look from him all day, nor a word of encouragement. Just one little gesture was all she needed to know everything was going to be all right.

But her husband had withdrawn into his woe, leaving her to fuss and obsess over the same redundant thought:
He loathes me
.

She tried to dismiss the terrible notion. After all, this was the man she loved. This was the man she was sure loved her in return—in part anyway. He had given up so much for her. Surely it was done out of some feeling of love? Surely love could not dwindle and die so quickly?

But one event repeated itself over and over again in her mind, rousing her doubt. Prior to their leaving London, Vincent had come to call on Anthony, desperate to see his best friend. But Anthony had barred him from the townhouse.

Now Sabrina was left with the irksome task of trying to figure out why Anthony had turned so cruelly against his dearest comrade. Was the viscount merely miffed at Vincent’s lack of supervision on the night she was abducted? Or was Anthony furious that Vincent’s carelessness had eventually led to his marriage?

She didn’t want to dwell on it. But she knew it might be true. Anthony might regret having married her. And if it was so, that hope for a salvaged future would be nothing more than a wistful memory.

The horses cantered at a steady gait, turning a bend and clearing a wooded grove. In a lush valley, a small manor house came into view. Well, small in comparison to Anthony’s other country estate. But it was still a good deal grander than anything Sabrina had ever imagined she would end up living in.

The home was quaint in appearance, two levels high and built entirely of stone. The greenery blanketing the walls was thick, concealing much of the rugged gray stone beneath, which occasionally peaked through a sparse patch of ivy.

A pepper of servants lined up in front of the house, seven to be exact. The ladies were smoothing their aprons, the men fingering their lapels, and such fussing prompted Sabrina to do a little grooming of her own.

The carriage rolled to a halt. Anthony was first to step down, leaving her inside the vehicle to comb her fidgety fingers through her mussed hair. Next, she tended to the crinkles in her skirt, then checked to make sure her boots weren’t too muddy.

Satisfied she was presentable, Sabrina took a hesitant, and rather uneven, step out of the carriage. All eyes went to her. Big round eyes of astonishment.

It shouldn’t bother her, being gawked at in such a manner. It wasn’t the first time eyes had broadened upon hearing
her
announced as the new viscountess.

But it did bother her. It made her feel an imposter. As if she had no earthly or divine claim to be Anthony’s wife.

“Mrs. Chadwick,” said Anthony, a cool and official tone to his voice. “As head housekeeper, you will oversee the servants until my butler arrives from London with the remainder of my belongings.”

Mrs. Chadwick gave a deep curtsy. “Aye, my lord.”

“You will also report all domestic matters to Lady Hastings, and follow her explicit directions in the governing of the household.”

Mrs. Chadwick gave the flustered Lady Hastings a critical eye, but then nodded in obedience.

Sabrina, on the other hand, wasn’t so agreeable. Her heart was in her throat. She knew nothing of running a household. She had never even lived in a house before! It was her custom to do everything for herself, from laundry to cooking to cleaning. She couldn’t ask anyone else to do it for her, nevertheless order someone about. She was better qualified to
be
one of the servants, not govern them. And that disparaging truth had her opening her mouth to protest such an arrangement.

But Anthony had one more order to dictate.

“And Mrs. Chadwick, see to it that the local seamstress is summoned in the morning. Lady Hastings is in dire need of apparel befitting a viscountess.”

Sabrina closed her mouth, her heart sinking to her toes.

Chapter 30

T
he flames spit and crackled, puffing warm air into the spacious room. Sabrina crouched before the fire, her back to the window and the wild spring storm soaking the land beyond. In her hand she held a towel, wrapped around the handle of an iron pot. And in that iron pot bubbled some sugar, slowly melting to the golden thickness of honey.

At the sound of a cough and the shuffling of papers, her eyes abandoned the snapping flames in favor of the restless man shifting only a few feet away from her.

Anthony was engrossed with a stack of calculations. A list of past market sales, of tenant names and rent dues, of servant wages and household expenses. He appeared lost. But she could offer him no help. She could gather meadow grass and twist it into rope. She could spot a prize thoroughbred in a crowd of endless studs. She could even grind a dead lizard into powder and turn that powder into a magical potion. But what good would all those skills do her here?

Another garbled cough drifted through the room. For much of the evening, Anthony’s cough grew more frequent and more intense. Back in London, after the visit with his parents, a fierce spring storm had lashed out at him, and ever since, he had shown signs of an approaching sickness.

On that matter, at least, she was quick to find a remedy.

Sabrina poured the melted sugar into a glass, then added a few tablespoons of honey, followed by some water. Stirring the concoction to a gooey consistency, she abandoned the hearth and walked over to the desk, setting the glass on the parchment-littered surface.

“Drink this,” she instructed.

Anthony gave the glass a curious inspection. “What is it?”

“A remedy for the cough.”

After a brief pause, he shrugged, and drank down part of the potion. Resting the half empty glass on the desk, he returned to his work, surveying the stack of papers in front of him.

Sabrina pretended his stiff demeanor didn’t mean anything, that Anthony was just brooding and she should let him brood in peace, give him some time to get adjusted to his new life—with her. But despite her attempts to rationalize his cold behavior, the gnawing fear in her chest intensified, cleaved to her heart with a vicious hold.

He blames me for the loss of his family, his friends…his life.

Her fingers curled into her palms. What right did he have to blame her?
She
had lost everyone dear to her, too. Or did her grief and suffering mean nothing because she was a gypsy?

Sabrina gave a weary sigh. There was a dark cloud of misfortune hovering above her head, always threatening to shower her with another tragedy. She was tired of it. It was time she moved out from under it.

For far too long she had trusted the members of her kin to take care of her. For far too long she had accepted whatever fate had thrown her way. Her wants, her dreams were always a nuisance, conflicting with her ordained destiny.

But now there was neither kin nor destiny to determine the course of her life. Now there was only her heart to guide her. And her heart yearned to fight for Anthony. To claw and to battle through his doubt and fear, to yank him from his oppressive grief. It was time she did what she wanted. And what she wanted was her husband’s heart.

“It’s late,” she said softly, and placed a gentle hand on his wrist. “Why don’t you put the papers away until morning?”

“Go on to bed.” He shifted his hand, reaching for another leaf of paper. “I have a lot of work to do.”

As did she. It would not be easy dragging her husband from his melancholy. He was evidently resistant to any such attempt.

But it would be a worthy fight.

“I don’t know which bedroom is ours,” she said, hoping to draw him out of the study; hoping a night’s rest, together in each other’s arms, might offset the sorrow in his heart and bring a new sense of hope to their marriage.

For a moment, Anthony abandoned the study of his papers, lifting his eyes to meet hers. And they were such dark eyes, shadowed by the flicker of candle flame. “Your room is at the end of the corridor. Ask the housekeeper to show you the way.”

And he was back to his examination of property taxes and estate dues.

Was that it? she wondered. One abrupt announcement of their separate bedrooms and she was to accept their wedded life was over? That he no longer cared anything for her?

Not bloody likely.

She drew in her grief like a whirlpool would a lost ship, her features settling into peaceful repose.

Lightning engulfed the room, and her eyes briefly lit upon a bright red cushion at the far end of the study.

She headed for it, her fright of storms replaced with anger. Red-hot anger. Anger that she could lose the most precious being in her life because of his own stubbornness.

The pillow sailed through the air. It missed its intended target—Anthony’s head—but landed within a few feet of him, and so still accomplished its goal, which was to gain the viscount’s attention.

“Something troubling you?” he drawled.

“Why did you marry me?”

A light was back in his eyes. A fire. Something other than empty pain. It was a relief to see, even if the fire was directed at her.

“Do you think me such a blackguard that I would allow an innocent woman to be murdered?” he said.

“Duty? Mere duty made you save my life?”

“What else?”

What else indeed. He had forsaken his privileged existence out of a sense of obligation? She didn’t believe it. She didn’t
want
to believe it.