Chapter Twenty-Seven
Robert went to Oban a few days later and came back with the report that Viscount Westburgh was, apparently, uninjured from his blow to the head. Though this was surmised, not told to him; Westburgh must have not have wanted word to get out that he’d been bested by a woman, because no one seemed to know very much about the matter. Just that he’d been seen leaving Oban the evening of the ship’s departure.
With any luck, he’d gone back to his country estate in defeat.
And each day, Annabel waited, tense, for the letter that would arrive from Theo’s solicitor. The letter that would mark the end.
Theo was doing his best to avoid her. He stayed away from the castle from dawn till dusk and took his dinner in his bedchamber. If he was awake at night, he confined himself to his room, because she experienced her own restless nights, roaming the castle, and she didn’t see him. She did her best not to care.
But she was telling herself lies.
Her mind drifted, as it inevitably did, to two distinct memories.
First, the night she’d visited him at the inn. Their joining had been shattering, tense, intense, intimate. If she’d had any doubt that Theo truly cared for her, it was eradicated by those secret moments. Lust could explain many things, but it couldn’t explain the way he’d held her the last few seconds, as though death was the only thing that would loosen his grip.
But even that memory, as wonderful as it was, was overpowered by the one that came later. The hard resolve in Theo’s face. The harshness of his tone. And one word: nothing. One word that sounded like an ending.
It took her a long time, too long, to work up her resolve to speak to him. But she could no longer exist as she was—tentative, uncertain, frightened—something had to give, something had to change.
She went to Theo’s room one night and knocked softly at the door, her heart in her throat, some deep well of strength the only thing that kept her hands from shaking.
When he appeared, he was fully dressed, as though he didn’t intend on sleeping at all. His eyes were bruised, his face pale. He looked as poorly as she felt.
“I only wished to speak to you,” she said when he didn’t move but remained hovering in the doorway.
After a moment of hesitation, a moment that made her heart pinch, he stepped aside. The silence between them was so pronounced it hurt her ears.
She drew in a deep breath and clasped her hands together—she’d come here for honesty—so she would have to be honest, too. She would have to start. “The truth is…I want to be with you, Theo.”
He blinked. Whatever he’d expected, it wasn’t this.
She rushed on, knowing if she didn’t say everything now, she would lose her courage entirely. “But I’ve yearned for this too long to settle. I want everything…everything you have.”
It was something she’d realized, not long after she’d realized she loved him. Once upon a time she might have subsisted on scraps of affection and assumed she didn’t deserve anything more. But that was before her aunt took her in, and before Theo had awakened her greedy heart. Before she’d begun to feel like she was worth more than she’d been given.
“I don’t want hasty couplings with a man who loves me but is too terrified to even think it.”
His throat moved as he swallowed. Every other part of him was unnaturally still.
“The truth is, you are not well.”
He blanched, and she would have done anything to take away his pain in that moment, but she wouldn’t take back the words, even if she could.
“I know. It’s why I cannot…why this cannot happen.”
She shook her head. “That isn’t why.”
His expression shifted, became tinged with anger, which was better than simply pain. “What am I supposed to do? I can’t just make it stop. Don’t you think I would have? Don’t you think if I could be whole for you, I would? I feel like I’m trapped in a hell that I can never escape from.”
She had to breathe deeply to keep her eyes from stinging. “There’s something I’ve been thinking about. We had travelers here once, and one of the men told me a story. He’d been beaten and robbed by a highwayman when he was younger. He said for months he was frightened; he would startle all the time, at any little thing. Later he and his wife went back to the place where it happened. He said it was the only thing that helped.”
Theo laughed, bitter and harsh, and she nearly flinched. “How wonderful for him. But I wasn’t beaten and robbed by a highwayman, and I can’t exactly traipse around the continent to visit the battlefields with a war going on.”
“I know. I know what helped him might not help you. I know what happened to him is a very different thing. But Theo, what you’re doing now isn’t helping, either. I thought distractions might offer you some peace. I thought horse races and games and things done just for enjoyment might be enough, but they only held the shadows at bay for a little while. How long has it been since you’ve slept more than a few hours?”
When he didn’t answer, she continued, “You keep it locked inside you. You keep everything bottled inside you because you don’t want it to touch me, or your brother and sisters. You think it’s something you can contain for our sake. But bottles break under too much pressure, Theo. I…I worry about you. We all do.”
“You shouldn’t.” He was immovable, even more so than she’d anticipated. She felt panic clawing at her throat.
“You can tell me anything,” she continued. “You can let me help you, just as I let you help me.”
“No,” he said, his voice sharp. “It isn’t the same. I don’t want your help.”
“It doesn’t have to be me, then,” she said desperately. “What about Robert? He would gladly listen. Or…or another soldier, someone who unders—”
“I am done with this conversation, Annabel.” His voice was cold, colder than she’d ever heard it. It chilled her to the bone.
She was losing him. He was slipping away too fast for her to hold.
“Then…then just let me be with you,” she whispered. “I’ve missed you these past days.” And when he didn’t answer, when his face remained as forbidding as ever, the words tumbled out, uncalled for, unheeding, but true to the depths of her soul. One last, desperate plea. “I love you.”
He was so still. So quiet. So impassive. And then, “You shouldn’t,” he repeated, his voice hollow and dead. And final.
She felt her heart crack.
She didn’t know what else to say to him. She didn’t know how to move him, if he wouldn’t yield on his own. She didn’t think there was anything else she could do other than be honest, and she had been. Her chest was open in front of him, bare and bleeding, and he wasn’t lifting a hand to help her.
She found herself nodding, inanely, clumsily. She tried to swallow, but her throat was too dry. At least she wasn’t crying. The only thing that could make this worse was uncontrollable tears.
She gripped her hands together tightly, backed away from him. She thought she should say something. The only thing she could utter was “very well,” which sounded just as inane as it felt on her awkward tongue.
I love you.
Very well.
I ache for you.
Very well.
Take me. Take my heart. Take my soul. Take everything.
Very well.
She went straight out of Theo’s bedchamber to her own. She didn’t stop moving. Not when she numbly packed a valise. Not when she scribbled a letter that Theo would find, maybe tonight, maybe the next day. Not when she stepped out into a misty evening.
Not for a long time.