He had not taken Isolde’s own worries seriously at the time, but after he had escaped the townhouse to walk and clear his head, he had realized just how idiotic he had been. There were always people wandering past the townhouses of Mayfair, peering in at windows to satisfy their nosiness, and they had been right there, not only dancing, but standing too close, their intentions—Edmund’s, at least—as clear as day for anyone to behold.
“You lost yourself in the fire of the moment,” Lionel said evenly. “It can happen to anyone. It does not mean you are suddenly dishonorable or wretched.”
Edmund squirmed in his chair, wishing he was in his own townhouse where he would have the room to pace and fret. “Then explain why I have not been able to stop thinking about it—abouther?”
“You like her,” Lionel replied simply.
Edmund scoffed, as he had done when the picnicking ladies in Hyde Park had alluded to the same thing. It was ridiculous. It was utterly ridiculous. Of all the women in the world, she was the very last he would think of in a romantic fashion.
But therehad,perhaps, been warning signs: the stolen looks, the ‘accidental’ touches, the way he sought her out in a crowd, the way he had intervened so forcefully during the morning visits of potential suitors, the fact he had behaved so out of character at the dinner party, and had felt a tightness in his chest upon seeing Isolde so enamored with Noah. Had it been leading to something like a kiss, without him realizing? Had he missed earlier opportunities to nip certain impulses in the bud?
“I do not hear you protesting,” Lionel prompted with a faint smile.
“Well, that is because I would not deign to give that suggestion any speech at all,” Edmund retorted, his mind buzzing with a hive of confusion and unease. “There has to be another reason. It cannot be affection.”
Lionel leaned back in his chair, swirling his glass of liquor before taking a pointed sip. “I would not assume to know what you are thinking, Edmund, but I do not see that there is anything wrong with seeing Lady Isolde in a romantic light. She is known to be very beautiful, I have heard that she is quite charming, she is of good standing, and she is already familiar to you. It would, perchance, bemoreunusual if you did not develop some sort of affection for her.”
“Then consider me unusual, because I will not allow it of myself,” Edmund insisted, his leg jiggling as if his body could not bear the pressure of his wayward mind’s unyielding thoughts of her.
Distraction had not worked. He must have walked across half of London trying to tire himself out, so his brain would not permit him to remember how wonderful, howrightit had felt to hold her in his arms. How soft her skin had been when he had cradled her face, how she had tilted her head up as if shewantedto be kissed by him.
Would she have hit me, pushed me, yelled at me?He had asked himselfthatquestion a thousand times since it happened, too.
“With respect, Edmund, whyever not?” Lionel’s tone held a rasp of frustration, as if he had grown weary of the conversation.
Then again, it was always difficult to tell what Lionel was thinking, for he rarely gave much away on his face or in his voice. It was what made him such a good listener, for one could talk for hours and he would not interject unless invited to.
“You know why,” Edmund replied, turning his gaze toward the window, where the river flowed slowly by, glinting in the afternoon sunlight. “It would not matter if she was a stranger I had met in the gardens of a ball, who had pierced my heart with longing; the outcome would be the same. I will not, cannot, and shall not marry. I have told you this before, Lionel.”
Lionel shrugged. “And I have always assumed that you would change your mind if the right lady happened to come along. You are a clever man, Edmund; I thought you would eventually realize that you do not need to punish yourself for things that were not your fault in the first place. Things that have nothing to do with having a wife and being content in life.”
With a sigh, Edmund squinted at the glittering water, wondering if he had not explained himself well enough to the friends who knew of his stance—Lionel and Vincent—or if they would simply never understand because they could not.
They had not lost what he had lost. They had not had to carry the burden of being the sole survivor of an entire family. They had not had everything one moment, and nothing the next. They were likely incapable of putting themselves in his position, feeling what he felt.
“It has more to do with that than you think,” he managed to say. “I have no desire for legacy. My cousin will make a fine Duke when I die, or my cousin’s sons if he has already passed, and they will fill that manor with life and people again.Thatis what I want.Thatis why I cannot?—”
A face appeared at the window he had been staring out of, eager knuckles rapping on the glass. A face he would not have expected to see in that part of London at any time, least of all then.
His heart jumped in alarm, his stomach sinking as he realized there was another figure framed in the window too. Someonewho would not look at him, despite her mother’s frantic attempt to gain Edmund’s attention.
Isolde—the very woman he had been trying to forget, haunting him in places he had been certain they would never cross paths.
“Did you tell them you would be here?” Lionel whispered, a subtle hint of cool amusement in his eyes. “Or are you, perhaps, more destined than you thought?”
Edmund shot his friend a dark look, downed what was left in his glass, and got up to head outside and greet Julianna and her daughter. Indeed, though it seemed like a cruel jest from the heavens, perhaps it was a blessing in disguise, for if he was to keep any inkling of affection at arm’s length, there was no better time to begin practicing than the present.
“Good afternoon to you,” Edmund said, bowing his head to Isolde and her mother as he stepped out of the rustic riverside inn.
A rather shabby establishment, in Isolde’s opinion, but if that was Edmund’s preference, she would not question it. She would not even mention it, for that might show she cared what he got up to when he was not standing guard over her marriage prospects.
And I do not care what he does when he is not acting like my shadow. I do not care a jot,she told herself, determined to make herself believe it.
“Good afternoon, Edmund,” Isolde’s mother crowed, wearing a gleeful expression. “What a fortunate thing that I caught sight of you, or I might have missed you entirely.”
Edmund smiled tightly. “Indeed, I would not have expected to see you here. Did you lose your way? Do you require an escort to return to more… savory parts of London?”
“Oh, what a fine and caring gentleman you are!” Isolde’s mother said, delivering a rather sharp jab of the elbow to Isolde’s ribs. “But no, we are not lost. We have been at the modiste, and when we emerged, three gowns heavier, it was such a beautiful afternoon that I suggested we should wander along the river. What a bit of luck that we should find you here too.”
