More laughter.
This time he did notice, and he inspected the ballroom meticulously, likely noting every sneer and raised brow.
They danced alone now, every couple having dropped to the sides of the room. Every eye was on them, the women’s mouths hidden behind fans, the men’s eyebrows arched skyward.
Rowan’s gaze settled on her, something broken in it. He released her and stepped back. “I should not be here. God, you are beautiful, and you are—” He swallowed. “I will go.” He fled.
Isabella followed, running once she passed through the ballroom doors. Down the hall, down the stairs, out the front doors. A line of coaches stretched to the end of the street on both sides in front of Clearford House.
Rowan passed straight through them to the other side of the street, a heavy shadow in the dark. He would have kept going all the way to the Hestia, no doubt, all the way to the sea, and down to the very bottom if he could, but Isabella sprinted and jumped in front of him.
He didn’t seem shocked, as if he’d expected her to follow. “Go home, Lady Isabella. You should not be seen with a man like me.”
“I do not care what they think.”
He stepped around her and continued into the night.
She ran to catch up. “At least let me thank you.”
“You already have.”
“Not well enough. You have saved my brother. And hurt yourself in the process. I never wanted that. I’ll come with you back to the Hestia and tend your wounds.”
He leaned in close, their foreheads almost touching, a shadow consuming her. “If you return to Hestia with me, I’m not letting you go. You will stay there until we wed by special license. You and me. No crowded St. George’s. No wedding breakfast with a duke. Nothing but you and me and the life we’ll live after that. I’ll not be laughed at again.”
“That’s not fair. I want—”
“What I cannot give you, Lady Isabella Merriweather. I cannot join your world of polish and gold and delicate blooms. I am rough and scarred. I am the mud on your brother’s boot. And you are a damned Irish rose. Toogood for me. I will marry you, but I cannot be some pathetic hanger on, forced to attend grand balls and musicales but pushed by scowls and whispers to the edges. I’m too proud for that. I stay at Hestia. And you do, too.”
“You are saying”—she took two steps backward, away from him—“you will not allow me to continue a relationship with my family?”
He cursed. “No. I would not deny you that. Even if I wanted to chain you up—and I don’t—you’d find a means of escape. Visit your family as you please, but I will not go with you.”
“You will miss christenings? And holidays? And dinner parties? When Gertrude makes her debut, my sisters will all have their husbands at their sides, but mine will be sulking at a hotel?”
“It’s my home. And if it’s not good enough for you—”
“I did not say that.”
He scrubbed his hands down his face. “You should return. I’m sure your family will worry over you.”
“You said you didn’t care who I am. You said you did not care if I was a duke’s sister.”
“I do care. I cannot stop caring. You were already too good for me. As Miss Crewe, you were miles above me. But not high enough I could not live comfortably alongside you. As Lady Isabella, I will never feel at home with you. I will feel like some street thief who’s robbed the duke of one of his precious possessions.”
“I am no possession.” She spoke low to keep her rage contained.
“We do not fit, Isabella. We do not fit unless you can simply be Mrs. Trent.”
“I will be Mrs. Trent, whether I’m in there”—she pointed at her family’s home—“or at the Hestia. It matters not.”
“To you. Because you are a… changeling, becoming whomever you need to become to fit in anywhere you please. I do not have that talent. Can you give up being a duke’s sister to be my wife? Because I am not made for your world.”
“You truly mean this? You will truly let me leave your side alone, every day. You will abandon me… or have me”—she swallowed a lump in her throat—“abandon them?”
He turned from her. “The decision is yours. You are not with child,and… and I will not blame you if you decide you cannot be Mrs. Trent.”
Her choice. Her decision to rip herself in two.
