Page 59 of Becoming Lady Dalton
“I don’t know everything you’ve done for me this past week, Lord Dalton. I know I owe you my life. I would like it very much if you joined us for the holiday.”
He shifted his weight and glanced away. “I wouldn’t like to cause awkwardness between you and your husband.”
“There won’t be. Ours has been a marriage in little but name for years and given his health it won’t be a marriage in truth for much longer. Sam may not survive the journey, but I believe getting him out into the country would buy him time and make him feel cared for at a time of great suffering. Any human deserves as much. I want this for Matthew, you understand. Not for myself.”
“Of course.” Piers moved as if to speak, then dusted the brim of his hat with his fingertips. “I shall make the arrangements, Mrs. Cartwright.”
Mrs. Cartwright.Viola mentally repeated her unwanted name.Now is the time he uses it without protest?
The man who’d played an instrumental role in saving her life was finally letting her go, but Viola was too exhausted and scattered to call him back.
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She was safe.
Piers traced the silk-tasseled fringe of his study’s curtains. Had Viola chosen the satin or the brocade? Did it matter anymore?
His chest hollowed at the thought that it might not.
“Are you well, brother?”
His sister’s pale, thin form emerged from darkness, in a halo of candlelight. Like him, she had dark hair and dark eyes. Unlike him, Gwendolyn’s wrapper couldn’t hide her frailty. Where Piers was robust, her body had been ravaged by disease and had never quite recovered.
“Not entirely,” he confessed. Gwen was rarely his confidant, for he was rarely in residence at his country estate. Gwen ruled over it as a gentle mistress while Piers remained mostly in town. In summer, he visited for the worst weeks of heat, but otherwise he attended to politics and business. Each time he returned to Dalton Manor, Piers felt haunted by memories.
But there was his sister, whom he adored, so he went anyway. Dalton Manor was no great distance from London. He ought to go more often.
“Tell me,” she demanded softly. Gwen curled herself into a wingback chair, expectant.
“Our parents should have named you Monica. The patron saint of patience,” Piers remarked.
“I see no brandy in your hand, even if we were given to popish religion,” Gwen replied firmly. “Which we are not. So tell me, brother. What troubles you?”
“Did I neglect Emilia?”
Piers’ question surprised him. He’d thought to ask in general terms what Gwen would advise in pursuing Viola. But his question went deeper. He couldn’t love Viola without acknowledging what had gone deeply wrong in his first marriage.
Viola wanted freedom. It was the one thing Piers couldn’t give her, because it meant his line wouldn’t continue. His parents, his siblings, all his forbears scowled down at him from a hallway of paintings.
Get a male child, whatever it takes.
Piers no longer cared what his forbears thought.
What he did care about was Viola. She was not a brood mare, any more than he was a stallion put to stud.
They were only people who loved one another. It was more than he’d given to his first wife. Hence, his question to Gwen, who appeared to have difficulty forming a response.
He had his answer.
“Piers. You did your best. Emilia expected a great deal from you. I know you tried hard to make her happy.”
“Did I?” Piers demanded harshly. “Or was I content to let her try to build a bridge between us without giving her support?”
He choked. Gwen eyed him, but said nothing. She untucked her legs from beneath her and went to his desk, where she poured two fingers of brandy into two glasses and offered him one.
“When did you begin drinking?” Piers demanded.
“When I felt like it, dear brother.” Gwen sipped her amber drink without flinching. She tucked herself back into her chair, legs beneath the drape of her wrapper. “I wish you’d let me come to London for a while. I’d like to live a bit, even if it means I die sooner.”
