Page 65 of To Love and to Loathe
He watched her with a fair amount of trepidation—he was a bit afraid she’d shy at this hint of his desire to continue their affair—but he was still unprepared for the flash of rage that crossed her face, just as quickly suppressed and replaced by her usual cool mask.
“That’s a lovely plan, Willingham,” she said, her use of his title akin to a slap across the face; he was surprised he didn’t physically recoil. “I suppose now that you’ve experienced one evening in the bedroom in which you were absolutely certain the lady was genuinely enjoying herself, you thought,Well, I’ve learned it all. Better find my next mistress posthaste.”
“That’s not—”
“But of course,” Diana continued, “you wouldn’t want your next lover to get any ideas about where she stood with you, and how better to achieve that than by racing to the altar first? Just to ensure that the lady understood how she ranked, of course.”
“I didn’t mean—”
“And, of course, who better to marry than a woman who is guaranteed never to expect much of anything at all from you? Isn’t that what you want, after all? For no one to expect much from you?”
“Yes, it bloody is,” Jeremy said heatedly, his mouth racing ahead of his mind by several measures, and he unable to give much of a damn about it. “Because I don’t have anything to offer! It’s best that everyone knows where we stand when we begin.” He sprang to his feet, unable to remain seated for one moment longer. “I’m not fit to be any sort of husband to anyone, so why not marry someone who doesn’t want a husband at all?”
Diana did not join him on his feet, instead remaining almost eerily still, her gaze on him unblinking. “And those future mistresses?”
“I wasn’t thinking about any goddamned future mistresses!” he burst out, frustrated. “I was only thinking about you!”
His words fell heavily into the silence between them, like rocks dropped into a still pond. He didn’t even wish them unspoken—it was an enormous relief to have them out in the open rather than at the tip of his tongue, threatening to spill out each time he spoke to her.
“Am I supposed to be flattered?” she asked quietly after the silence had dragged out to a length that could only be classified as excruciating. Her face was pale, and her eyes glittered. “Am I supposed to swoon at your feet with the knowledge that you wish only to bedmefor the immediate future, even as you plan to woo and wed another woman?”
“Only so that I could still be with you!” he said heatedly, his mouth now apparently operating entirely independently of the rest of his body—a novel occurrence, to say the least. “You’re the one who has made such a point of the fact that you never wish to remarry, that you value yourindependenceabove all else—and all I am doing is coming up with a solution that allows us to be together without asking you to sacrifice that!”
“Is that supposed to beromantic?” she asked incredulously, unfolding her legs and rising to her feet at last. “Do you think you’re making some sort of grand gesture by not asking anything of me, ever?”
“I’m trying to give you what you want!” He raked a hand through his hair, frustrated. She was standing very close to him, and even through his anger he was unable to help noticing the becoming flush that had replaced the paleness of her cheeks a few moments before. It was probably inappropriate to react to a woman’s anger with desire. He assumed. He didn’t think asking Diana’s opinion on the matter would yield positive results at the moment—which was, in and of itself, perhaps an answer to his question.
“But what doyouwant?” she asked, pressing closer to him, and he was instantly distracted by the heat emanating from her skin, the subtle scent of her, the smattering of freckles across her nose with which he feared he was becoming perversely obsessed.
“That doesn’t matter,” he managed to say, tearing his eyes from those accursed freckles with great effort. Logically, he understood they were mere dark spots on her nose; illogically, he wondered if they possessed some sort of peculiar, trance-creating witchcraft.
“It should,” she said, her face suddenly erased of all expression, as if by magic—and if it was magic, then it was a sort of magic he absolutely despised. “I had a plan for this evening, you know. I planned to be honest with you—to tell you that I have…” She trailed off; he held his breath. “I have feelings for you. No, I think I love you—or at least IhopeI do, because if anything less than love is causing me this degree of emotional turmoil, then I assure you I have no interest in the real thing.”
He was vaguely aware that she was still speaking, but his mind was stuck on a single word:love. Shelovedhim. At least, he was fairly certain that was what she was saying.
“You love me?” he croaked. He’d like to have imagined some more dashing, romantic way of describing the sound of his voice at that precise moment, but strict honesty compelled him to admit thatcroakwas really the most accurate word.
“That isn’t the point,” she snapped. Her assertion seemed a trifle unfair to him—it was a very rare situation in which someone declared their love for another person and it wasn’t at leastsomewhatthe point. “I don’t know what I was thinking! I can’t imagine why I possibly thought this was a good idea!”
“Love?” he asked again incredulously, feeling as though he werescrambling after her as fast as he could but was always,alwaysat least twenty feet behind. “But I—but you—” He had the vague impression that this response was not going to gain him any admiration from her; his suspicion was confirmed a moment later.
“Don’t be too flattered,” she snapped. “I assure you, if I had any control over the matter, this would not have happened!” She sighed heavily, as though this was all a frightful burden. “In light of this… unexpected development, I wanted to discuss your own sentiments, and the prospect of prolonging things between us, and then seeing where that led…” She shook her head in disgust. “Don’t worry,” she added with haughty froideur. “I see now that I must have taken temporary leave of my senses, and I shall no doubt be back in my right mind again almost immediately. I find there is nothing quite like the object of one’s affections discussing marriage to another woman to make one reconsider one’s preferences.”
“But you said you never wanted to remarry!” he protested weakly.
“I’m not saying I wish to now!” she said. “But I’ve experienced something of a deepening of my feelings, and I—foolishly, apparently—thought that you might be feeling the same way. I thought that you might have changed your mind and seen a different path forward for us.” She was so close to him that when she huffed an indignant breath, he could feel it on his cheek. “Clearly, I was wrong—and I can assure you, I won’t make this mistake again.”
He inhaled a deep breath, feeling rather as though he’d been punched in the stomach repeatedly. If this was what came of feeling genuine concern for a woman, then he had clearly been wise to avoid any such emotional entanglements in the past. He suspected, however, that it would be rather more restful to fall in love with—well, with just aboutanyoneother than Diana.
Unfortunately for his sanity, however, restfulness didn’t seem to be what he was after.
“Diana,” he said in what he felt was an admirably calm tone of voice, “we had an arrangement, which I have done my best to adhere to. I have found myself, of late, devoting rather more mental energy to you than I am accustomed to giving other people, and it occurred to me that I was unwilling to allow our liaison to end anytime soon. Considering the parameters you set out at the beginning of our arrangement, I was given to understand that you had a strong aversion to marriage—an aversion that, until quite recently, I entirely shared.
“When I discovered that my emotions had become inconveniently engaged, I set out to determine a way to extend our arrangement without causing you undue distress. I thought I had landed upon just such a method. Clearly, I was wrong. I apologize for any offense I may have given, and will take this opportunity to humbly withdraw.” He finished speaking at last, vaguely aware that he sounded like he had a stick shoved up his arse but unable to care overly much. He hadn’t known any other way to speak in the moment—the situation was too dangerous, his emotions riding too close to the surface. He had spent the past six years doing his utmost to ensure that his emotions—toward the brother who had died, leaving him with a whole heap of unwanted responsibility; toward himself, and the disgust he felt at his inability to live up to his brother’s memory; and certainly toward anyone else—were kept tightly reined, never allowed to govern his actions. He wasn’t going to falter now.
“That’s not what I’m asking you to do!” she burst out in frustration. “I’m just asking you not to be acompleteass, for once in your life, by perhaps not proposing to one woman whilst you claim to have feelings for another?”
“I’m trying to give you what you want!” he burst out, resisting the temptation to clutch at his own hair with some difficulty. He felt as though they were talking in circles, and yet each time he opened his mouth, he thought that this time, somehow, he would make her see reason.
