Page 39 of Better Love Next Time
CHAPTER TEN
Present Day
Southampton, England
Julian sethis fork and knife into the rare slice of roast, aware of the woman one white-clothed-covered table to his right. She had met his eyes twice and the quirk of her lips extended another invitation to room fifteen. If she looked again through his meal, he could not know. Julian had been determined not to damn his soul further by engaging in a careless fuck for the sake of his needs.
Smart, brown shoes appeared at his left under a grey skirt and a long apron with a prayer book dangling from her waist. Julian nodded for the maidservant, Althea, to speak.
“I offered Madame dinner, sir. She thanked me but would not take the tray.”
“Did she appear unwell?”
Althea’s wide grey eyes clouded behind thick spectacles. “I did not see her, sir. She would not open her door.”
Julian cursed Kitty for her sulk, and then his conscience reared. After their painful discussion at the yard, the sulk wasappropriate. He asked Althea if she had a key, and when she bobbed a nod, he pressed a tuppence into her thin hand and directed her to check on Kitty in the morning.
His gaze traveled to the window but not before the woman from room fifteen caught his eye again. He frowned back in bald irritation. Did the chit not see that now was not the time? The sun had lowered to the horizon and his wife had been holed up in her room for more than eight hours.
Much had happened in one day. And if it hadn’t gone as smoothly as he had hoped, he had seen it through. With Kitty, he had rarely resorted to subterfuge. Because Kitty had been a rare girl. Kind and whip-smart. An open book of joys and worries. He had loved that girl.
He had learned to live without her.
Time had passed in an agonizing existence. First in Southampton as he had struggled to prove he could build ships without her. Furious to extract her from his dreams. After two years, he had understood that Kitty was the dream, more than the ships.
He had walked away.
His paternal great-aunt, with a soft spot for stubborn boys and a hatred for the earl, had settled a fortune on her favorite nephew, allowing Julian’s time to be measured in women and drink, in minutes and hours, then days and months, until another year had passed and he had awakened alone, not lonely.
He no longer loved Kitty. He was certain.
Quitting the dining room, he dressed for exercise, decided to drink instead, and fell asleep on the settee facing the gallery windows. He awoke before dawn with a raging erection. He slapped cold water on his face and walked out through the service entrance, running north.
The day dawned flat and grey but warmer than the day before. Birds called, desperate to make use of the summerbefore fall set in. He lengthened his strides, his pace unforgiving abreast the River Test’s eastern shore. He weaved in and out of the thick vegetation and swooped under willows and birches. He avoided a nesting site, and his face struck a gnarled limb, throwing him back a step.
The resounding whack vibrated through his brain. He swiped the blood from his cheek with his sleeve. Hands on his hips, he stared at the grey sky between the verdant leaves with as many greens as Kitty’s eyes.
Was she right? Did his actions reek of revenge?
He started running again.
Had he wished to hurt Kitty? Did he hate her? He searched within, and while he couldn’t name it hate, it was far from indifference. Kitty had abandoned him to traipse about the Continent. Black rage rose up in his chest. She loved him? Did she really? No, she could not. Nor could he love her. And he would never trust her with so much as pouring him a cup of tea.
An hour later, Julian trotted down High Street where vendors set up their carts and shopkeepers swept their front walks in the morning light. Sailors trudged blurry-eyed toward the quay from their night of drink and women and fighting.
The grueling run, his first since leaving Venice, made him feel old. It had done nothing to clear his head. He called for a bath, and the soothing water could not wash away the nagging sense that he had gone about this all wrong.
He dried himself and paced the main room naked. He dropped down and completed a hundred press-ups and sit-ups each, and when he was through, he eased back to the carpet, folded his arms behind his head, and stared into his bloody feelings.
The comfort of indifference he sought was born of anger. He had, yes, been angry for five years. He wanted Kitty gone because he wanted to be angry still. And the selfish man he was,he preferred the company of his own interests. And his interest was… revenge.
Muttering an oath, he sat up and, elbows to his bare knees, sheathed his fingers in his wet hair. He remained in this position until a knock came at his door.
Stepping back as he opened the door, Althea’s spectacles slipped down her as nose as she ogled his bare chest down to the towel wrapped around his hips. “I checked on Madame, sir. I had to make use of my key, but she is sleeping. Quite soundly.”
Sleeping still at half past ten when she had been in her room for more than twenty hours? “Check on her again at noon.”
She shoved up her spectacles, her eyes reminiscent of an owl. “Yes, sir.”
