Page 87 of More or Less a Countess
Violet straightened her shoulders and rose from the bench, her lips pressed together with determination.
This courtship had just begun.
Chapter Twenty-one
Once Violet determined Nick hadn’t left the house, it wasn’t difficult to figure out where he’d gone. As she mounted the stairs to his bedchamber, she tried to persuade herself to consider the scene in the conservatory from her usual practical angle, but her heart sank lower with each step.
For the first time since she’d arrived at Ashdown Park, her optimism was threating to give way to hopeless exhaustion. Nick desired her, but he didn’t trust her, and he wasn’t any closer to forgiving her than he’d been when he’d first discovered those sketches. Nearly a fortnight had passed, and he still refused to talk to her, or allow her to talk to him.
Perhaps he never would. Perhaps her marriage had ended the very day it began, and nothing she could ever do or say would earn his forgiveness.
The thought made Violet’s shoulders sag with fatigue, and as she slipped into her bedchamber, she let her gaze wander longingly to her bed. How easy it would be to give in to the need to sink down onto it and lose herself in a dreamless sleep. How peaceful to forget, if only for a little while, the icy disdain on her husband’s face right before he’d left her alone in the conservatory.
She didn’t yield to the temptation, but squared her shoulders and crossed the room to the connecting door. She raised her hand to knock, but before her fist met the wood, she paused.
If she knocked, he’d only send her away.
Violet squeezed her eyes closed, wrapped her hand around the knob, and twisted. Her eyes flew open in surprise when it turned obligingly in her palm.
Nick hadn’t shut her out.
The unlocked door—it must mean he wanted her to come after him, mustn’t it? Oh, if only he’d give her a chance! If only he’d look at her, and trulyseeher. He need only look into her eyes to believe he was the only man who’d ever held her heart.
Violet eased the door open, hope flaring in her breast for the first time in weeks…
Only to sputter and die again when she stepped into Nick’s bedchamber.
It was dark—as dark as if the sun had never risen this morning.
He’d drawn the heavy drapes over the windows to shut out the light, and Violet blinked in the sudden dimness. Was he here? Perhaps Gibbs was mistaken, and Nick had ridden out after all—
“Get out.”
She jerked her head toward the voice, and after a moment her eyes adjusted enough so she could make out Nick’s solid bulk on the bed. He’d pulled the coverlet over him, and it was clear from his tone he didn’t intend to crawl out from underneath it anytime soon.
“Didn’t you hear me, Lady Dare? I said get out.”
Violet took two halting steps toward the bed, but Nick’s angry hiss made her freeze. “Christ, you’re worse than Gibbs. Neither of you seem to have the least idea whatoutmeans.”
Violet didn’t answer, because a hot, tight knot rose in her throat, and she couldn’t say a word. She didn’t realize she’d closed her hands into fists until she felt the sting of her fingernails biting into her palms.
“Are you confused, my lady? Allow me to clarify my meaning. Idon’twish to see you, and Idon’twish to speak to you, so I fail to see why you’re still standing in my bedchamber.”
The knot in Violet’s throat grew so thick it threatened to choke her, but by now she recognized it for what it was, and once she gave way to it, it swept all before it. Her exhaustion, her hopelessness, her fear—all gone in one single, powerful rush, like one wave swallowing the next and hurtling the water back out to sea.
It left a single thing behind in its wake.
Anger.
No, fury. Sudden, sharp, cleansing fury.
When she still didn’t move, Nick jerked up in his bed and let out an ear-splitting roar. “Damn you, I said leave my room at once!”
Such a frightening bellow would have sent a meeker woman running for the door, but Violet hadn’t ever been afraid to stand her ground, and she didn’t intend to start now.
“No.”
“No?” His lordship was accustomed to having his bad temper indulged, and his voice rang with disbelief. “No?”
