She had a feeling the turn of her lips was too small to be called a smile. “Thank you for trusting me enough to share.”
With a scant nod of acknowledgment, he pulled on the latch and pushed open the door.
Because she wanted to linger, she swept through the opening without hesitation. And because it hurt so much, she paused in the study, turned, and lifted to her toes to press a kiss to his cheek. Friendly, that’s all. A show of appreciation for honesty in a world that seemed to have none.
Yet when she rushed into the hall, her heart twisted, keen and painful. She wanted her mother. Someone to embrace her with no expectations, someone to love her in the truest sense. She would grab her cloak and…no, Mama was spending the day with Paulina and baby Ezra. Marietta would be welcome there, but it wouldn’t be the same.
For a moment she stood in the hall with no direction. Then her eyes caught on the side staircase, and her feet aimed that direction. A minute later she knocked on the door to Barbara’s sitting room, and her friend opened it with a welcoming smile.
Marietta hastened in. Barbara was about as close to Mama as she could get just now.
“Mari. Are you all right? You look upset.”
A quick denial was on her tongue, but she swallowed it and stopped in front of the window. The world outside looked so drab and dreary. “I don’t know.”
Barbara joined her at the window and took her hands. “You’re like ice! Were you outside?”
“No.” She gripped Barbara’s fingers and closed her eyes, calling up an image of the street with green buds on the trees and flowers blooming. She thought of summer with its waves of humid heat.
But these past years, it had been only oppression. No picnics in the parks or walks along the harbor, nothing but dread of the next casualty report. Everyone knew someone who had fallen. Sometimes it felt as though there had been no life before the war, that there would be none after it.
The image of warmth vanished like smoke in the wind. There wouldn’t be much by way of life after this. Not for her. Her association with Lucien and Devereaux Hughes would ostracize her from the society that mattered. And if she were with child, there would be no sanctuary from wagging tongues.
“Mari?”
She blinked away the haze and focused on Barbara’s guileless face. “Slade kissed me.”
Barbara’s brown eyes went wide with…mirth? “Well, now. I suppose that could render any woman dazed.”
Marietta searched her face for censure but found none. Only that soft amusement. “Shouldn’t you be shocked? We have only known each other a month.”
With a light laugh, Barbara chafed some warmth into Marietta’s hands. “I had only known Stephen a week when he first kissed me.”
Her brother? Staunch, staid, upright Stephen—kissing a girl he scarcely knew? “Surely you jest.”
The dreamy look in Barbara’s eyes proved the truth. “I had never thought to gain the attention of a man like him. Aside from my humble means, I have no great beauty, I know—but our love came so quickly. We both knew by then that God had meant us for each other.”
At the time Marietta would have scoffed. Now, satisfaction glowed beyond the regret. Perhaps he died too early, but he had lived. “You sell yourself short, Barbara. It is easy to see what Stephen loved, and I am so very glad you found it together. But it is hardly the case here.”
Barbara’s gaze sharpened. “Did you kiss him back?”
“Well, I am not made of stone.” Heat crept up her neck.
Her friend laughed. “Why, then, are you so quick to dismiss all possibility? He is a man with depth of character and conviction; I saw that quickly. And the way he watches you…”
Marietta knew well enough how he watched her. With as much suspicion as attraction. And knowing her loyalties now wouldn’t change the reality of her bonds to Dev. Slade would destroy him, and he wouldn’t be interested in picking up her pieces when he was through.
More, she shouldn’t want him to. Her gaze latched on the window-sill. “I think I ought to remain free of romantic attachments.”
Barbara squeezed her fingers before releasing them. “Because you feel you should, or because you have given up hope of finding real love?”
“Because I…” The feelings came again, swamping her, twisting her, making her doubt. “Because I cannot be trusted with these decisions. I am too fickle.”