“Why don’t you call back a little later, love?” he drawled drowsily. “I’ve been on the run since dawn and I have to be up again in—oh my God—four hours. ”
“But, Bill—”
“Lori, I’m whacked. I’m sunburnt and mosquito-bitten and I put a fishhook through my thumb and I have to get some sleep or I’ll be good for nothing tomorrow.”
I paused. “All the way through your thumb?” I asked, aghast.
“Just through the fleshy pad, but it hurt like hell, and the shot the doctor gave me put me out like a light.” Bill interrupted himself with another yawn before continuing, “Please let me sink into oblivion again. I’ve had an incredibly trying day.”
“But—but, Bill ...” I stared blindly at the spotless tile floor, then raised my eyes to the morning light pouring through the bathroom window. Bill hadn’t bothered to ask about the kind of day I’d had, or why I was calling him at such an ungodly hour, or what my phone number was so he could call me back. His father might have had another heart attack, I might have crashed the Mini, Nell might have plunged headlong from Saint Bartholomew’s bell tower—but all Bill could think about was his sunburn, his mosquito bites, and his thumb.
“Okay,” I said slowly. “I understand.”
“Thanks, love,” Bill murmured. “G‘night.”
I hung up the phone, feeling as though I’d been cut adrift. Was I being unreasonable? Was it asking too much to expect my husband to recognize panic in my voice when he heard it?
I raised a hand to touch the gold band that still hung from the chain around my neck. It wasn’t the first time Bill had tuned me out, or the first time I’d struggled, in vain, to win his attention. That struggle had begun the moment our honeymoon had ended. I thought back to my conversation with Emma the previous morning and, with a sickening sense of clarity, began to listen to that small voice in the back of my head.
Bill didn’t want to start a family. A child, after all, would only compound the mistake he’d made by marrying me. That was why he kept me at arm’s length, why he buried himself at the office and evaded all discussion of our future. I’d thought success with the Biddifords would restore my husband to me, but I’d been grotesquely naive. The Biddifords were simply another in a long line of excuses Bill had found to stay as far away from me as he could get. My Handsome Prince had known all along how this fairy tale would end. He’d just been waiting for me to figure it out.
I sat huddled on the tub, clutching the phone, feeling sick and dizzy, as though the foundations of my life had been snatched out from under me. What would I do? Where would I go? How could I bear to start over again? Trembling, I placed the telephone on the floor and tottered to the sink to splash cold water on my face. I couldn’t allow myself to cry, because once I started I didn’t think I’d ever stop, so I leaned there, taking deep breaths, until the dizziness had passed. Then I looked at my reflection in the mirror.
“Willis, Sr., still cares about you,” I whispered. Of that I was certain. But I could no longer say the same about my husband.
Nell was awake and packing when I emerged from the bathroom, and she looked me over carefully before asking, “What happened last night?”
“I’ll tell you about it on the train,” I replied shortly.
“The train?”
“The train.”
I wasn’t up to engaging in a blushing match with Miss Coombs—my illicit tête-à-tête with Gerald was still burning holes in my conscience—so we slipped out of the Georgian via the garden, unencumbered by any luggage but the briefcase. I’d settle the bill by credit card, I told myself, and ask Miss Kingsley to arrange for our suitcases to be sent on.
I’d ask her to have someone pick up the car, too. Conscious of my promise to Derek to avoid driving in London, we left the Mini in the car park at the Haslemere station and caught the nine twenty-five for Waterloo. The carriages were packed with commuters, but Nell had spoken with Mr. Digby’s daughter in the ticket office and secured us a private compartment as well as two Styrofoam cups of milky, sugary tea.
Nell had discarded her Nicolette blacks in favor of a sleeveless sky-blue dress, a white linen jacket, white pumps, and a soft-sided white leather shoulder bag. She’d dressed Bertie in a blue-and-white sailor suit and selected a similarly summery outfit for me, but I’d opted for the hideous tweeds again. They were the closest thing to mourning she had packed.
In her pretty blue dress, with Bertie cradled in one arm and Reginald’s pink flannel ears poking out of her shoulder bag, Nell presented a picture of golden-haired innocence as we made our way to our private compartment, but as soon as I closed the door, she scowled like a Tatar.
“Eat,” she commanded, reaching into her shoulder bag to produce the round tin Gerald had given me.