Still she didn’t move. Years with her stretched out in front of him—years of almost, years where she felt happiness with him nearly as great as if they’d never met. Years watching her look out the windows of this great big house, remembering what she’d once had.
This estate, this title, this life…for her, all of this would be a constant bruising, an eternal source of pain. He couldn’t do that to her.
Slowly, he drew himself from around her. Even more slowly, he stole from her bed.
He didn’t dare look back. He simply walked out the door and down the stairs before he lost his nerve.
Chapter Twenty-Six
THE SOUND OF BIRDS pulled Free from sleep. Happy summer chirps filtered through the open window. She woke, opening her eyes to a spill of sunlight across the carpet. It was still scarcely morning; dawn came early in summer.
Now, that early morning light illuminated the pattern of some rich carpet, imported from who knew where. Hand-carved mahogany furniture stood against the walls. The window framed the rolling hills of an estate that she didn’t want but was going to have anyway. After last night, though… After last night, that feeling of disconnectedness had faded to a dull ache. In another month, she might even be satisfied.
The one consolation—the only thing that made it worthwhile—was that they would be doing this together. She shut her eyes and turned in bed, reaching for her husband.
She found cold sheets instead. That woke her right up. She got out of bed and fumbled for her robe.
He wasn’t in the dressing room, nor in the library next to it, nor in… She didn’t have names for all the rooms that she looked in. Why did anyone need three sitting rooms, all in different colors?
Where was he? Why hadn’t he woken her up? He wouldn’t leave her entirely, she told herself. She wouldn’t panic. The thud of her heart had nothing to do with fear.
She rushed down a stairway wide enough to host a stampeding herd of cattle. In the normal course of things, she might have been able to ask the servants where he’d gone. But there were no servants—except in the stables. Surely they’d have seen him there, if he’d left.
She dashed outside. The dew on the grass soaked into her slippers. But as she came up on the stables, she heard voices—just audible over a loud, soughing sound. She heard Edward. She hadn’t realized how she’d worried until she staggered in relief, knowing that he hadn’t disappeared.
“Just like that,” he was saying. “Yes, we’ll need it a bit hotter than you’d use for a shoe. Wait until it glows orange.”
That heavy soughing sound repeated, and now she recognized it as a bellows working. He’d showed her a bit of that yesterday. She dashed up to the stables, turned the corner to the farrier’s station.
Edward was holding a thin piece of metal over a fire. He’d donned thick leather gloves, removed his coat, and rolled up his sleeves. He turned the iron in his hand, slowly, with great precision. Free found herself unable to breathe at the sight of him—at those lovely muscles she’d admired up close last night, displayed to such lovely advantage, at the intent concentration on his face.
The metal went from dark gray to dull red, coming up on orange. He picked up a tool—something that looked like a pincers—and then tapped the metal with it, shaping it with light, gentle touches, coaxing it into a graceful curve.
“There,” he said to the man working the bellows. “Now to heat the end. This will have to be damned hot, Jeffreys—work the bellows hard, until the iron is almost yellow.” He held the tip in the fire, watching. “Yes. Precisely like that.”
Before she could understand what was happening, he’d set something on the table, something small and shiny. He touched the heated end of his iron to that thing, holding it in place for a moment.
“There. That’s the last one, Jeffreys.”
The man left off working the bellows. “You know your way around a forge, sir. My lord, I mean.”
Edward’s nose wrinkled at that last, but he didn’t say anything. Instead, he crossed to a barrel. He slipped the thin metal inside and steam rose in clouds.
“There.” He pulled it out, turning it from side to side, considering.
She’d not had a good view of the thing before. She could see it now. It looked like a flower. A flower made of iron, the base sporting graceful leaves, the stem rising up in a gentle curve, leaning into some unseen wind. It terminated in what looked like a tiny iron bell.
No. She leaned forward squinting. That wasn’t a bell.
He nodded at his handiwork and then turned around. That was when he saw her. His eyes widened slightly. “Free.”
“Edward.” She looked at him. “You awoke early.”