Lucian cleared his throat and Sara turned. ‘I know you do not love me,’ she said, stating plain facts. ‘If you did, you would have told me, shown me.’ At least whatever it was that Lucian felt for her, it was not made infinitely more complex by love. ‘You have never pretended to feel like that. That was never what our agreement to marry was about.’
‘I think perhaps your belief in your ability to tell a man’s deepest feelings may be misplaced,’ Lucian said, that infuriating, mocking smile on his lips, his eyes bleak in a way she had never seen them before. ‘We may not wear our hearts on our sleeves as you seem to think. You believe that men want to give a hostage to fortune in that way, by admitting to love when they do not think it will be returned?
‘I told you, when we first met, that I protect the women in my care—and that includes my betrothed. To do other is dishonourable.’
‘There is a very simple solution to that, one that will get us out of this hateful, dangerous situation we seem to be in, one that should stop the pair of you carrying on like fighting cocks in the cockpit. I thank you for your flattering offer of marriage, my lord, but I find on further reflection that we will not suit. Please consider our betrothal at an end.’
Lucian was white around the mouth, but his eyes were hard and his voice icy. ‘You would have me understand that you place the life of the man who killed your husband above our marriage?’
‘Of course I do! I would place the life of any decent human being above my own happiness, my dreams, my hopes of…’
‘You are serious about this?’ He seemed incredulous.
‘Of course I am. Do you think I could jest about it? Our betrothal is at an end. I will take full responsibility for that, your precious honour will have not a smudge upon it and people will tell each other that you had a lucky escape from the eccentric and wilful Lady Sara.’
Lucian turned a baleful stare on Francis. ‘And you—’
‘I never want to see him again and I very much doubt, once he has thought it through, if he will want to see me. You have no reason whatsoever to call him out on my behalf, my lord. You have no rights over me and no responsibility for me. If my honour is offended, then I have a father and a brother to turn to. To force a duel would be dishonourable and you know it.’ She was arguing like a nit-picking lawyer, weaving the threads of honour and the tradition of the duel into a net from which Lucian could not escape. And neither would she. This was the man she loved, the man she was giving up for the sake of her conscience. She could not make him a murderer.
‘You had better go. And, Francis, you must leave, too. Go home to your parents, to the young woman who is willing to marry you and learn to love her, and don’t talk yourself into emotions that are not true. The real ones hurt too much—and what hurts you is the way you betrayed Michael’s friendship, not unrequited love for me. Please go. I wish you well, I truly do, my friend. But I never want to see you again.’
Lucian stood aside to let Francis past and he stumbled into the hall like a man emerging from a dream, or thick fog. There was a murmur of voices, the front door opened and closed and she was alone with Lucian.
Chapter Twenty-Three
‘You had better leave, too.’ Sara stood up.
‘There is no need for this, Sara. I lost my temper just now. If you tell me that there is nothing between you and Walton, then of course I accept that. It is him I am angry with, never you.’ Lucian came fully into the room, gestured towards the chair that Francis had occupied. ‘May I sit down?’
‘If you must, but there is nothing to stay for. Are you concerned about Marguerite? My mother will look after her, just as she promised she would. She will be quite safe until you are ready for her to join you in London.’ She sat down again and concentrated on keeping her head up, the polite, frosty little smile on her lips. Her heart was breaking, but that was no reason to give in to floods of tears, she told herself. ‘People will understand that under the circumstances she should marry earlier now there is no reason to wait for our wedding.’
‘Forget Marguerite,’ he snapped, the loss of control so uncharacteristic that for a moment she gaped at him. ‘I told you I will not fight Walton, that there is no reason for me to do so. For a second I doubted you, I am sorry for that, but I cannot see why that should mean the end of our betrothal.’
‘I… You want to pretend this has not happened? Lucian, that is impossible. What would happen the next time you became suspicious of something—and we are married?’
‘You think it possible that I will find you alone at night with a man in your arms professing his love for you?’
‘Of course not. I mean that your reaction to any threat to me, or to your possession of me, is unacceptably primitive. Over-emotional.’
‘Emotional? I would have thought rather that you would have thrown the formality and the codification of duelling at my head, not tell me it is emotional,’ he said bitterly.
‘It allows you to hide your emotions,’ Sara said wearily. ‘But why are we speaking of such things? We agreed to marry because it seemed rational. We were suited, we were attracted.’
‘What will you do now? Remain here?’
‘No. My life here has ended and I have promised the shop to Dot and her cousin. I will hand it over and…go.’ Somewhere.
‘Where? And to do what?’ Lucian demanded.
‘I do not know and, just at the moment, I do not care. Something different. I will decide sooner or later.’
‘In that case I will go and let you decide,’ he said with awful politeness as he stood up. ‘Just tell me one thing before I leave. You told me I was not a romantic. I know what that means in terms of literature, in respect of the landscape and art, but what do you mean by romance, Sara?’
Taken unawares, she reacted without thinking. ‘I mean the emotions of love. I mean wanting to feel deep emotions when you are with someone you love, or to show the emotional side of your feelings when you react to something the loved one says or does, how they feel. It means opening yourself up to the hurt as well as the joy. And it means being moved to tears by a raindrop on a leaf or a touch between two old people who have been together for a long time or a perfect line of verse. You do not have to be in love to be a romantic, but I do not understand how anyone who is in love cannot be so.’
She could feel the tears coming now and she was too proud to let him see them, risk him interpreting them as what they were, so she turned her shoulder. ‘You should go now, Lucian.’
‘Of course. Goodbye, Sara.’ The door closed behind him gently but with a firm click that seemed to her to be the sound of finality, the sound of the man she loved leaving for ever.