Wild Star (Star Quartet 3)

“I see,” he finally said.

“You did tell me I should provide the funds myself, if you remember.”

“Damnation, Byrony—” He broke off, plowing his long fingers through his hair. Suddenly he saw the entire situation as an outsider might see it, a hilarious, cross-purposed argument with no real foundation. He threw back his head and laughed.

“What is going on here? Brent, why are you carrying on like this?” Laurel looked from Brent to a stiff-backed Byrony.

“The little missis make him laugh,” Mammy Bath said complacently as she scratched her scraggly bun with a very long f

ingernail.

Brent got control of himself and said to his wife, “Won’t you come with me into the library? I think we should discuss this privately.”

He sat on the corner of his father’s desk, watching her as she came into the room. She’d taken off her plum-colored bonnet and was dangling it by its ribbons. Her lovely hair was tousled. He wished at this moment that her expression would be as winsome as her appearance. He mentally stripped off her pale blue gown, remembering how he’d bunched her nightgown around her waist, coming inside her. He closed his eyes for a moment, surprised at himself for the shot of desire that went through him.

“What is it you wish to say, Brent?”

Her challenging voice brought him to alertness in an instant. He grinned at her. “I simply wanted to tell you that our people will be the best-garbed slaves in the entire South. I met with a Mr. Cranford here at Wakehurst this afternoon. He will be delivering many different items of clothing the end of the week. Not only for the field slaves, but for our artisans and house slaves as well, and, of course, all the children.”

Byrony could only stare at him. “Why didn’t you tell me? Why did you make me think that you didn’t care?”

He gave her a long measuring look. “As I recall, you were very busy telling me what was wrong with me. And I—well, I do like to keep some things to myself.”

“Yes, I was, wasn’t I? I wonder if it did any good at all.”

He walked to her, and was appalled at her wary look and her quick dodging step back. “Why are you running from me?”

“I’m not running,” she said. His long fingers lightly stroked over her jaw. She watched his blue eyes darken to almost black.

“Unrequited lust again, Brent?”

“There’s nothing unrequited about you, Byrony. And I’m not touching you, at least not yet.”

She slowly turned back to face him, her eyes fastened on the top button of his white shirt. “No,” she said, “It doesn’t matter. It’s just that you make me so angry.”

“Or so happy?”

She raised her eyes to his face. “I don’t understand.”

“My dear Byrony, I was thinking about all those meaningless endearments you spout to me when you’re happy.”

Her gaze was steady, her voice very calm as she said, “Love can be quashed, Brent. I used to believe—girlish romantic foolishness, of course—that once one fell in love, it was forever. But maybe that isn’t always true.”

“I should think it had to exist first,” he said, his voice mocking, but he felt trapped and bitterly uncertain. Of her and of himself.

“If you don’t mind, I should like to bathe before dinner.”

He automatically stepped back, allowing her to leave the library. He listened to her light footsteps on the marble entranceway as she walked toward the stairs.

Lizzie was back to her old self again, Byrony thought as she listened to her chatter happily as she helped her off with her clothes and into the tub.

“Josh look so manly in new clothes,” Lizzie said as she laid out Byrony’s evening gown and underthings.

“And you will look very pretty in a new dress,” Byrony said. Several new dresses, if Brent were to be believed. But what would happen when they left? All the new clothes in the world would make not one whit of difference. All five hundred souls would remain the property of Wakehurst. If they left, would Brent leave Frank Paxton in charge? If only she owned Wakehurst. Yes, and what would you do? Myriad considerations flashed through her mind. Why, she wondered, was life never so simple as it was when one was a child?

Byrony came awake with a start and sat up in bed. It took several moments for her eyes to adjust to the darkness. Brent wasn’t beside her. The sheets and pillow were smooth. He’d never come to bed.

Fine, she thought, let him do just as he wishes. “Oh, damn.”