Page 67

Another day of pretending she had never hoped for more.

CHAPTER 15

“The silence of the hour, however, conspired with the gloom of night to his melancholy; and he threw himself on a window seat, indulging in the remembrances which his situation recalled.”

Ann Radcliffe

* * *

February 18, 1822

Angelo had not slept.

He had lain in his bed for hours, staring up at the canopy while the wind sang its mournful song over the cliffs, waiting for the distant notes of organ music that never came. At some point near dawn, exhaustion had dragged him into a fitful doze, but even that brief respite was plagued by dreams. Isolde’s face, devastated and betrayed, turning away from him into darkness. Her voice, cold and brittle, cutting through his excuses. “I know exactly what you meant.”

He woke with a start to find gray morning light filtering through the curtains and his chest aching as if someone had reached inside and squeezed his heart in a merciless fist.

Isolde.

Her name was the first thought in his mind, as it had been the last before sleep claimed him. Where was she now? Was she weeping in some hidden tower room, cursing his name? Had she slept at all, or had she spent the night as he had, tormented by what had passed between them?

He had to fix this. He had to find a way to reach her, to explain. His offer had been for her benefit, to help her leave the confines of the hall. To give her the confidence to venture into society so that she may travel with him to London to meet his brother. He had no desire to hide her from himself.

But first, he had obligations. Responsibilities he had neglected in his distraction.

Nicholas.

The realization struck him with a fresh wave of guilt. He had been so consumed by his pursuit of Isolde last night that he had entirely forgotten his uncle’s treatment. Nicholas required daily massage and liniment to address the stiffness in his injured leg, a routine that Angelo had established since their arrival at Grimsfell Hall. And last night, for the first time, he had failed to appear.

Groaning, Angelo dragged himself out of the bed. His body felt heavy, sluggish, as if the weight of his misery had settled into his very bones. He splashed cold water on his face from the washstand, hoping to chase away the fog of exhaustion, and dressed mechanically, his movements lacking their usual energy.

You must pull yourself together, he told himself sternly. Moping about like a lovesick fool will not help Isolde, and it will not help Nicholas.

But it was difficult to summon his customary optimism when his heart felt as if it had been trampled beneath carriage wheels.

He found Nicholas in the morning room, alone at the breakfast table with a cup of tea and a plate of toast he appeared to be ignoring. His uncle, though only a year Angelo’s senior, a peculiarity of their tangled family tree that never failed to amuse, looked up as Angelo entered. His blue eyes narrowed with immediate suspicion.

“You look dreadful,” Nicholas observed, his tone carrying its usual edge of caustic disapproval. “Did you fall into a hedgerow? Your cravat is tied like a hangman’s noose, and there appears to be something nesting in your hair.”

Angelo raised a hand to his head, realizing belatedly that he had not bothered to comb it. “I did not sleep well.”

“Evidently.” Nicholas took a pointed sip of his tea. “You also did not appear last night for my treatment. I was forced to attempt the stretches on my own, which was about as effective as asking a fish to climb a tree.”

“I know. I am sorry.” Angelo crossed to the sideboard and began loading a plate with food he had no appetite for. It was something to do with his hands, something to occupy the restless energy that hummed beneath his skin. “I was … distracted.”

“Distracted.” Nicholas’s voice dripped with skepticism. “By what, precisely? The fascinating wallpaper? The riveting conversation of the mice in the wainscoting?”

Angelo did not answer. He could not tell Nicholas about Isolde. Not yet, not when everything was so fragile and broken. Instead, he carried his plate to the table and sat down across from his uncle, forcing himself to take a bite of toast that tasted like sawdust.

“I would like to make it up to you,” he said after a moment. “If you would permit me to work on your leg now, before the others come down. The muscles will have stiffened overnight, and it would be better to address it sooner rather than later.”

Nicholas regarded him with narrowed eyes, clearly sensing that something was amiss. For all his acerbic demeanor, the man was not unintelligent. But after a long moment, he merely shrugged.

“Fine. But if you are as ham-fisted as you look this morning, I shall not hesitate to tell you so.”

“I would expect nothing less.”

They adjourned to Nicholas’s bedchamber after he finished his meal, where Angelo retrieved his liniment from his own room and set about the familiar routine. Nicholas rolled up the leg of his breeches with ill grace and settled onto the chaise lounge beneath the window, his injured leg extended before him. The morning light illuminated the old scars, pale ridges of tissue where the bone had once broken through the skin, a decade-old testament to a fall that had changed his uncle’s life forever.