A Taste of Desire(120)

Once standing outside the library door, he saw he was still in possession of his coat.

“You will go back in there and speak with that girl.”

The viscountess’s presence several feet away startled him. The tone of her voice even more so. It had been a long time since she’d reprimanded him with such rank censure.

“I’ve spoken all I care to, to Amelia. And I beg you to keep out of my personal affairs. I manage them quite fine without either yours or her father’s interference.” Rarely was he forced to speak to his mother in this manner, but then rarely did she give him cause.

She approached him, her mouth set in a line of disapproval. “I don’t know what crime Amelia has committed to cause you to treat her this way, nor do I really care to. What I do know is that for almost a month she’s become a shadow of the girl who returned from your sister’s home. She mopes about the place like a lost soul. She jumps every time someone comes to call because she believes it might be you returning home. She looks haunted every time your name is mentioned. If not for her sake or your own, then go back and talk to her for my sake. Listen to her. Perhaps you’ll see sense enough to lower that pride of yours.”

Thomas wasn’t sure for whose sake he turned and reentered the room, but he did.

Amelia’s throat locked up, and the corners of her eyes stung. She heaved in another painful sob. But her eyes remained dry.

After another minute of grieving the death of her hopes, Amelia rose to take her leave when the door opened and Thomas strode in, halting by the table of spirits. Without glancing at her, he poured himself a drink, downing it in one swallow. Only after he’d placed the empty glass back on the table, did he turn to regard her.

Amelia longed to sink back onto the stability of the chair, but as it was, he was peering down at her, his green eyes glacial and narrowed, his mouth a slash under his nose. So she remained standing, her hands clammy and cold.

“I returned at my mother’s urging,” he stated coldly.

“Thank you,” she whispered hoarsely.

The room went silent.

“I’m waiting,” he said, impatience and a trace of anger in his voice.

Lord, he was going to make her crawl—not that she believed it would do much good. “My father was here. We talked.”

“And your point being? I am quite aware your father was here.”

Amelia swallowed hard, and before her courage splintered into a train wreck at her feet, she whispered, “He told me that you might care to see me again. That perhaps you’ve been unhappy since you left … me.”

A short, dark laugh rent the air. “And in your arrogance, you believed him? Well let me clarify my position. If I was at all unhappy, it was not due to our parting but due to my own gullibility. That for even one second I believed you to be anything than the utterly selfish and feckless woman I met the year before.”

Amelia’s head dropped as if her neck couldn’t bear the weight. She closed her eyes briefly and drew in a shaky breath. “Since Christmas, I’ve wished to apologize for my behavior toward you. I’ve long realized how truly abominable I’d been. But as I thought we had become close …”

At her words, Thomas abruptly turned from her. Amelia raised her head and viewed the black jacket covering the broad expanse of his back. Despair caused a tight knot to form in her throat. She should go. He was lost to her. Any affection he’d had toward her was obviously long gone. But she wouldn’t leave until she’d said what she had to say. She refused to be her father, living his life with those kind of regrets. Regretting that he hadn’t tried harder, hadn’t pushed for explanations when she’d grown cold and distant, hadn’t fought to keep her affections. He hadn’t fought for her love.

“Once I believed you intended to ask my father for my hand.”

Thomas slowly turned to face her. He regarded her in silence, his expression closed, his gaze hooded. A vein in his temple jumped. “Obviously a supreme lapse in judgment on my part.”

His cool dismissal stabbed at her heart. “Mr. Cromwell, Lord Clayborough, neither truly meant anything to me. They were both just means of getting out from under my father’s roof. Men who would demand little of me and I of them.”

His expression did not shift. He did not blink. He merely regarded her with a cold, blank-eyed stare. “None of that matters now, as I said I will no longer be making that offer.” He paused. “No doubt you’ll soon find another marriage prospect.” A hint of dry sarcasm fractured the coldness of his tone.