Not an opinion popular at Almacks.
She shrugged. For six years, Ive lived as Williams pensioner and watched him brag and bully. Even though my sisters dowry was all that kept clothes on his back. Unmarried, Im at the mercy of nobodys mistakes but my own.
Dont you want children?
Not at the cost of freedom.
He frowned. Such a solitary path you map. What about love?
Love? She spat the word as though it tasted sour. You surprise me, Merrick. I doubted youd acknowledge the concept.
Astonishing, isnt it?
He waited for some derisive comment, but she remained silent. Perhaps because of that silence, he lifted the veil on the bitter truth he never mentioned. Ever. Im not a fool. Ive seen devotion. My father loved my mother till the day he died. His heart broke when he lost her. And his heart broke anew every time the world called her whore.
Damn it, hed said too much. Revealed too much. He knew it the moment he saw Sidonies face whiten with distress. All his life hed survived by standing alone, relying on nobody but himself. Yet these uncharacteristic confidences placed him even further under Sidonies spell.
He needed to remember that isolation offered safety, whatever the appeal of pansy eyes and soft female compassion.