Dearly Beloved by Mary Jo Putney

Author:Mary Jo Putney
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Published: 2011-11-12T05:17:48+00:00

THE morning came late and heavy and Diana woke unrefreshed from restless slumber. The room was cold, with neither Gervase nor a maid to build the fire, and she shivered as she added fresh coal to the faintly glowing embers herself. Even though it was nine o’clock, her chamber was dim in the gray half-light, and from the window she saw that the storm had deteriorated to a near-blizzard, with a hard east wind whipping the snow into drifts. It was like a high country storm in Yorkshire, and the sight pleased her. If they were forced to stay at Aubynwood, there would be time to heal the breach with Gervase.

But her hopes were frustrated; only Madeline was in the breakfast parlor. The footman gave her a note from Gervase. He wrote that he could no longer linger in the country, that he would be able to reach London on horseback, but conditions were quite unsuitable for a carriage. She and her party should avail themselves of Aubynwood for as long as they wished, and he recommended that she heed his coachman’s advice on when the roads would be safe for travel. It was a brief, impersonal note, such as could be written to anyone. Only the last sentence held any comfort: I will call on you on your return to London.

She folded the letter slowly. As careful as the viscount was with words, he would not have added that last line unless he really intended to see her again. Perhaps she refined too much on what had happened last night, and there had been no fundamental change between them. But in her heart, she did not believe that. Last night battle had been joined, and it would end with them truly united, or forever apart.

For five long days Diana and her party waited through snowing, blowing, and finally thaw. Even a house as large as Aubynwood began to seem too small, and they were all ready to leave as soon as the St. Aubyn coachman allowed that a carriage could manage. The roads were muddy and slow, quite unlike the journey north, and they had to spend one night at an inn.

Diana was tense with anticipation when they arrived back in London, longing to see Gervase, but her hopes were dashed again. This time is was her own servant who handed her a letter, and for a long, heart-stopping moment she feared that it would say good-bye, that the viscount had no desire to put up with her moods and demands any longer, that she had already been replaced by any one of hundreds of more satisfactory mistresses.

Given her black imaginings, it was some relief to tear open the envelope and learn that the worst had not happened, though the message was bad enough. In another polite, passionless note, Gervase said that he found it necessary to go to Ireland on business, and that he would be back in several weeks.

As she stared down at the heavy, cream-colored stationery, she wondered if this was another skirmish in their undeclared war.

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