She smiled.
“I will worry about your heart,” he said gruffly.
Phoebe’s eyes widened to hear her once-cynical brother speak so casually about matters of the heart. His apparent weakness for Evie was something Phoebe would never get used to seeing. “What about my heart?” she murmured.
“While he is protective of you, Albury does not look at you like a man in love,” he said with brutal frankness. “You must protect yourself, Phoebe. You might be unwilling to admit it, but that man had ulterior motives for marrying you. I do not want you to hide from it and leave yourself open to pain.”
She flinched as a quiver of pain arrowed through her chest. Phoebe did everything to hide the torment digging at her heart. “He is frightfully contained with his emotions, but I assure you not only is he protective of me, but he treats me with kindness. He also desires me quite a lot.”
Richard scowled and tugged at his neckcloth as if she made him uncomfortable at the mention of her husband desiring her.
“Protection and kindness are not love,” he retorted.
She wanted to yell at him that he should leave her some hope. Why did she feel so horribly vulnerable and scared? “Perhaps they are the beginning of it.”
Her brother hesitated, and his gaze lowered briefly to her hands. It was then she realized she had them clenched tightly around the edges of her skirt. She released her dress as if she had been singed and smoothed the wrinkles.
“If you ever need to breathe…come to me, Phoebe. My home is always open to you, and no one can take you from it unless you are willing.”
She nodded and walked over to him to press a kiss to his cheek. When she moved to walk away, he enfolded her in a hug. “I love you, poppet.”
Tears formed in her eyes. The last time Richard had been this affectionate and called her poppet was before Francis had died.
“I love you, too,” she whispered.
A few minutes later, she went outside to see her husband waiting patiently in the hallway, the viscount nowhere to be seen. Hugh turned at the closing of the door and held out his hand. Her heart thumped as she placed her gloved hand in his and allowed him to sweep her away from her brother’s residence to the waiting carriage outside.
Once they were settled inside the carriage, she leaned her head against the squab, painfully aware that his stare had not left her person. Never the kind of person to shy away from scrutiny, she lowered her gaze to his. A strange stirring began in the pit of her stomach and drifted lower.
His gaze moved to her mouth, his desire to kiss her a tangible thing. Phoebe went over to him and sat in his lap. She twined her hands around his neck and kissed him. He responded immediately, but her heart went cold.
The unrestrained passion he normally kissed her with was missing. It was just as ravaging and deep, rousing her pleasure, but something was missing.
“Tell me what is wrong,” she whispered against his mouth. “Share with me.”
There was a terrible air of indifference around him. His face was inscrutable, and she hated that contained emotion.
“Such oversentimentality is not necessary in our marriage.”
For several moments, she felt as though she couldn’t drag enough air into her lungs. “I see,” she finally said stiffly, moving from off his lap to settle against the squabs.
He thought sharing their feelings an oversentimentality.
“I might no longer have your tender considerations, but I demand your respect,” she said with biting civility.
This arrested his attention.
“I can tell there is something different between us…I feel the loss of it here,” she said, pressing the flat of her palm against her chest. “It writhes inside, hot and terrible, and I ache. I have asked twice, you have ignored me, and that, my Lord, is intolerable.”
A flash of admiration lit in his gaze. He touched her cheek with the tips of his fingers, and for a moment, she savored the wonderful caress. But then he lowered his hand, and her skin grew cold again.
“Our marriage is one of convenience. You will have my loyalty, faithfulness, and protection always.”
She managed to say, after a brief struggle, “Is this your way of saying I must not muddy the water with talk of love and sentimentality?”
He stared at her for several moments. “George asked you to be with him. He was confident that you still loved him. Why did you not answer his question?”
The shock that tore through her felt as if someone had dropped her into a lake in winter. Awareness bloomed through her. “I was simply not interested and had no wish to waste my efforts in explaining my stance. It was not because I considered his offer or was confused! Do you think me capable of abandoning the vows I made to you before God?”
“Anyone is capable of acting in a manner to satisfy the desires of their heart.”
“Do you not trust me, know that I am faithful to our marriage?” The words felt like glass scraping along her throat. “I trust you, Hugh. In the months we’ve been married, I’ve come to know your heart and character, and the manner of man I see is who I admire, even as I yearn that he would fall in love with me…as I have fallen in love with him. You’ve known me as long as I’ve known you, but you think so little of my character…” Her voice broke, and she stared at him, hating the pain worming through her heart.
“I suppose you have stopped loving George, then.”
Phoebe did not understand why the words pierced her heart in such a violent manner. “I do not love George. I never did. You heard him declaring his love and promising all sorts of rubbish. You know he…he…” She took a deep breath. “To feel even a smidgen of jealously is normal under the circumstance—”
The sharp slashing motion of his hand faltered her speech, and Phoebe’s throat went dry at the briefest flash of torment that crossed his features. “I am not the jealous sort, nor will I ever be. Do you think me so weak that I would allow myself to be tortured over another man kissing you? Do you think I would be foolish enough to ever make myself so weak to a woman where she could drop me to my knees and leave me there to suffer with a craving she does not return?”
“Of course, I do not think you weak. Loving and caring for another is not weak.”
His eyes widened with incredulity, and the smile that hovered across his lips scared her. It seemed derisive and…dismissive.
“Do not speak,” she breathed shakily. “We are not ourselves at this moment, and I believe—”
His expression hardened, and his fingers spoke for him. “I am myself, Phoebe.”
“Are you?” she demanded, hating that her lips trembled, and intolerable tears burned behind her eyelids. “I was ashamed at how silly I had been with George. That is the only reason I shied away from speaking about him at all. I should have explained everything to you the moment you asked me to marry you. I did not love him when I acted with recklessness, and I do not love him now. So if George plays any role in how you are feeling now, please dismiss him from your awareness.”