The questions burning through her, she turned, and with determined steps, reentered the ballroom. She scanned the crowd and spied her husband exiting the room, Lady Arabella following at a discreet distance. Livvie’s knees went weak and a blast of anger tore through her, leaving her hands trembling.
How dare he break his promises. A footman passed and she grabbed a glass of champagne from his tray and emptied it in one swallow. She took another, and followed the path her earl had taken. She went through the terrace door and allowed their voices to guide her steps.
She turned left at a column and froze. Lady Arabella was kissing her husband. The pain that tore through Livvie’s heart was like a poison-tipped knife.
Tobias pushed his mistress from him, a derisive smile tipping his lips, but Livvie was not mollified.
“How dare you,” she breathed out.
The lady spun, her eyes widening in genuine shock. So this was not staged as how Lady Wimple had done.
“Why am I always coming upon you with a trollop twined around you, my lord?” Livvie asked cuttingly.
A muscle jumped in Tobias’s jaw. “You will mind your tongue, countess, and we will have this discussion in private.” Keeping his gaze firmly on her, he spoke. “You will excuse us, Lady Arabella.”
“Darling, I—”
“Now.” His voice vibrated with cold warning, and Arabella flushed.
She hurried away, and when she passed by Livvie she murmured, “He was mine first and I will have him again, you upstart.”
Livvie swiveled and stepped in her path. “What did you say to me?”
Arabella faltered, no doubt not expecting Livvie to act with such bold impropriety. She was simply too out of sorts to be pretentious.
“I said nothing, Lady Blade,” she said demurely, but her eyes fired with spite and there was a mockingly cruel slant to her lips. Then she mouthed the word upstart.
Livvie did not pause to think, she simply lifted her hand and delivered a sound slap to Arabella’s cheek. The lady stumbled back and promptly burst into horrified tears.
“If the earl and I ever separate, you are welcome to him. Until then, if you dare try to disrespect me and dishonor my marriage, I will call you out and put a bullet in you,” Livvie snapped low and hard.
Lady Arabella whitened, shock glazing her eyes.
There was a gasp behind Livvie, and in her periphery, she spied two ladies. They hurried from the terrace back to the ballroom, surely to spread what they had just witnessed.
“Countess!”
She glared at her husband and her hands trembled in reaction. Within two strides, he was in front of her, staring down, his mien wintry. “We will leave this instant,” he said flatly. “Are you staying at your father’s town house?”
“Yes.”
“I will escort—”
“I am not going anywhere with you, my lord.”
“Do you understand the magnitude of the scandal you just caused with your reckless—”
She stepped close to him so her breast was flushed against his chest. “You, my lord, have no cause to berate me. You came here with your mistress!”
A flush worked itself along his cheekbones. “I did nothing of the sort. I encountered her in the hallway and we only spoke of business. Now, we will leave, and I will escort you home where we will have a calm and reasonable discussion.”
“No,” she said. “I will stay at the ball and dance the night away.” She was very aware of the crowd gathering on the terrace and the loud murmurings filtering through.
“She challenged Lady Arabella to a duel!”
“How shocking and scandalous.”
The tick in her husband’s cheek grew more pronounced. Embarrassment and hurt vacillated through her in equal measure. He would never forgive her now for the scandal erupting. The reconciliation she had been hoping for would never come. Tears pricked behind her lids, and she stood frozen. Livvie almost fainted when her husband grabbed her and threw her over his shoulder and calmly walked through the throng, as if such a spectacle was an everyday occurrence.
Chapter Twenty
The carriage traveled with speed through London, jostling Livvie uncomfortably. No doubt her father’s coachman was responding to the veiled anger in Tobias’s tone. She was still in a daze from being carted off from Lady Branson’s ball. It was too overwhelming to even think of the scandal they would face tomorrow. He’d said nothing after he had none too gently stuffed her inside the carriage and taken a seat opposite her.
“You threw me over your shoulder,” she finally said, still unable to reconcile his actions.
“It seemed the most efficient way at the time to get you to leave. I could see you were preparing to be stubborn.”
“The scandal…it…”
“It will roar through the ton and linger for weeks, months, years,” he said flatly. “No doubt they will all recall the way my father acted in the past and celebrate my behavior in a similar manner. Bevies of callers will descend on the town house and the papers will sensationalize everything and a great deal of lurid speculation will be attached to our names.”
Her throat tightened. He appeared so dispassionate. “What were you thinking?”
“That is the problem, wife. I never seem to think or act sensibly around you.”
There was an intolerable ache of tears burning in the back of her throat. She knew how much he despised the scrutiny of society and she had done nothing to temper the rage and pain she had felt. She had acted on pure emotions, a state in which he despised. “You must resent me,” she said softly. “Since I’ve entered your life I have done nothing but cause you heartache.”
The silence thickened and her heart broke a bit more. She gripped the edges of the cushioned seat, a strange sort of desperation worming through her heart. Was her mother truly correct in her insight? For their marriage to work, would she have to bury all sense of herself?
“Tobias—”
“I would never dishonor you by taking a mistress.”
That blunt but earnest statement unnerved her. “Her lips were pressed to yours and her body contoured perfectly onto yours. I daresay you welcomed her advances.”
Tobias sighed in evident disgust. “She flung herself at me. I was about to throw her off the balcony when you arrived.”
“How convenient, but that is not what I witnessed.”
He gave her a steely smile. “You will trust me, wife.”
“My father—”
“I am not your father, nor am I like many men who take a mistress, dishonoring the vows they’ve made before God and their wives. I’ve made promises to you and I’ll be damned before I break any of them. You frustrate me with your willful and reckless ways, but you also hold my desire unlike any other woman I’ve ever met.”
Her heart lurched, and sweet hope bubbled inside her. Might their marriage truly work?
“You will return to the country,” he continued dispassionately.
Her heart calcified in her chest. “Tobias—”
“You will return tomorrow, countess.”
“And where will you be?”
“I will remain in Town.”
More separation. She stared at him mutely. “Will you ever approve of me as I am…love me as I love you?” she managed to ask, her heartbeat in her throat.