Untamed (39 page)

She nodded. “As soon as the document is signed and witnessed, I’ll go. There is no reason I cannot be prepared to leave for London within the week.”

Silence descended like a leaden curtain between them, cumbersome and heavy. Rourke fancied he felt the pall of it pressing down upon them both, burying all their unrealized dreams and cherished hopes.

Kate’s gaze climbed to his face. “We never would have worked. It was a lovely dream, but we’re too different. We never stood a chance … did we?”

Staring down into her lovely, sad face, Rourke felt as if a razor slashed at his heart. He shook his head. “Nay, we never stood a chance. Not a snowball’s chance in hell.”

Kate’s determination to take the high road while they had guests under their roof was subverted by Felicity’s seeking her out alone. She was in the dining room fighting tears and checking the table settings when the Scotswoman waltzed in.

Without looking up, she asked, “What can I do for you, Felicity?”

“I came to offer my condolences. You and Rourke are separating, are you not?”

Kate snapped her head upright. The spoon she’d held clanged to the floor. “Listening at keyholes is not an attractive quality.”

Reaching the foot of the table, Felicity slid a dessert fork a fraction of a millimeter to the left. Kate felt her jaw clench.

“Were I you, I’d try for an annulment. With your reputation as a shrew, sure everyone will think you were simply too frigid to bear bedding.”

Kate swallowed against the lump rising high in her throat. The dam at the back of her eyes was a hairsbreadth from bursting. Rourke had called her out as a shrew the week before. Was Felicity parroting what he’d told her in private? Separating though they were, the prospect of her husband discussing her with his mistress made her sick inside.

“Get out, Felicity. Until dinner, you may amuse yourself in the parlor with our other guests provided you hold that forked tongue of yours in check. Tonight is Gavin’s birthday, and our friends have traveled a goodly distance to celebrate. I won’t have you ruining everyone’s evening.”

Felicity shrugged. “Nay worries, Katherine. I’ll keep your secret so as not to spoil your wee dinner party. It may be meant as a birthday celebration, but it seems more in the way of a farewell dinner—yours.” She turned and strolled out of the room, leaving Kate clutching the back of the chair and shaking in her wake.

Kate walked back to the table, dragged out a chair, and sat. She pushed a place setting of carefully laid Limoges to the side with the edge of her arm, planted her elbows on the table, and braced her head in her hands. Only then did she give herself permission to cry. She cried until she tasted the scalding brine inside her mouth, and then she cried some more. She cried as though her heart would break, as though it was broken already. It
was
broken, she felt sure of it. Bit by bit she felt it breaking away, releasing an avalanche of buried dreams, of pent-up pain. And how could it not be?

She loved Patrick with all her soul, with all that she was and had yet to become. She loved him for his failings, as well as for his finer qualities. She loved his humped nose and crooked half smile every whit as much as she loved his beautiful emerald eyes and perfectly planed chest. Loving him wasn’t a matter of logic or convenience or, God knew, common sense. She loved him because she loved him, because she couldn’t help loving him, because to not love Patrick O’Rourke was quite simply not in her realm of being. To settle on not loving him would be akin to choosing to have blue eyes over brown, to stop being who she was, to stop
being.
And yet as much as she loved him, the curse remained unbroken.

When Kate loved someone, they always,
always
went away.

Kate’s encounter with Felicity set the tone for the dinner party that night. The couples paired off to go into dinner. Rourke held back from the door, and Felicity seized the opportunity to slip her arm through his. He cast Kate a look, but she refused to meet his eye. He and Felicity were humiliating her under her very roof, and there wasn’t a bloody thing she could do about it. Not her roof for much longer, she reminded herself. After she and Rourke made their announcement tomorrow, she would begin making her arrangements to leave. Once she let a small house in the country with a stable, she would send for her horse. Given the trouble to which he’d gone to buy Princess back, Kate didn’t think Rourke would begrudge her another few weeks of stabling and feed. Even with the proof of his infidelity sailing ahead into the dining room on his arm, she couldn’t think of him as a bad person.

But house hunting and packing must wait. First there were the next few hours to be got through.

From the head of the dining table, Rourke called down to Kate, “If it isna too much trouble, pray pass the salt. It is at your end, I believe.”

“No trouble at all, my darling. Would you care for the pepper, as well, or do you find the tart sufficiently spicy?” She cut her gaze to Felicity.

Felicity didn’t look up. The redhead appeared engrossed by the veal cutlet on her plate. Among the eight of them, the Scotswoman was the only one doing justice to Cook’s fine fare.

Rourke glared back. “The dishes are all perfectly prepared, though the company in certain quarters seems to have curdled.”

That did it. Kate threw down her napkin as though it was a gauntlet. “No worries, husband. Ere long you shall have only honeyed words and syrupy smiles to grace your table.”

The farcical dinner party seemed to be taking its toll on everyone. To make matters worse, Bea shot dagger looks Kate’s way every chance she got. Rourke had apparently spoken to Ralph, and the offer of riding lessons had been tabled indefinitely. By the time the fruit course was cleared, Harry declared himself stuffed to the gills, and the others echoed the sentiment. When Kate suggested they take their champagne and cake in the parlor, the company rose at once as if glad to escape the oppressive atmosphere.

In the parlor, champagne flutes were passed around and cake cut and served. Once the birthday toast was drunk, Felicity announced she would favor them with a song. Looking on with an aching heart as her rival sang a soulful Celtic ballad of unrequited love, a deliberate choice, Kate was sure, it occurred to her that soon Rourke would have almost all of what he’d set out to win two years before: a willing woman to charm his dinner guests and breed heirs for his railways.

Only it wouldn’t be her.

Callie and Daisy exchanged glances. Throughout the tense meal, they, too, had watched Felicity and the byplay surrounding her, and they did not greatly care for what they’d seen. As soon as the song ended, Daisy crossed to the piano and took firm hold of Felicity’s arm.

“Felicity, I’d like a word with you—in the hallway, if you please.”

The girl scarcely looked up from the sheet music she flipped through. “I don’t fancy going out into the hallway just now.”

Callie appeared on Felicity’s other side. “I’m afraid we insist.”

Taking advantage of the confusion, they marched her out into the hall between them.

The Scotswoman divided her gaze between them. “What is so terribly important that it could not wait?”

Daisy came directly to the point. “My husband and I have considerable contacts in the theatrical world. W. S. Gilbert is a very great friend of ours.”

Felicity’s jaw slackened. “You know Gilbert of Gilbert and Sullivan!”

Daisy nodded. “I do. Sir Gilbert has been badgering me to star as Yum-Yum in
The Mikado
ever since he first saw me debut at Drury Lane. Were I to recommend another actress for the part, an audition would be all but guaranteed.”

Felicity clapped a hand over her heart. “I know all the songs by heart.”

“I’ll wager you do.” Tall herself, Daisy looked around Felicity’s shoulders and caught Callie’s eye. “But if you want that audition, you’ll have to strike a bargain with us first.”

Felicity’s blue eyes narrowed. She looked between the two women. “What sort of bargain?”

Her quarry having taken the bait, Daisy continued, “I will write a letter to Sir Gilbert, recommending you for a private audition. In return, you will not only go away but stay away, and leave our friends Rourke and Kate in peace—permanently.”

Callie broke in, “And first thing tomorrow morning, you must have a chat with Kate and explain to her that you are not sleeping with her husband.”

Felicity screwed up her face. “And if I refuse?”

Daisy didn’t hesitate. “I shall make bloody sure the only role you ever receive in a London theatre is as a member of the audience.”

“All right, I’ll do it.”

Watching Felicity sashay back inside, Daisy and Callie could no longer hide their smiles. They burst out laughing.

Callie wiped her eyes and turned to her friend. “Do you think she has a chance?”

Daisy shrugged. “Whatever else she is, Felicity really does have a very good voice. And as we’ve just seen demonstrated, she’s a decent actress, though her delivery could do with a bit of polish. With her flamboyant looks and obvious flair for drama, who knows how far she might go?”

Callie smiled. “So long as her success takes her far away from Rourke and Kate, I’d say it’s a case of
bon voyage
and good riddance.”

Rourke didn’t sleep that night. Lying awake listening for sounds of Kate stirring in the adjoining room, he allowed that the impending separation was entirely his fault. In relying on a play to “tame” his bride, he’d built their marriage on a foundation of trickery and deceit. Small wonder Kate didn’t trust him, not with her troubles and most definitely not with her heart.

Giving up on sleep, he rose, dressed, and headed out to the stables, boots crunching on the frozen snow, his dog darting ahead. Once inside the stable, some devil’s impulse drew him over to Zeus’s stall. The trainer had finally arrived, and the stallion was coming along nicely. He wasn’t yet broken, though, not completely. Rourke could see the untamed passion in his eyes, just as he could see it in Kate’s.

Kate.
Pain fisted his heart, the aftermath making him reckless. The horse’s wildness matched his mood. He took the lantern off the peg and went into the tack room. Saddling a wilding in shadow wasn’t easy, but as determined as the beast was to thwart him, Rourke had the devil on his side. Before long, he was galloping across the snow toward the loch.