Free One Night for Love by Mary Balogh Page B

and would be presumptuous in me. Know, though, that you are loved by this family, which is yours as much as it is mine or Gwen’s.” Pompous, empty words despite their truth. He did not belive he had ever felt more helpless in his life.
    “But nothing is ever going to be the
same
,” Gwendoline cried. “When Vernon died and I came home a widow and then Papa died, I thought the world was at an end. But then you came back and we three were together again and I could see that you would marry Lauren and … But now everything is ended, shattered beyond repair.”
    Neville ran a hand through his hair. Lauren swung gently.
    Gwendoline had married for love while he was away in the Peninsula. He had never met Viscount Muir. But it had been a short, tragic marriage, over in two years. First Gwen had had a dreadful riding accident that had caused a miscarriage and left her with a permanent limp after her broken leg had healed, and then just a year later, Muir had died in a fall through a broken banister from the balcony of his own home to the marble hall below. Gwen had fled to the familiar comfort of home rather than remain at her husband’s house.
    “And how I despise my own selfishness,” Gwendoline said when no one responded to her words. “I am thinking of my own unhappiness when it is
nothing
to poor Lauren’s. Oh, what a brute I am.” She gathered up her skirts and dashed toward the house, avoiding Neville’s outstretched arm as she passed him.
    “Poor Gwen,” Lauren said. “She wanted so very much to go back in time after Lord Muir’s death, Neville. She wanted life to be as it was when we were children, and it seemed to her that her dream was coming true. But we can never go back. Only forward. We cannot go back to yesterday or early this morning. There is Lily now.”
    “Yes”
    “I have been selfish too,” she told him. “I have been preoccupied by my own disappointment. But you must be so very happy, Neville, even though in your kindness you are sad for me and have taken time to come and talk with me. Lily is alive and she has come to you. How wonderful for you.”
    “Lauren,” he said softly. “My dear, don’t do this. Please don’t.”
    “You want me to tell you how much I hate her, then?” she said. “How much I wish she had died and stayed dead? How much I wish even now that she would die? You want me to tell you how much I resent your going away aftertelling me not to wait and then marrying a sergeant’s daughter on mere impulse? You want me to tell you how much I hate you for not telling me? For caring so little for me that you did not mention the fact that this would be your second marriage? For causing me such humiliation this morning?”
    He drew a slow breath. “Yes,” he said. “This is what I want to hear, Lauren. Let it out. Yell at me. Throw things at me. Hit me. Don’t just sit there.” He ran his fingers through his hair again. “Oh, dear God, Lauren. I am so wretchedly
sorry
. If I could only—”
    “But you cannot,” she said quietly, though there was an edge to her voice at last. “You cannot, Neville. And hatred is pointless. As are violent emotions. Will you go now, please? I wish to be alone.”
    “Of course,” he said. It was the only thing he could do for her. To take himself out of her sight.
    She was still pushing the swing with one foot when he turned to leave. Nursing her shock. Her conviction that if she just stayed calm and rational, everything would be all right. Her intense hatred for the sergeant’s daughter who had destroyed her hopes and her dreams, her very life, in one stroke. And for the man she had loved all her life.
    It did not help Neville to know beyond all doubt that she had always loved him with a far deeper intensity than he had ever loved her.
    He thought suddenly, as he made his way back up the drive, of Lauren as she had been the night before—radiant, glowing with happiness, asking him if anyone could possible deserve to be so