His grip on her wrist didn’t falter, and she frowned, looking into his eyes. “I would prefer to keep the mask on today,” he said.
“I prefer to see you without it.”
His fingers tightened, and he drew her hand away, placing it deliberately in her lap. “You should go to bed. The next few days will be trying.”
“Hugh—”
“We can talk when we return.”
“Talk about what?”
But he just shook his head, making her feel as though the last solid thing under her feet had abruptly fallen away. Her stomach swooped, and the rush of uncertainty that swept through her now felt even worse than the blow of hearing about her father’s impending death.
She had always had a father and always known that he would die at some point. But she had not counted on a husband. She had never, not once, not in her whole life, thought she would have Hugh. To have had him and then to feel him slipping through her fingertips was a fear she had never once had to combat.
“Hugh,” she said, her heart fluttering in her chest. “Tell me. Has my father—has that changed something for you?”
“No.” Although the word was gentle, there was still a finality to it. He had none of his customary softness; he was as remote and unobtainable as the duke she had first met in Mrs. Dove-Lyon’s study. “Go to bed, Chris.”
“Will you at least come with me?”
His gaze skipped across her features, and she wished she could understand what he saw in her face. Whatever it was, it compelled him to nod. “I’ll be up later. Don’t wait for me.”
She could have pushed harder. Demanded to know what it was he hid from her. His own pain, perhaps? Her father’s imminent demise reminded him of how it had felt losing his own parents. But why, then, did he push her away? Surely, if the news left him as raw as her, he would seek solace in her arms.
All she could do was give him the space he so clearly desired and leave him to his own devices. And hope, desperately, with everything she had in her, that the conversation he deemed so important for them to have did not involve her leaving and living elsewhere the moment her father passed on.
When Christiana awoke,Hugh had already risen and was straightening his cravat in the mirror. Roberts had already departed, the closing of the door the thing that must have woken her. He was, once again, wearing his mask. She had vague memories of him coming to bed sometime in the early hours, but he showed no signs of exhaustion.
She propped her elbows against the pillows as she watched him. A few seconds ticked by before he noticed she was awake in the mirror, and he turned, giving her a clear view of the reserve in the set of his mouth. With his mask on, there was so little of his face visible to give her clues about his mood, and she hated it.
“You’re up,” he said by way of greeting. “I’ll call Baxter for you.”
“Wait, Hugh—”
He left the room and closed the door with a click behind him.
Christiana put her face in her pillow and screamed.
When Christiana dressedand came downstairs for breakfast, Hugh explained that he had arranged for two carriages to convey them to her father’s home. She would go ahead with Baxter, and he would follow more slowly behind her. That way, she wouldreach her father faster and he would have the liberty to take the time required for his burns.
“It feels like the best compromise for us both,” he said, the words perfectly neutral.
Her heart sank. “So we would not arrive together?”
“I fear if you wait for me, you may miss him entirely. The journey is already a long one.”
Logically, it made perfect sense. Two months ago, she would have suggested the same. But now, she felt irrationally as though he were establishing distance between them, no doubt in preparation to send her to live in her father’s house when the time came.
“Oh,” she managed. “Of course.”
He strode from the room, organizing the servants placing the luggage on the roofs of the carriages.
Amelia came to stand behind her, watching Hugh with the same contemplative expression. “He gets like this sometimes. Don’t think too much of it.”
But he has never been this way with me.
The words wouldn’t come; they felt too petty.