The Defiant Wife (The Three Mrs #2) - Jess Michaels Page 0,73

would let her. Because she wasn’t wrong in all of her assessments of what would happen if he made her stay.

But as she reached the door, he stepped toward her. “I have to know one thing.”

She kept her back to him, her shoulders slumped forward. “What is it?”

“If I’d been to your father’s assembly room in Bath before you met my brother. If I had found you there first, if you and I had met—”

She pivoted to face him, her cheeks pale and her eyes brimming with tears. “That is a cruel question.”

“And I want the answer,” he pressed.

She fisted her hands at her sides, fingers flexing open and closed. “If I had met you first, there never would have been anyone but you, Rhys. It would have always been you.”

She said nothing more, but pivoted on her heel and ran from the room, leaving him alone. Leaving him broken. Leaving him lost.

Chapter 21

It had been a week since her last encounter with Rhys, and Pippa still woke up thinking about him every morning. When she slept, that was. Abigail and Celeste had mentioned how tired she looked, Pippa saw it in the mirror, herself. The circles beneath her eyes were dark and deep. But when her friends pressed, she always blamed the exhaustion on all the excitement that had been happening in the past seven days.

And she supposed that’s what they believed, even if they exchanged worried glances when they thought she wasn’t looking. After all, the home Rhys had selected for Kenley had been readied at last. She had moved the boy there three days before and they were settling in.

Rhys, of course, had not made an appearance there. He was honoring her request that he back away, that he sever whatever they had shared. Nan had even taken Kenley to see him on the moving day so the child wouldn’t be underfoot.

Life was becoming what it should be. Pippa liked the part of London where they lived. It was a solid middle-class neighborhood near a park and shops. She wasn’t far from Abigail or Celeste, so she could visit often.

She’d even received an invitation to join Lady Lena’s, a salon operated by one of Celeste’s good friends. It was a coveted invitation and she looked forward to attending, though she wasn’t sure of the reception she might receive.

It all should have amounted to peace for her, this plan set in motion at last. But she felt nothing like it.

“God, don’t get maudlin now,” she scolded herself as she got up from the settee where she had been trying to read and set her book aside.

It was dark outside, and she went to the window to look at the lamplight in the street. Carriages bustled by and she strained to see the crests on the doors. Perhaps one of them was Rhys’s.

“Mrs. Montgomery?”

Pippa turned with a smile for Mrs. Barton. “You know, I think the time has come to change what you call me. I was never married, was I? Not in truth. I don’t want to carry Erasmus’s name anymore. It is more fitting to call me Miss Windridge. Or even Pippa, as I’m no longer your mistress.”

Mrs. Barton shifted as if that made her uncomfortable. “I understand. Thought I cannot agree that you are not the mistress of this house.”

“I’m not, though. In truth, we all are in service of Kenley now, me included. I’m no less of a servant than you or Mr. Barton.”

Mrs. Barton wrinkled her brow. “That will take some getting used to, ma’am…miss?”

Pippa laughed despite her down mood. “We will figure it out together, won’t we? What can I do aside from make you very uncomfortable, as I have accidentally done?”

“Not at all, Miss Windridge.” Mrs. Barton glanced over her shoulder. “Nan got Kenley down about half an hour ago. Are we still expecting Lord Leighton’s solicitor tomorrow afternoon?”

Pippa nodded. “Yes. The letter I received today from the man said two o’clock. I think he’s going to discuss the allowance for the household, as well as what we can expect for Kenley’s future funds.”

“Will we be seeing Lord Leighton, as well?”

Pippa opened her mouth but could not make a sound as she tried to push aside the feelings that question stirred in her. “No. I do not think Lord Leighton will often call here, if ever. He must focus on the great deal of work he has to do, and we must focus on Kenley.”

Mrs. Barton’s gaze flashed with something remarkably like