Page 97 of A Scottish Bride for the Duke
England was not the Scottish Highlands.
She felt tears prick her eyes and turned away before he could see them. After doing all this to her, he didn’t deserve her pain. Her anger, yes, but not her hurt.
“Isobel—” he called after her, but she ignored him, walking out to the carriage in the drizzling rain.
How fitting that it should be raining as she left her husband behind.
He made no attempt to follow her, and she climbed into the carriage.
The door shut and they began to rumble away from London, the threat that plagued her life for months, and the husband she had come to adore.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
“What’s this I hear about Isobel leaving for Brighton?” his mother asked, her color heightened.
Adrian barely had time to reconcile himself to Isobel’s loss when the dowager duchess came sweeping into the drawing room as though she owned it.
He sighed and pinched his nose. He’d had enough of explaining himself to people, and he already knew what his mother would think about the affair.
“She didn’t leave for Brighton,” he said. “Sit down.”
“What’s going on, Adrian?”
In as few words as possible, he explained the bare bones of their situation. The fact that Moreton was a danger to Isobel’s life, and by extension had threatened him, too.
“And so, I’m sending her away,” he finished shortly. “It’s not safe for her to be here with me when Moreton is looking for any reason to find her and harm her. And if she’s here, I’m going to be constantly worrying about her welfare. This way, I can ensure her safety while focusing my full attention on stopping Moreton.”
For a long moment, his mother sat silently.
“Oh, Adrian,” she said finally, a little sadly.
“There’s no need to sound like that. I’m doing what’s best for the both of us. Once this is over, she can return, or I will go to her, and everything will be as it should.”
“I knew there wassomethinggoing on—and frankly, I didn’t find her mother’s desire for her to find an English husband plausible—but I didn’t know the situation was so dire.” She looked up at him steadily. “Did you?”
“Know the situation before I married her? No.”
“Would it have changed your mind?”
“I hardly know why that is of any concern.” He strode about the room, attempting to keep his composure. “I didn’t know, and now I do, and with Moreton targeting her and extending his threats toward me, it seemed prudent to remove Isobel from the situation.”
“What does she think about it?”
“Isobel?” He frowned at his mother. “She thinks she should be the one to stay here and fight, naturally. But we both know that this is for the best.”
“Hmm.”
“Don’t take that tone with me,” he snapped. “I can’t risk anything happening to her.”
“Marriage is not about one person making all the decisions,” she said softly. “Do not shut her out of your life.”
“For heaven’s sake—I am protecting her!”
“And is that how she sees it?”
Adrian clenched his jaw. After watching Isobel clatter away from him in that damn carriage, her face too pale and her body too weak from her excess the day before, he felt too raw for this conversation.
“I have explained the situation to her plenty of times,” he said, his voice clipped. “If she chooses not to see it, that is her problem, not mine.”
