Page 98 of Tremaine's True Love
* * *
“I wanted to take my leave of you in private,” Nita said, though most of her didn’t want to take any leave of Tremaine at all.
She could no longer read his expressions, or perhaps she no longer merited much emotion from him. He cut an elegant figure in his riding attire, though riding boots were next to no protection from the elements.
“I hadn’t thought to trouble you with farewells,” he said, crossing his bedroom to close the door behind her.
“You didn’t sleep well.”
And Tremaine hadn’t locked the door. He could still read Nita, apparently, because he drew her into his arms. His generosity was more than Nita could endure.
“Tremaine, I’m sorry. I never meant to mislead you.” Tears welled, when Nita had been certain she’d never cry again. Her head throbbed, her eyes were scratchy, and her voice sounded as if she’d overindulged at the men’s punch bowl.
“I wanted to be misled,” he said. “Maybe you did too.”
Badly, badly, Nita had wanted to be misled, also loved and accepted. “I should not have—”
“Made love with me last night? Perhaps not. I’ll have a lifetime to puzzle out your motivations, won’t I?”
The small sting of his words was nearly welcome, because Nita’s motivations had been foolish and selfish. Desperate. Would she ever stop feeling desperate?
“Maybe we wouldn’t have children,” Nita said miserably, though no method of preventing conception was foolproof, except the one she’d failed to use.
“We’d have children, God willing. Many children, and even if we weren’t so blessed, there’s you, my dear. I will pray nightly for your continued good health.”
Tremaine’s hand on Nita’s hair was a benediction and a torment, a final tender caress and reminder of all Nita was casting aside. She’d wracked her brain for a compromise, for a way through their dilemma.
Wee Annie, gasping for every breath, choked the life out of Nita’s hope. Mr. Horst, his cough finally quiet, closed the lid of its coffin. Mary Eckhardt, coming through another winter of successive ailments, put flowers on the grave.
Tremaine’s mother, choosing death instead of watching her sons grow to manhood, sang the final dirge.
“I’ll keep you in my prayers as well,” Nita said, though she couldn’t step back, couldn’t move away from the warmth and comfort of Tremaine’s arms. Even when a knock sounded on the door, she stayed in his embrace.
“Nita, I’d give you my handkerchief,” Nicholas said, hovering by the doorway, “but I’ll need it myself. Lovey, please stay with Nita while I see St. Michael on his way.”
Still, Tremaine made no move to step back, and Nita realized he was leaving the final instant of their parting up to her. Not exactly a kindness, maybe more of a closing argument.
They belonged together, and wee Annie deserved a chance in life too. Both were true.
Nita stepped back, snatching at the handkerchief Tremaine held out to her, a white flag of surrender that bore his initials and his scent.
“Fare well, my lady,” he said, making the words both a parting and an admonition. “If you ever have need of me—”
“Good-bye,” Nita said, kissing him, though Nick and Leah were both in the room.
She stayed where she was, back to the door as Tremaine walked out of her life. When his footsteps had faded, she crossed to his bed, unbelted her dressing gown, and climbed under covers that still bore his scent.
“I shall cry now,” Nita said, because Leah had offered not a single word. “I shall go completely to pieces, and sob and scream, and wail, and carry on. I will put Mrs. Siddons to shame with my self-indulgent dramatics. You’d best leave. I’ve just sent away the only man I’ll ever love, and he is too g-good to hate me for it.”
Leah settled at the head of the bed. “I’ll leave if you want me to, but as for that other, all the tears and self-indulgence, I say you’re past due. You’ve soldiered on long enough, Nita Haddonfield, and heartbreak is one tragedy a lady should not have to deal with alone.”
Leah wrapped her arms around Nita, which only made the tears come faster.
* * *
“I was hoping to have a word with George before I left.” Tremaine had also been hoping for a miracle, a brilliant insight that would allow him to renew his offer of marriage to the only woman he’d ever love.
For Nita’s very stubbornness and selflessness, Tremaine loved her, even as he wanted to pen her into a luxuriously appointed stone keep, where disease and a charitable heart couldn’t lay her low.
