Page 85 of His Spirited Lady
“Of course I do.”
“Really, because you hadthislife.” Richard pointed to the floor. “And then you hadthatlife,” he said as he gestured toward what he hoped was west. He didn’t even know anymore. He’d completely lost direction. “And now you havethislife again. It’s like we were grafted on but didn’t take root.” He faced his silent friend, his dead sister’s husband. “When I’m introduced, people think I’m Thea’s brother, did you know that? They don’t know anything about Julia. They know Canada. They know Simon. But they don’t know her.”
Oliver managed to look surprised and sad at the same time, but he stayed quiet. After all, what was there to say?
“Not even Simon.” Richard reached for his cravat and paused. He wasn’t wearing another one of those until he had to. And that one was bloody anyway. “There’s not a portrait of her anywhere.”
“And you think that’s because I don’t love her?”
Oliver’s quiet question contrasted with his white knuckles. Richard didn’t care if he was angry. It was time he heard the truth.
“You didn’t even come back to say goodbye,” he said. “I was left to tell everyone how you’d met someone and married and were staying in the English countryside on an estate you’d inherited along with a title as long as my arm, which you had claimed you never wanted.” By the time his sentence ended, he was shouting.
“My brother died, Richard. My father—”
“So did my sister. Yourwife, the mother of your child, died.”
“I was fucking there, remember?” Oliver’s eyes blazed. “Holding a child that looked so much like his mother I couldn’t stand to be in the same room with him for a week. Keeping myself going because you kept telling me she wouldn’t have wanted me to crawl in the mausoleum next to her and turn to stone. Do you rememberthat?” He sneered. “I guess she just didn’t want me to livethismuch?”
“That’s not—Do you remember when we started telling fairy stories to Simon and they all had black hair and light eyes, and their laughter was like rain on glass?”
Oliver waited for him to nod, which Richard had to do. Of course he remembered.
“The miniature of Julia from our wedding day is on my dressing table, next to my shaving brush,” Oliver continued. “Simon comes in and tells fairy stories every morning. After he leaves for school, Thea puts the miniature back in its place. Because it’s the only damned portrait I have of her. You didn’t send me a larger one when you packed.” He held up a finger to stop Richard’s rebuttal. “I know I shouldn’t have asked you to do that alone. I should have come home, but Simon…it would have been the Bremen Town Musicians comes to Canada. He refused to leave anything behind, the family finances were a mess, and the business was just starting, and then Thea was increasing and…” He drew a deep breath. “I’m sorry I left you alone to deal with that, but I won’t apologize for not giving everyone I meet my personal history. I don’t talk about Julia to strangers here because I didn’t talk about Thea to strangers in Canada—unless I was drunk in a pub.”
Which had stopped when he’d married Julia. Richard dropped into the vacant, squeaky chair. Oliver dragged his across the floor so they could face each other, elbows on knees, hands dangling, just like they’d done for years, whether they were discussing a timber contract or Simon’s dinner schedule.
“If the roles were reversed,” Oliver said. “If Thea had…died and I had arrived in Quebec with Jamey. If Julia had married me, would you have considered Jamey your family, or would he always have been an outsider?”
Richard wanted to say it was different, that a child needed a mother, that…was exactly what he and Oliver had argued about when Simon became old enough for solid food. As much as he cherished his memories of Simon as their third co-chairman, Simonthe boyhad thrived here. Because he had a mother.
Oliver’s mouth tipped up in a wry grin, as it did every time he knew he was right. “You may disagree with me, but I will not tell my seven-year-old son that he had a mother he never knew and a brother he never knew, and an uncle. If he understands it at eight, I’ll tell him. But it might be at twelve. Hell, it might take until he’s twenty.”
Richard chuckled. He knew Oliver was hoping for twenty.
“My life has been shaped by loss,” Oliver said. “I will not have it shape my son’s. And I won’t have it shape yours.”
It was too late.
“I’d wager you haven’t changed that hideous wallpaper in the foyer.” Oliver laughed when Richard wouldn’t answer. “We hated that when she chose it, Rich.”
Laughing made things better, but also worse. “She’s alone, Oliver. She’s over there now with no one to—”
“No she isn’t. She’s in the barn when Simon giggles over feeding that fool pig. And, when he insists on sliding down the banister, she’s next to Thea holding her breath.” He kicked Richard’s foot. “She’s here, now, making us face each other when we disagree, just like she always did. And she’s taking my side this time.”
Richard scrubbed his face, clearing his vision. “How do you figure?”
Oliver hoisted a stack of paper. “You can’t finish these. You always stop in the same place.” He made a show of reading the line. “I don’t want to marry Amelia.” He dropped a page. “I don’t want to marry—”
“I can’t cry off without ruining her.”
“You can’t cry off because you can’t lie.” Oliver smirked and held up three slips of paper. “Three passages to Quebec, all on separate days, all missed. Just admit it.”
“The business—”
“As much as I love Quebec, it doesn’t need us anymore, Richard. It’s what we’ve always wanted—a business that earns us money without taking our time. We get to pick a new trail, plan a new adventure.” His partner’s eyes sparked. “Who do you want next to you when you do that? Other than me, of course.”
God help him, he knew the answer to that all too well. “How is she?”
