leave it be for now.’
Jasper rubbed his chin, his many mistakes piling up on him, along with those of his uncle. Uncle Patrick no longer had to face them, but Jasper did, every day. He had a sickening sense that his carefully constructed world was about to come crashing down around him. There was nowhere else for him to go if things fell apart here and this time so many more people would suffer.
* * *
The bark of a dog on the street outside startled Jane out of sleep. Her back was cold and she turned over to find Jasper missing, again.
He must have gone to the gambling room. She pulled the coverlet up to her chin and snuggled into the soft mattress, but the sound of a bird outside announcing the coming dawn, and the front door opening and closing downstairs, made her sit up. She listened for the fall of Jasper’s boots on the stairs, but heard nothing except a slight noise in the sitting room beneath their bedroom. It wasn’t like him to linger downstairs when he came home.
She twisted the sheets between her fingers, wondering if she should go down or leave him alone. He hadn’t come up for a reason and she feared her questions would revive the awkwardness of their previous early morning encounter. However, if he was suffering she didn’t want to leave him alone. In the weeks after Philip’s first wife had died, Jane had caught Philip up at night many times. The helplessness Philip had experienced over his wife’s death had haunted him and robbed him of sleep. He hadn’t been any more forthcoming about his reasons for being up than Jasper had been the other morning, but she’d guessed. Then Laura had come into Philip’s life and helped him to open his heart and leave the tragedy of his wife’s death behind. It had brought them closer together and uncovered the love developing beneath their marriage of convenience. Jane wanted to do the same for Jasper and be to him what Laura was to Philip.
Unless it wasn’t Savannah keeping him up, but guilt. She turned the diamond wedding ring on her finger, hesitant to risk rejection again, but she didn’t want to sit here in the darkness with so many questions about the letter and his sudden reserve torturing her either.
She rose, tugged on her robe and left the room.
The wood of the stairs was cold against her bare feet. Outside, a few voices of men making their way along the street carried in through the closed windows. In another hour or so light would fill the sky and more people would join them to begin their long day.
Once downstairs, she crept up on the sitting room, pausing outside to listen to the steady fall of Jasper’s feet as he paced inside, her courage wavering. It was clear he craved solitude and she didn’t relish another fight, but she couldn’t leave him in pain either. Jane braced herself and stepped into the room. ‘Jasper, what’s wrong?’
He whirled on her, his pale skin reddening at the interruption. Embarrassment brought a faint flush to his cheeks before it vanished, replaced by the testy irritation of a lack of sleep combined with being startled.
‘Nothing, go back to bed.’ He flicked his hand at her.
‘No.’ He was mistaken if he thought he could dismiss her like a child.
‘Don’t be so stubborn.’
His accusation rattled her more than it should have. Milton used to call her stubborn, so did Philip, Justin and, on a few occasions, Mrs Hale. It had turned people off her so many times, but she had never thought it would happen with Jasper. It bit into her determination, but still she continued on. ‘I want to know what’s wrong and don’t lie to me about it not concerning our venture or some other such nonsense. I want the truth about whatever is going on at the hell and the letter you received today.’
His eyes flashed with irritation. ‘I needn’t explain myself to you or anyone.’
Jane stepped back, stunned but not cowed. ‘If you think you can hide things from me, you’re mistaken.’
‘I’m not hiding anything.’
‘You wouldn’t behave like this if you weren’t. Tell me what it is.’
‘I said there’s nothing.’ The tightening of the lines at the corners of his eyes betrayed him. She’d cornered him, but it was a hollow victory.
‘Liar.’
‘Don’t chastise me like you’ve never had troubles you’ve kept from everyone.’
The image of her mother’s sickroom and her on her knees beside the bed almost startled the argument out of her. She hadn’t told him about her guilt. She’d never told anyone. With him all but scoffing at her, she wasn’t about to reveal her greatest failing. ‘This isn’t about me. I’ve seen how this kind of thing eats at people and the damage it can do. Philip worked so hard to hold back from Laura, even after her uncle tried to kill her. It changed him and almost drove a wedge between them until Laura overcame it.’ With love, she wanted to say, but this wasn’t the time to say it and put him off the idea for good.
Jasper studied her with a sadness to make her ache. ‘You must accept there are things you can’t know about me.’
Like who the woman who wrote the letter is. Fear began to overwhelm her but she held it at bay. If she allowed it to engulf her, she’d lose this argument for sure. ‘So you say, but what happens when there are children? With the way we’ve been carrying on there are sure to be. Will you be there for them at night like your parents were for you or will you be too busy handling your private affairs to care about their welfare or mine?’
‘You wouldn’t say such things if you had any idea what I’m dealing with to ensure your and our future children’s welfare.’
She marched up to him. ‘Then tell me everything you’re facing, no matter what it is, and we’ll find a way to deal with and overcome it together.’
His expression went blank and she held her breath, thinking he might at last confide in her. A coal popped in the grate and outside two men called to one another before their voices faded off down the street. ‘I don’t need your help. I need my privacy.’
‘Fine. Pace a hole in the floorboards for all I care, but don’t wake me when you finally decide to come to bed.’
Jane fled the room, her hands shaking at her sides. This wasn’t the Jasper who’d kissed her so tenderly and laughed with her during the day. He was a stranger she loathed and she didn’t know what had brought about the change.
Perhaps Mr Bronson knows what’s wrong. She considered paying a visit to the hell and asking him, but she hated to garner information about Jasper in such an underhanded way. She didn’t know how he would react if she did and he discovered it.
She paused in the upstairs hallway, catching the faint reflection of herself in the black-speckled mirror. She was no longer sure this was a fluke and not some indication of how their future together might be. Jasper, her oldest friend, her husband, was, like everyone else, pulling away from her. In the darkness, the image of her six-year-old self being chased out of her mother’s sickroom by the cranky old nurse reflected back at her.
‘You’ve done enough damage already, child, now get out.’
‘But I want to see my mother. I need to see her and say I’m sorry.’
‘Your apologies won’t help her. You should have listened when she told you not to sneak out to the fair instead of insisting on having
