Lady Whittaker Wages War

Comfort Undeserved

Cassius Godwin found himself leaving his wife's room, humiliation burning through him, her harsh words stinging worse than a slap. After all these years, one might expect that he may have gotten used to the constant rejection, to feeling as if physical closeness was an arduous favor that was uncouth and troublesome. That he was some kind of villain for wanting-!

Bile crawled up Cassius' throat while hurt and grief twisted his heart and his guts.

He hadn't even been asking for more when he had tried to kiss her. Just the sort of intimacy that existed between husband and wife.

More fool he for expecting comfort from her. More fool he to have expected that he might gain some grace on the eve of his mother's funeral.

You hated the woman, didn't you? Then why are you making a fool of yourself by shedding tears? You should be glad that blight on your name is finally gone.

The jeering inside his head sounded suspiciously like Jemma's voice.

Maybe there was something wrong with him. Maybe he did have a sickness within him, as Jemma said.

His friends had suggested time and again that he take a mistress. That sex was a part of human nature and had to be indulged.

But that meant that he was just like everyone he had despised. That he was a hypocrite for hating his mother, and that he would be to Jemma what his mother had been to his sire.

He could not turn his back on what he knew to be right, on the values that he had sworn to honor ever since he was young.

He wandered aimlessly through the halls, finding himself at the nursery, peaking in and watching the stranger inside. She looked up from her book, a wary look crossed her face. She got up from her place on the window bench, smoothed her little skirts out and dropped into a curtsy.

"Good evening, sir," she said with perfect manners. The ideal little lady, well-mannered and restrained. Exactly what he had wanted when he had married Jemma.

So why was it that her formality flayed him to bits?

Sir?

"I am your father, Honoria. Surely you needn't be so formal," he said through an increasingly thick throat, feeling oddly fragile, the pit in his stomach opening into a chasm.

"As you wish, sir," she replied with a deferential bow of her head. Cassius wanted to howl in frustration, though God knew why. When he had married had Jemma he had always expected that she would rear their children to be polite, restrained, well-behaved individuals. It was one of the central reasons why he had married her.

"How have you found your boarding school?" He ventured, trying to dispel the oppressive awkwardness that had settled in the air between them. He had been so against sending her away all the way to a boarding school in Carlisle, but as usual his input was disregarded.

After all, the absentee father did not hold much sway with decisions regarding his child. No matter that the law stated that he had final say of what happened to his offspring, Jemma always had a way of making him feel like an inadequate tyrant until he capitulated to her superior judgement.

"It is tolerable, sir," she replied tersely. "The rooms are clean, the girls I share my room with are kind, and the teachers are very experienced."

"I see," he replied, at a loss for what else to say. He had hoped.....he had hoped she would want to tell him some more, what classes she liked, what teachers she did not get on with....

But what right did he have to expect such frankness? He spent nine months of the year at the embassy in Belgium, and when he was in England, Jemma preferred to keep a separate residence.