Once And Always

Chapter 29

Hello!!!!

How are you guys doing?

Another short chapter, I would like say enjoy this chapter but... I didn't....

You be the judge..

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Tee went to Bangkok and stayed for four days, hoping against hope that Tae might come after him, growing lonelier and more frustrated by the hour when he didn't. He went to three musicales and to the opera, and visited with his friends. At night he lay awake, trying to understand how a man could be so warm at night and so cold during the day. He couldn't believe the khun luang saw him only as a convenient receptacle for his desire. That couldn't be true— not when he seemed to enjoy Tee's company at the evening meal so much. He always lingered over each course, joking with him and urging him to converse with him on all manner of subjects. Once he had even complimented Tee on his intelligence and perception. Several other times he had asked his opinions on subjects as diverse as the arrangement of furniture in the drawing room and whether or not he ought to pension off the estate manager and hire a younger man.

On the fourth night, Prama escorted him to a play, and afterward Tee returned to Tae's townhouse to change his clothes for the ball he'd promised to attend that night. He was going to go home tomorrow morning, he decided with a mixture of exasperation and resignation; he was ready to cede this contest of wills to Tae and to resume the battle for his affection on the home front.

Wrapped in one of his expensive suit of swirling silver, he walked into the ballroom with the Marquis de Salle on one side and Baron Perawat on the other.

Heads turned when he entered, and Tee noticed again the rather peculiar way people were looking at him. Last night he'd had the same uncomfortable sensation. He could scarcely believe the ton would find any reason to criticize him simply because he was in Bangkok without his husband. Besides, the glances he was receiving from the elegant ladies and gentlemen were not censorious. They watched him with something that resembled understanding, or perhaps it was pity.

Copter Varodom arrived toward the end of the evening, and Tee pulled him aside, intending to ask Copter if he knew why people were behaving oddly. Before he had the opportunity, Copter provided the answer. "Tee," he said anxiously, "is everything all right—between Lord Kreepolrerk and you, I mean? You aren't estranged already, are you?"

"Estranged?" Tee echoed blankly. "Is that what people think? Is that why they're watching me so strangely?"

"You're not doing anything wrong," Copter assured him hastily, casting an apprehensive glance around to make certain that Tee's devoted escorts were out of hearing. "It's just that, under the circumstances, people are jumping to certain conclusions—the conclusion that you and Lord Kreepolrerk are not in accord, and that you've, well, you've left him."

"I've what?!" Tee burst out in a disgusted whisper. "Why ever would they think such a thing? Why, Lady Calliper isn't with her husband, and Lord Vihokratana isn't with his, and—"

"I'm not with my husband either," Copter interrupted desperately. "But you see, none of our husbands were married before. Yours was."

"And that makes a difference?" Tee said, wondering what outrageous, unknown rule he'd broken this time. The ton had rules governing behavior in every category, with a long list of exceptions that made everything impossibly confusing. Still, he could not believe that first spouses were permitted to go their own way in society, while second spouses were not.

"It makes a difference," Copter sighed, "because the first Lady Kreepolrerk said some dreadful things about Lord Kreepolrerk's cruelties to her, and there were people who believed her. You've been married for less than two weeks, and now you're here, and you don't look very happy, Tee, truly you don't. The people who believed the things the first Lady Kreepolrerk said have remembered them, and now they're repeating what she said and pointing to you as confirmation."