Gabby chewed on her lip for the last hour of their journey, wondering how on earth a woman who talked too much and a man who didn’t see the use of words were going to rub along together.

Kitty Dewland sat opposite her, looking utterly composed and making pleasant conversation. In Gabby’s opinion, Kitty had not yet realized that her husband was dead. And Peter slept in the corner most of the afternoon. To Gabby’s amazement, he reclined so stiffly that his velvet coat was not rumpled in the least when they climbed from the coach in the late afternoon.

By the time they reached the Dewland estate, the manor had already been put into mourning. The largest parlor was hung with black silk, and the servants wore black hatbands, armbands, and gloves.

During the weeks before the funeral, Gabby hardly saw Quill at all. He was out of the house most of the time, walking the estate with his father’s manager. “He can’t ride, you know,” Kitty explained. “And walking takes a good deal more time. But one can’t see the fields properly from a carriage.” That was the first Gabby knew that Quill wasn’t able to ride a horse.

Her husband sat next to her at meals, but their conversations were trivial and often fell away into silence. Quill’s mother, Kitty, had developed a bewildering habit of switching back and forth from light fashionable conversation to hopeless sobbing. Gabby spent her time worrying about Kasi Rao’s future and writing more and more letters to London and India.

On the day before the funeral itself, Gabby was sitting alone in the breakfast room eating a scone and guiltily wishing that the ceremony were over. Sometimes it was hard not to compare the relentless swags of black cloth draping the walls of Dewland Manor to the vases of bright orchids adorning her home in India.

Just then someone walked into the breakfast room. Instantly Gabby’s heart started to race. Every instinct told her that Quill had just sat down and that it was his black sleeve that lay close to hers. Finally she raised her eyes.

“Gabby.”

She bowed her head in a polite greeting. “Good morning, my lord.”

“Wife,” he said quietly, bending closer.

Gabby swallowed. Should she reply in kind? No. “Husband” would sound idiotic on her lips. But Quill’s “wife” sounded gloriously possessive.

His lips touched hers softly. “Are you sleeping well?” A trace of a wicked grin played around his mouth. Quill had decided that a light flirtation might dispel his driving lust for Gabby. It was dehumanizing, this lust. It reduced him to a tortured care-for-nobody who wanted to ravish his wife before breakfast and the devil with the consequences.

“No,” Gabby replied, clear brown eyes fixed on his. “I can’t sleep well at all. I miss you.” Her voice trailed off. Then she whispered, “Husband.”