“Don’t!” His voice was like the crack of a whip in the room. “Don’t tell me any further lies. Can’t you just admit, for once, that you were wrong? You broke your word to me.” He swung around and faced her.

Gabby could hear her heart pounding in her ears. Blistering tears pressed at her eyes. “But I didn’t mean—”

“That excuse is overused,” Quill remarked. “Good motives do not excuse lies. Ever since you entered this house, you have flung about untruths as if they were nothing important. I am not saying”—and his voice softened—“that you tell lies for mean or shabby purposes.”

She swallowed a sob. “I don’t!” she cried.

“I know that.”

“The only lie I told was for your own good. I didn’t tell you about Sudhakar because I knew you wouldn’t allow him to travel to England—and I thought he was already on the way, so what did it matter? He might be able to cure your migraines, don’t you see? His note said that there is a medicine that has provided remedy—”

“What I see is that I cannot trust my wife’s word.” The words fell like stones into a deep well. “I must constantly be doubting you, trying to decide whether you are telling me the truth or whether you have decided to deceive me, for my own good.” Quill’s tone was savage.

More tears were falling, but Gabby refused to give in to sobs. “I—I …” What could she say? She had lied to him, at least by omission, as he put it.

“I meant to tell you about Jawsant Holkar,” she said, steadying her voice with an effort. “But it was only a matter of a few letters, and I was…I was enjoying making the arrangements by myself. I thought it would be a surprise. I didn’t think of it as lying.”

“That’s just it. You don’t think of lying as something to be avoided, do you, Gabby?”

She blinked away more tears. “I never tell bad lies.” Embarrassingly, her voice squeaked. “I just got in the habit because of my father—” She had to gulp back a wrenching sob.

“Your father undoubtedly deserved to be deceived,” Quill said. He walked over and stood in front of her, drawing her gently to her feet. “But I do not, Gabby. I am not a tyrant. I would never have betrayed your plans to the government. I can see that your father drove you into acting surreptitiously. But our marriage will be nothing more than a shambles if we are untruthful with each other.”

He kissed her hair and then her salty cheek. Words emerged from his chest as if torn. “And God knows, Gabby, I want our marriage to be a success more than anything I’ve ever wanted in the world.”