Adelaide gaped at him, outrage and horror warring across her lovely features and distorting them into an almost childlike mask.

He took a breath, willing his irritation to wane. “I am not unfeeling. If you truly felt for him, then this must be hard. But fighting with me, resenting me, for securing your hand when he could not be bothered to even try to do the same is a waste of your considerable energy. Had he truly wished to marry you, he could have done so. There are ways and means.”

“I did not want to be a scandal,” she whispered harshly.

He could have shrugged again, but he resisted the urge. “Then you ought not to have laid your affections where they could never grow. Were you planning on taking up with him when enough time in our marriage had passed?”

Her eyes went wide, her earbobs clapping silently against her neck. “Do you mean…?”

“Becoming his mistress,” Harrison elaborated, belatedly recalling just how innocent she still was in so many things. “Taking him to your bed as we have done here.”

“I hadn’t thought…” She shook her head, her cheeks a little paler. “I don’t know.”

Harrison grunted. “Well, I have no doubt Phillip Evans does know, and has thought. I realize your bitterness may never fully fade where I am concerned, but I would ask that you not engage in infidelity, no matter how your heart yearns for anybody else. I can only take so much mortification from members of my family.” He nodded as though that should settle matters and went back to his meal.

“And you?” she demanded, her voice pitching higher and growing almost shrill. “If I am forbidden to be with who I love, will you agree to the same?”

He dropped his cutlery on his plate and stared her down, wondering why the length of the table was so great; it felt like a jousting match. “I will never stray from the bonds of our marriage, my lady. Not once. I respect you enough to avoid doing so, though we have little affection between us. I am not holding you to unreasonable standards. I live them myself. Save your indignation for causes more worth the effort.”

A muscle ticked along her delicate throat, drawing his attention there even as footsteps approached. He dragged his eyes along the length of her neck, tracing each feature of her face until he met her eyes once more. Suddenly, the distance between them seemed far less than he’d previously thought, and the tension that was coiling in his core and throughout his frame seemed almost inexplicable. Almost.

“Miss Moyle,” Mervyn intoned, a smile evident in his voice.

Harrison didn’t look away from his wife, who was just as intent on him.