Julia Quinn: When He Was Wicked With 2nd Epilogue (Bridgertons)

“Michael?” she said, once his valet had shown her to his small sitting room.

“Francesca,” he replied, shocked at her appearance. She’d never come here before. Not when John had been alive, and certainly not after. “What are you doing here?”

“I wanted to see you,” she said.

The unspoken message being: You’re avoiding me .

It was the truth, of course, but all he said was, “Sit down.” And then belatedly: “Please.”

Was this improper? Her being here in his apartments? He wasn’t sure. The circumstances of their position were so odd, so completely out of order that he had no idea which rules of etiquette were currently governing them.

She sat, and did nothing but fiddle her fingers against her skirts for a full minute, and then she looked up at him, her eyes meeting his with heartbreaking intensity, and said, “I miss you.”

The walls began to close in around him. “Francesca, I—”

“You were my friend,” she said accusingly. “Besides John, you were my closest friend, and I don’t know who you are any longer.”

“I—” Oh, he felt like a fool, utterly impotent and brought down by a pair of blue eyes and a mountain of guilt.

Guilt for what, he wasn’t even certain any longer. It seemed to come from so many sources, from such a variety of directions, that he couldn’t quite keep track of it.

“What is wrong with you?” she asked. “Why do you avoid me?”

“I don’t know,” he replied, since he couldn’t lie to her and say that he wasn’t. She was too smart for that. But neither could he tell her the truth.

Her lips quivered, and then the lower one caught between her teeth. He stared at it, unable to take his eyes off her mouth, hating himself for the rush of longing that swept over him.

“You were supposed to be my friend, too,” she whispered.

“Francesca, don’t.”

“I needed you,” she said softly. “I still do.”

“No you don’t,” he replied. “You have the mothers, and all your sisters as well.”

“I don’t want to talk to my sisters,” she said, her voice growing impassioned. “They don’t understand.”

“Well, I certainly don’t understand,” he shot back, desperation lending an unpleasant edge to his voice.

She just stared at him, condemnation coloring her eyes.

“Francesca, you—” He wanted to throw up his arms but instead he just crossed them. “You—you miscarried .”

“I am aware of that,” she said tightly.

“What do I know of such things? You need to talk to a woman.”

“Can’t you say you’re sorry?”

“I did say I was sorry!”

“Can’t you mean it?”

What did she want from him? “Francesca, I did mean it.”

“I’m just so angry,” she said, her voice rising in intensity, “and I’m sad, and I’m upset, and I look at you and I don’t understand why you’re not .”

For a moment he didn’t move. “Don’t you ever say that,” he whispered.

Her eyes flashed with anger. “Well, you’ve a funny way of showing it. You never call, and you never speak to me, and you don’t understand—”

“What do you want me to understand?” he burst out. “What can I understand? For the love of—” He stopped himself before he blasphemed and turned away from her, leaning heavily on the windowsill.

Behind him Francesca just sat quietly, still as death. And then, finally, she said, “I don’t know why I came. I’ll go.”

“Don’t go,” he said hoarsely. But he didn’t turn around.

She said nothing; she wasn’t sure what he meant.

“You only just arrived,” he said, his voice halting and awkward. “You should have a cup of tea, at least.”

Francesca nodded, even though he still wasn’t looking at her.

And they remained thus for several minutes, for far too long, until she could not bear the silence any longer. The clock ticked in the corner, and her only company was Michael’s back, and all she could do was sit there and think and think and wonder why she’d come here.

What did she want from him?

And wouldn’t her life be easier if she actually knew.

“Michael,” she said, his name leaving her lips before she realized it.

He turned around. He didn’t speak, but he acknowledged her with his eyes.

“I . . .” Why had she called out to him? What did she want? “I . . .”

Still, he didn’t speak. Just stood there and waited for her to collect her thoughts, which made everything so much harder.

And then, to her horror, it spilled out. “I don’t know what I’m supposed to do now,” she said, hearing her voice break. “And I’m so angry, and . . .” She stopped, gasped—anything to halt the tears.

Across from her, Michael opened his mouth, but only barely, and even then, nothing came out.

“I don’t know why this is happening,” she whimpered. “What did I do? What did I ever do?”

“Nothing,” he assured her.

“He’s gone, and he isn’t coming back, and I’m so. . . so. . .” She looked up at him, feeling the grief and the anger etching themselves into her face. “It isn’t fair. It isn’t fair that it’s me and not someone else, and it isn’t fair that it should be anyone, and it isn’t fair that I lost the—” And then she choked, and the gasps became sobs, and all she could do was cry.

“Francesca,” Michael said, kneeling at her feet. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”

“I know,” she sobbed, “but it doesn’t make it better.”

“No,” he murmured.

“And it doesn’t make it fair.”

“No,” he said again.

“And it doesn’t—It doesn’t—”

He didn’t try to finish the sentence for her. She wished he had; for years she wished he had, because maybe then he would have said the wrong thing, and maybe then she wouldn’t have leaned into him, and maybe then she wouldn’t have allowed him to hold her.

But oh, God, how she missed being held.

“Why did you go?” she cried. “Why can’t you help me?”

“I want to—You don’t—” And then finally he just said, “I don’t know what to say.”

She was asking too much of him. She knew it, but she didn’t care. She was just so sick of being alone.

But right then, at least for a moment, she wasn’t alone. Michael was there, and he was holding her, and she felt warm and safe for the first time in weeks. And she just cried. She cried weeks of tears. She cried for John and she cried for the baby she’d never know.

But most of all she cried for herself.

“Michael,” she said, once she’d recovered enough to speak. Her voice was still shaky, but she managed his name, and she knew she was going to have to manage more.

“Yes?”

“We can’t go on like this.”

She felt something change in him. His embrace tightened, or maybe it loosened, but something was not quite the same. “Like what?” he asked, his voice hoarse and hesitant.

She drew back so she could see him, relieved when his arms fell away, and she didn’t have to wriggle free. “Like this,” she said, even though she knew he didn’t understand. Or if he did, that he was going to pretend otherwise. “With you ignoring me,” she continued.

“Francesca, I—”

“The baby was to have been yours in a way, too,” she blurted out.

He went pale, deathly pale. So much so that for a moment she couldn’t breathe.

“What do you mean?” he whispered.

“It would have needed a father,” she said, shrugging helplessly. “I—You—It would have had to be you.”

“You have brothers,” he choked out.

“They didn’t know John. Not the way you did.”

He moved away, stood, and then, as if that weren’t enough, backed up as far as he could, all the way to the window. His eyes flared slightly, and for a moment she could have sworn that he resembled a trapped animal, cornered and terrified, waiting for the finality of the kill.