“I didn’t think it was necessary to ask his permission,” Victoria replied, uneasily conscious of Captain Farrell’s searching questions and intent gaze.

“He must be worried sick about you by now.”

“I very much doubt if he’ll discover I’ve been gone.” Or that he’d care, even if he knew, she thought miserably.

“Lady Fielding?”

There was something about the bluntness beneath his polite tone that made Victoria certain she did not want to continue this conversation. On the other hand, she had little choice. “Yes, Captain?” she said warily.

“I saw Jason this morning.”

Victoria’s unease grew. “Oh, yes?” She had the worst feeling that for some reason Jason might have come here to discuss her with his old friend, and she felt as if all the world was turning against her.

Apparently Captain Farrell sensed her suspicion, because he explained, “Jason owns a large fleet of ships. I have command of one of them, and he wanted to discuss the success of this last voyage with me.”

Victoria seized on that remark to try to shift the conversation away from herself. “I didn’t know Lord Fielding knew anything about ships, or that he was involved with them,” she said in a bright, inquiring voice.

“That’s odd.”

“What is?”

“Perhaps I am simple and old-fashioned, but I find it rather odd that a woman wouldn’t know that her husband spent years of his life aboard a ship.”

Victoria gaped at him. As far as she knew, Jason was an English lord—an arrogant, wealthy, world-weary, spoiled aristocrat. The only thing that distinguished him from the rest of the noblemen she’d met was that Jason spent a great deal of time in his study working, while the other wealthy gentlemen she’d met in England seemed to spend all their time in the pursuit of pleasure and diversion.

“Perhaps you simply aren’t interested in his accomplishments?” Captain Farrell prodded, his manner chilling. He puffed on his pipe for a moment, then said bluntly, “Why did you marry him?”

Victoria’s eyes flew wide open. She felt like a trapped rabbit—a feeling she was beginning to experience very often and which was beginning to grate terribly on her pride. She raised her head and regarded her inquisitor with ill-concealed resentment. With as much dignity as she could muster, she replied evasively, “I married Lord Fielding for the usual reasons.”

“Money, influence, and social position,” Captain Farrell summarized with scathing disgust. “Well, you have all three now. Congratulations.”

This unprovoked attack was too much for Victoria to bear. Tears of fury sprang to her eyes as she stood up, clutching the blanket to herself. “Captain Farrell, I am not wet enough or miserable enough or desperate enough to sit here and feel obliged to listen to you accuse me of being mercenary and— and selfish and—a social parasite—”

“Why not?” he bit out. “Evidently, you’re all those things.”

“I don’t care what you think of me. I—” Her voice cracked and Victoria started toward the bedroom, intending to get her clothes, but he rolled to his feet and blocked her way, angrily searching her face as if he were trying to look into her soul.

“Why do you want a divorce?” he demanded sharply, but his expression gentled slightly as he stared down at her beautiful, fragile features. Even wrapped in a plain woolen blanket, Victoria Seaton was an incredibly lovely sight, with the firelight glinting in her red-gold hair and her magnificent blue eyes flashing with helpless resentment. She had spirit, but it was evident from the tears glistening in her eyes that her spirit was nearly broken. In fact, she looked as if she were about to splinter apart.

“This morning,” he persisted, “I jokingly asked Jason if you’d left him yet. He said you hadn’t left him, but you’d asked for a divorce. I assumed he meant that to be humorous, but when you walked in here just now, you certainly didn’t look like a happy new bride.”

Teetering on the brink of utter despair, Victoria gazed into her tormentor’s implacable, sun-bronzed face, fighting back her tears and trying to hold onto her dignity. “Will you please step out of my way,” she said hoarsely. .

Instead of moving aside, he caught her by the shoulders. “Now that you have everything you married him for—the money, the influence, the social position—why do you want a divorce?” he demanded.

“I have nothing!” Victoria burst out, perilously close to tears. “Now, let go of me!”

“Not until I understand how I could have misjudged you so much. Yesterday, when you spoke to me, I thought you were wonderful. I saw the laughter in your eyes when you talked, and I saw the way you treated the villagers. I thought to myself that you were a real woman—one with heart and spirit, not some mercenary, spoiled little coward!”

Hot tears filled Victoria’s eyes at this unfair condemnation from a perfect stranger, and a friend of Jason’s to boot. “Leave me alone, damn you!” she demanded brokenly, and tried to shove him out of her way.

Amazingly, his arms wrapped around her, hauling her against his broad chest. “Cry, Victoria!” he ordered gruffly. “For God’s sake, cry.”

Victoria shuddered as he whispered, “Let the tears come, child.” He stroked her back with his broad hand. “If you try to hold all this inside you, you’ll shatter.”

Victoria had learned to deal with tragedy and adversity; she could not, however, cope with kindness and understanding. The tears rushed to her eyes and poured out of her in wrenching sobs that shook her body and tore themselves from her in painful torrents. She had no idea when Captain Farrell coaxed her to sit beside him on the plain sofa across from the fire, or when she began to tell him about her parents’ deaths and the events leading up to Jason’s coldblooded offer of marriage. With her face buried against his shoulder, she answered his questions about Jason and why she had married him. And when she was finished, she felt better than she had in weeks.

“So,” he said with a slight, admiring smile. “Despite Jason’s unemotional proposal, despite the fact that you actually know nothing about him, you still thought he truly needed you?”

Victoria self-consciously wiped her eyes and nodded sheepishly. “Obviously, I was foolish and fanciful to think that, but there were times he seemed so alone—times when I would look at him in a crowded ballroom, surrounded by people—usually women—and I would have this queer feeling that he felt as lonely as I did. And Uncle Charles said Jason needed me, too. But we were both wrong. Jason wants a son, it’s as simple as that. He doesn’t need me or want me.”