The Arrangement

by Mary Balogh

her. He believed she liked him. He enjoyed having sex with her. How foolish they had been to imagine that dreams conceived when they were both single and none too happy would survive a marriage that was bringing them a great deal of contentment.

Vincent had been right in what he had said that afternoon when they had rowed to the island, she came to realize. Everyone needed friends of their own sex.

“He thinks you are good for me, you know. The first time or two he said it, he sounded almost grudging. Now he does not. He approves of you and admits that I

made a good choice.”

“I think they are all relieved and disappointed in equal measure,” he told her. “Relieved that you are the wife they have always wanted for me,

and disappointed that they are no longer needed to organize my life for me.”

He hoped they could be comfortable

together for a lifetime. He very much hoped it. Although he was becoming more and more independent—thanks in many ways to his wife’s efforts—he could not quite imagine his life without Sophia. Indeed, the thought was too terrible to contemplate.

She worships the ground you walk upon, you know.

Did he mean to be offensive? Amazingly, Vincent thought he probably did not. He was an amiable fellow, probably handsome and attractive to women. He was lacking only in the character department.

Even now Maycock could think only of the effect Sophia’s declaration had had upon him. Did the fact that she still remembered not alert him to the fact that she had been deeply hurt?

It was amazing what a difference five years could make to one’s understanding. He was handsome; he was charming; he was amiable. He lacked all empathy for others.

He loved her, he thought. The idea popped out at him as if from nowhere.

Just as she did not hold a grudge against Sebastian. He was an amiable, weak, rather self-absorbed man, and he certainly had not been worthy of a young girl’s devotion,

“I may be without sight, Sophie, but I am still a man. And when my woman needs defending, I will defend her.”

That was all that really mattered tonight—that she be happy. It was all that mattered anytime, he thought a little sadly.