Because We Belong

He shrugged negligently. “The women never mattered that much to me, so it never bothered me until now.” Against her will, warmth flooded her at his words. He was admitting he was jealous because it was her. “Gerard was an orphan, too,” Ian said quietly after a moment. She suppressed a sigh of relief that he hadn’t further pursued the topic of Gerard’s romantic interest in her. “He lost his mother and father when he was barely of age. Officially, Gerard chose to be independent, becoming master of his parents’ home. He was at school most of the time, but when he was ‘home,’ he was usually here at Belford, not Chatham. I guess you could say we learned what it meant to be orphans together.”

“And thanks to Anne and James’s support and love, you both survived the trauma,” she said, turning to face him again.

His dark eyebrows made a flicking motion in acknowledgement of her statement, but he seemed distracted. “What is it?” Francesca asked.

“Nothing. It’s just . . . I was wondering. Were there any more incidents with photographers?”

She stared at him blankly.

“In Chicago. Lin sent me a photograph that was in the Chicago Tribune business section of you at Noble Towers getting off the elevator.”

“Oh,” she said, comprehension rising. “No, that was the only time. Security was a little lax—”

“Because of the Christmas party,” Ian finished for her.

“Yes. Why do you ask?”

His eyelids narrowed. “I’m just wondering if that photo had something to do with the attack in Chicago.”

Her eyebrows went up in surprise.

“Maybe some sicko caught sight of you and became obsessed. Or maybe it signaled to someone that you were in a position of power at Noble and they planned a kidnapping. I think it was the latter, given the fact there were at least two men—the man who attacked you and the driver. Two people rarely share a twisted obsession, but will easily team up over greed.”

She came up slowly, bracing herself with her elbow.

“You’ve really been thinking a lot about this, haven’t you?”

“Almost about nothing else,” he admitted grimly.

“And so that really is the reason you came back. The only reason. Because you believed I was in danger.”

He caught the edge to her tone. His expression went carefully blank. “I came back because I was worried about you, yes.”

She just stared at him as her heartbeat began to pound in her ears. “The idea of me being harmed is the only thing that could penetrate your misery in regard to Trevor Gaines,” she stated more than asked.

He didn’t respond, but she saw the flash in his eyes—that one that always hinted at a storm on the horizon.

“What exactly have you been doing since you’ve been gone, Ian?”

There. She’d said it. She couldn’t take it back now, not it or that underlying subtext that accompanied the question. What is more important than me? Than us?

“Ian? What were you doing in France?” she prompted when he didn’t speak, just watched her with those dark-angel eyes.

“I told you,” he said. “I’ve had business there.”

A chill seemed to settle in her heart, but unfortunately, it didn’t numb off the flash of pain she experienced. “I see,” she said quietly. “So you don’t trust me enough—or care enough—to tell me, in other words.”

“Francesca, it’s not that—” he said sharply, but she interrupted him by flipping back the sheet.

“Excuse me,” she murmured before she left the bed and hurried to the bathroom, walking past her discarded clothing on the floor. She’d find a towel to cover her nakedness before she retrieved them. The last thing she wanted to do at that moment was expose herself to Ian any more than she already had.

Chapter Eight

It was a cool, crisp, windless morning. She went for a long walk with Anne and Elise on the grounds after a light breakfast. She struggled to focus and take part in the conversation as they walked through fields, gardens, and woods, but could tell from the other women’s concerned glances that her distracted, withdrawn state hadn’t gone unnoticed. At Elise’s request, they stopped in the ultramodern stables on the return to the house.

“You’re very quiet this morning,” Anne said privately to Francesca as Elise stroked a russet-colored mare in the distance.

Francesca blinked, rising out of her ruminations. She gave Anne a smile. “I’ve been thinking a lot about the painting.”

“You’ve been thinking a lot about Ian.”

She started. She saw Anne’s sad, knowing smile. “Is he coming around any?” the older lady asked hopefully.

Francesca ground her teeth together at the question. “No. He won’t budge. He’s determined to be miserable.”

Anne sighed. “In my experience, people are seldom determined to be alone and depressed. It’s more that they feel they can’t escape it.”

Regret sliced through her. “I know,” she assured, frustration edging her tone. “But why is he so insistent that Trevor Gaines matters? Ian never even knew him! He’s dead, thank God,” she muttered bitterly under her breath.

Anne put her hand on her forearm. “I know it must be so difficult for you to understand, given your situation with Ian.”

“You’re right,” Francesca said in a burst of honesty. “I’m furious with him for being so stubborn. And are you honestly saying you do understand him?”

“Yes. I don’t agree with him, and I’m extremely worried about his state of mind, but I do understand,” Anne said. She shook her head. “Ian had such a fractured childhood, caring for Helen as if he were an adult, worrying day in and day out he’d be put in an orphanage if the townspeople understood how mad she was, dreading the times when his own mother would cringe away from him in fear. I think that moment when Lucien showed him that photograph of Gaines, and it looked so much like Ian, might have been the worst minute of Ian’s life, but one of the best, too.”

“Best?” Francesca asked, stunned.

“Well not best, perhaps, but . . . significant. He could never make sense of his past. He always tried, but it’s as if Helen’s disorganization, her insanity, made it so hard for him to focus. The questions he used to ask us when he came here as a child: What makes a person go mad? Would he become like his mother? If his father wasn’t schizophrenic, was there a chance he wouldn’t be? Who was his father? Why hadn’t he taken care of Helen?” Anne grimaced in memory. “The concept of an adult looking out for him was so foreign to him, he never even asked once why his father hadn’t taken care of him.”

Francesca closed her eyes to shield her pain.

“He always guessed his father had taken advantage of Helen’s vulnerability,” Francesca said after a moment. “He worried she’d been raped. I don’t understand how finding out all his suspicions were valid—even worse than what he’d suspected—could have been remotely a good thing for him.”

“Because you know how important clarity is to him,” Anne said. “Ian has to be one of the most focused, methodical people I’ve ever known. He prizes seeing clearly above all else, partly I believe, because he was forced at a young age to deal with his mother’s disorganization and irrational behavior. Do you realize how hard it would be, to understand who you are when your only guide is a woman ruled by madness? He coped by making their world as orderly, as controlled, as predictable as he possibly could. But still, so many questions remained for him.