Muse in Secret

Chapter Ten

The ride to England was made in cold, terrible silence. There were tears that James wanted to brush from Lily's fair cheeks, but he knew she would strike him again. He deserved to be struck again, over and over. Perhaps she was right, perhaps he would burn for this. But how could he burn when it was what his heart ached for?

There was also a hot anger in him brewing toward Sirius, even though he knew he had not done what he did with ill towards James. He knew rationally, Sirius never knew of the changes of plans. Why would Regulus have told him anyways? Sirius didn't need more going on in his life than what already had happened. And yet, James couldn't stem that anger, even though there was no one but himself to blame. Had he been a good man, he would have told Lily after he first started his affair with Regulus. Had he been a good husband, he would have begged her forgiveness the moment that he had set eyes on Regulus, and never had returned to France. But he was neither of those things. In his next life, he would try his hardest, but in this life, he had been cast into a mold that was all but impossible to fit.

Lily exited the carriage outside their home, slamming the door in his face and locking it behind her. Had it not been for the kitchen entry remaining unlocked, he would have had to disgrace himself further by shimmying in through a window like a common burglar.

"Lily, can we please talk about this." He asked, kneeing before her where she sat in the parlor. There were fresh tears on her face although she did not make a sound.

"James, you have made up your mind! There is nothing to talk about."

"There is logistics. I was going to leave you with the British accounts, all my inheritance, all of the money I've made here."

"And how am I to access them without you?"

"I will make sure you can access them if I have to withdrawal it all today! Lily, once some time as past, you can either be granted an annulment due to my infidelity and our lack of heir, or you can be granted a widow status. Two years from now, and you will have a husband, and a nicer house than this. You will be with child and you will be happy with all the things I could never provide you, you must have faith in that! I believed myself to have loved you, I truly and honestly did. I hid myself away so that I may please you, so that I might conform to society, and believe me had I not thought you enough, I never would have married. I understand there is no issue for those of us lucky to be born male in this world, and that you as a woman are completely reliant on me. I understand this Lily, and therefore I understand that this cannot be a clean break, but I have planned for it. You will have everything, and I will walk away with a measly sum but my heart true."

She scoffed, her face flaring red once more. "You walk away to an heir to a fortune. Do not pretend that you will live in poverty James. He is wealthy, and he will provide for you far beyond how you have provided for me, your handsome devil."

"Lily, Lily, Lily. My lovely London Lily." He said. "I would go to him if he was penniless. I would go to him if God himself came down from the heavens and said that move would send me hell bound. I do not know the ways in which I can explain my feelings for him, nor do I believe you want to hear them. All I can keep saying, however useless, is that I did not intend my heart to feel this way."

"Then make it stop!"  She screamed.

"I can't. I want to, I wish I could but I can't! Why can't you see that? You had no issue with Sirius and Remus, and yet you say these things to me."

"Neither Sirius nor Remus were my husband! And regardless, Sirius was clearly grief stricken. Now I am the one stricken with grief, looking at the ghost of my husband while he still draws breath, and somehow that makes me the monster? Somehow that makes me unhinged, undesirable, crazy even? Should I not go along with your scheme, will you have me locked up, or will you chain me yourself, and continue to flaunt your lover in front of me for your own sick pleasure?"