"I turned 18 a week and a half before I married Rupert. He was 29. I had been at all-girls boarding schools most of my life. We'd been engaged for four years, which meant I was a dating pariah for most of my teenage years."

Joseph chuckled.

"Rupert was an international playboy, I suppose. He liked to travel and he liked women. His exploits sometimes made the papers, but more often than not, they made the rumor mill. I didn't worry about it. I thought it was probably a good idea that he get all of that out of his system before he got married and had to settle down.

"I was extremely naive."

She stopped and took another drink of the hot chocolate.

"The honeymoon was certainly interesting. Somewhat reminiscent of getting a four year college degree in a three week summer class. " She raised her mug in rueful toast to the portrait of herself and her husband hanging over the fire place. Joseph laughed softly.

"That was my first experience with the many varied uses of whipped cream. That was my first experience, period. Rupert was very attentive and I was happy. Much happier than I expected to be, actually.

"To be honest, the idea of the marriage scared me to death. I had no idea what to expect. He seemed to sense that and went out of his way to make me feel like a princess." She laughed at that. "Everything was good.

"Then we came back home. Things changed. I was expected to do nothing more mentally challenging than needlework. My job was to stand just behind him and look enraptured at every word that dropped from his lips. I got bored.

"I started working on projects of my own, getting involved in various charities and social work programs. I continued my society duties, planning balls, state dinners and festivals. But I wanted to do something more important. After all, I'd spent all those years in secondary school reading about politics and diplomacy. Silly me, I thought I might need to know those things.

"It wasn't a problem until my picture started showing up in the papers almost as much as Rupert's. I was doing things – important things – that didn't involve him. Until then I had no idea how fragile his ego was. He began to argue with me. I couldn't figure out what I was doing wrong. He became more and more distant.

"Later I realized that he was actually just looking for a reason to pull away. I wasn't the only one who was bored. He'd already started having affairs and this was a way to justify it in his own mind."

Joseph took hold of her ankles and moved her feet to his lap. He began to massage her feet. She smiled appreciatively and settled further down into the cushions. After a few more sips of the hot chocolate, she continued her story.

"I had no idea what was happening at first. I just knew that suddenly he didn't seem to want me around. He brushed me off if I ever entered his office. His phone calls seemed to end abruptly when I came into the room. Dinner conversation was strained to non-existent and he spent a lot of time away at 'meetings' in the evenings.

"That was bad enough. But then he started to get nasty with his need to control me." She paused again, tracing a finger along the patterns in the couch cushions. She was quiet for several moments.

"You don't have to tell me this," Joseph said. "It's not really my business."

She didn't look up and continued her study of the fabric. "I care about you. I know you care about me. That means we have to be honest with each other, right?"

"Yes. But the past doesn't matter. Not to me."

She looked him in the eye. "I want you to know. It matters to me."

"Then you have my undivided attention. Carry on."

She took a deep breath. "Just because he didn't want to talk to me didn't mean he wasn't interested in me. And of course, I still had that solemn duty to perform – we needed children.

"It wasn't wine and roses any more. He went out of his way to make his attentions as inconvenient for me as he could. Instead of coming to my room in the evenings, he would stop by my office when I was in the middle of a meeting or working on a project. He would ask if he could interrupt for just a few minutes, as he had 'pressing business' that he needed to 'discuss' with me right away. He made sure that everyone knew what he meant. I would have to acquiesce or be faced with making a public scene. He did his best to make me feel like a whore.

"And it worked. That is exactly what I felt like.

"Then I got pregnant. He was thrilled. At first I thought I couldn't handle it. I didn't want to have his child. I didn't think I could stand to look at something that was such tangible, physical proof of what went on between us. There were a few moments in the first few months, usually right after I'd been horribly sick and was sitting in the bathroom floor, that I hoped I would die. I didn't think he would care that I was dead, but I wouldn't feel so degraded any more and he wouldn't get the child of his dreams.

"It was mostly hormonal, I suppose, because after the first few months I began to bond with Pierre. That wasn't what I called him, though. I was sure he would be a girl." She laughed softly. "I could feel him moving and I began to understand how my activities and moods affected him. I started to love him.

"I decided life wasn't so bad after all. Rupert's behavior improved drastically while I was pregnant. I thought maybe the child was what was needed to pull our marriage back together. Years later I learned that he had been so happy because he'd been afraid he couldn't father a child. Once I was pregnant, he felt like the pressure was off."

"Phillipe was conceived under much happier circumstances. Pierre wasn't quite a year old when I became pregnant the second time. I've always wondered if, or how…" Her voice trailed off as she searched for the right words. "Pierre and Phillipe were very different, even as children. I know that's normal, but Pierre had a much quieter, brooding personality. Phillipe was loud, happy, and boisterous. I've always wondered if my emotions, at the time they were conceived or during the pregnancies, had any influence on how their personalities developed."

"Very interesting theory," Joseph said thoughtfully.

"For a few years after the boys were born, he was wonderful. He made sure we spent time together as a family. He quit the philandering, at least as far as I could tell. I thought things were good. The boys adored him. The press adored him. The people adored him. I found him to be rather more than tolerable." She grinned at that.

Joseph smiled back at her. "So the two of you finally became friends and lived happily mostly after?"

She threw back her head and laughed out loud. "Not on your life, Joseph. Our troubles hadn't even started then."