Chapter 28
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
By some miracle, nothing else happened between the end of the intermission and leaving for the carriage. Instead of home, they went to Sebastian’s townhouse on Grosvenor Square; he had sent people ahead to prepare it for them.
This all felt like a terrible mistake.
Sebastian felt his temper rising, and fought to keep it in check. Aurelia hadn’t known this would happen—she hadn’t known that their negative reputations would have this undue effect.
He wished they had never come.
“They’re jealous,” Aurelia said.
He glanced at her.
“Jealous? Of what, pray?”
“That you married a nobody like me instead of returning to the ton and choosing a wife in the regular fashion. All those mothers and daughters in there—they’re jealous. And the Duchess of Fenwick—”
“Do not mention her,” he said shortly.
Aurelia took a deep breath. “What did you expect her to do when you riled her so?”
“There was nothing else I could do once I learned what her nephew had done. And she dismissed you over it.”
“I suspect Lord Redwood told her I attempted to seduce him.”
“And she believed that?”
“Of course,” Aurelia shrugged. “He is her nephew and the apple of her eye. I am no one.”
Sebastian controlled himself with some difficulty. Yes, logically, he understood. But this entire situation just made him feel more furious.
They were silent until they reached the grand townhouse, four stories, and lights gleaming behind the windows. Sebastian hadn’t returned to this particular one since he had married Kate.
What a terrible decision that had been.
Aurelia gawked at the grand building. “Is there anything of yours that doesn’t look like it was built to house a minor royal and his twenty illegitimate children?”
Sebastian chuckled lowly as he handed her down from the carriage and guided her into the impeccably tiled hallway, then through to the Grecian-style dining room, with frescos on the wall.
She looked around in wonder, but he wanted to forget everything.
Even the delicious aroma of food couldn’t change his mind.
“Sit,” he said shortly, leading her to the chair beside his.
After the first few days of their marriage, Sebastian had quickly come to terms with the fact that she would always sit beside him, erasing the formality he had grown up in.
What else was there to expect, having married a woman who had not lived within the ton?
Even at the duchess’s house, she had been, in essence, staff, straddling the gap between upstairs and downstairs.
Certainly not a high-born lady.
His brows descended over his face.
“Sebastian?” she asked gently, putting a hand over his. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing.”
He practically felt her skepticism.
“I see. Well, if there’s nothing wrong, I’d wager you ought not to be scowling.”
“I’m not scowling,” he scowled, instinctively, before feeling her fingers on his face, prizing his eyebrows apart. Next, she turned the corner of his mouth.
“There,” she pointed out, smug and satisfied. “Now you are not scowling.”
“Aurelia—”
“At least the music was pleasing,” she interjected, putting a napkin on her lap. “I’ve never been to such an intimate musical, and it was a pleasure to hear the players being so good at what they do.”
“At least someone enjoyed it,” he muttered.
“We need to find a way to be present in London together,” she said anew. “Even if we appear infrequently.”
“Why?” The word near exploded from him, and he slammed his hand on the table.
She jumped. “You are posing all the same arguments as Kate. Do you really think we will be spending most of our time attending social functions and smiling? Did you truly enjoy that farce of a show more than spending time in the village, giving our help where it is needed and appreciated?”
She blinked at him, as though trying to make sense of his anger. “Of course not. But that’s different.”
“No, it’s not. It’s where I’m needed. And, more to the point, it’s where I can be accepted.
And you. Did you think the people of London would accept you now that you are a duchess and my wife?
Of course they will resent you! You are precisely the antithesis of whatever traditions those vultures are raised on.
It was never my plan to parade you in front of the ton’s sharks and let them rip you apart! ”
“They did not rip me apart,” she mumbled, her fingers curling keenly around the knife. Although she might have appeared calm and composed on the surface, the twin diamonds hanging from her earrings were trembling.
“Of course they did.” He ran an exhausted hand through his hair. “I hardly know why I agreed to go through with it. To show you, I suppose, that there is nothing for us here. You should stop trying for something that will never happen.”
“You want me to accept that your world will never accept me?” Her lip trembled. “For the entirety of our lives?”
“I didn’t marry you so I could drag you into drawing rooms and show you off. You are not some sort of trophy.”
“Then why did you marry me?”
“You know why.”
“No.” Her eyes glistened. “A marriage of convenience where you could not afford to find a wife the usual way. Fine. But tell me—why at all?”
“Because I am a duke, and I must have heirs!” He glared at her, hating that she had put him in a position where he must say it—and hating even more that he thought it would hurt her, though it was the reason any man sought a wife.
Without falling in love, it was the most practical way of allying oneself with a powerful family, or producing heirs who could take over the estate and title, and have compassion for those who lived on them.
Sebastian had no need or desire for powerful allies. He had no desire to be in London or to play the game of politics. Since Catherine, that had been how he’d preferred to live his life.
“You know that was why I married you. You know it was not because I wanted a wife in any other sense. I’m not—” He had lost what he was trying to say, and his head pounded. What he really wanted was to go to bed and pretend this entire mess of an evening had never happened.
Aurelia stared at him, her face pale. He didn’t know why—he had been transparent about his motives from the very beginning.
Getting along with her, particularly in the physical sense, had not changed any of it.
All it meant was the process of getting her with child would be remarkably more agreeable.
“Do you regret it?” she whispered through trembling lips.
He flung his napkin on the table. “What?”
“You heard. Do you regret marrying me? Do you instead wish you had married a lady like Miss Davenport?”
“Who?” Sebastian stared at Aurelia, racking his brain trying to determine who this Miss Davenport was, and why he ought to care.
“That sour-faced girl you were sitting with? Of course not! I just don’t want you to think that…
” He didn’t know what he wanted her to think. “Must we have this conversation now?”
“If not now, then when?” Aurelia folded her arms beneath her bosom. “If I’m disappointing you as a wife, then we may as well discuss it sooner rather than later. Are you ashamed of me?”
“No,” he said flatly. “Not ashamed.”
“Not even when you have to defend your decision to marry me to your peers?”
“What are you trying to say, Aurelia?” Sebastian massaged his forehead.
“What do you want me to say? All I wanted was a wife content with my simple life, who would bear me sons and make my life a little more bearable. Is that unreasonable? Have I offended your dignity because I chose you, thinking you would adhere to these principles?”
She watched him for a long moment, then her shoulders sagged. “No,” she murmured, almost unwillingly.
“Then what?”
“I’m ashamed,” she said in a mumble. “That the world thinks you deserve someone better than me.”
“What about me?” he demanded. “I’m a murderer in the eyes of the ton. If anyone ought to be embarrassed, surely it should be me?”
“You, at least, are a duke.”
“Much good it does me. Being a duke doesn’t stop the rumors from spreading.
If anything, it makes them worse.” He shook his head and reached out, drawing Aurelia into his lap.
His entire body felt tense with the vibrating tension that ran through him, but he sought to quell it.
All this arguing would do them no good. “Enough with this. It was an experiment, and it went wrong. That’s all there is to it.
When we return home, we can put this business behind us.
I will not be ashamed of you, so don’t be ashamed of me. ”
He wiped his thumb across her cheeks, catching stray tears. His heart squeezed—he hadn’t intended to upset her that deeply. “I’m sorry today was difficult. The ton can be cruel.”
“I thought it would make me feel more like a duchess. More like I belonged somewhere,” she whispered, finally winding her arms around his nape. “Instead, it made me feel less so.”
“I’m sorry for that.”
Finally, her body relaxed atop his. Later, he would make love to her slowly, and one of these days his seed would catch, and she would get with child, and hopefully she would feel more as though she had a purpose in his life.
A child would make things easier.
Until the point he had to decide whether to keep her with him or send her away.
He was erring toward keeping her. So long as she agreed to be content with the life he could offer her at his secluded country estate, rather than Town.
“The villagers see you as a duchess,” he mumbled against her coffee-dark hair.
“And I see you as my wife. And, little shepherdess. I don’t regret marrying you.
” He leaned forward, kissing her mouth, salty with her tears.
“Now, let’s get rid of these tears, all right?
Everything will look better in the morning. ”
He rose and gathered her up, cradling her against his chest. Her head tucked beneath his chin, her body curved into his as he strode from the room.
“Send a tray upstairs,” he called over his shoulder. They would need sustenance for the night he intended for them.
Tomorrow, everything would feel better.
So long as they never ventured into London again.