Chapter 11
How dare he!
Madeline was already halfway down the hallway before she even knew where she was going.
She was trembling with raw, righteous fury, her soft slippers creaking the floorboards with every step.
She could still hear Emily’s small, wobbling voice in her head when she stopped the first footman she could find.
“Where has His Grace gone?”
“To his chambers, Your Grace.”
That was all she needed to hear.
Her orange skirts made swishing sounds against the floor. It almost seemed as if she were painting the place a brighter color with each movement. There was no time to think or second-guess her actions. There was no time to even breathe. In her head, she could still remember Emily’s forlorn voice.
‘It is almost like we are not worth the effort.’
Perhaps it was not even a wife that Kenneth needed. He simply needed to listen to his niece and nephew. Someone had to tell him that, and it appeared that someone was going to be her.
When she reached the usually intimidating doors to Kenneth’s rooms, she felt nothing but determination.
Whatever foreboding had followed her the last time she stood here was gone, burned away entirely by her fury.
She pushed the door open and walked straight in.
She may not have had the Duke’s strength, but her entrance was just as explosive.
Her only audience stood by the tall window. His back was turned to her. There was nothing to indicate what he was feeling at that moment. He remained still, with no movement coming from him.
Holding her breath, Madeline approached. She could then see that he had discarded his coat and placed it carelessly onto his leather armchair. It was the same armchair where he had placed his drying sheet the previous time.
A desperate, illogical part of her wanted to touch his coat. She still had the one he had given her, but perhaps this one still carried the warmth of his body. She wanted him to strip away his ducal mask. That instant would give her the man who could make her feel.
Her breathing grew heavy. Her mind clung to the details of how warm his body had felt and how urgent his kisses had been when they kissed. Maybe it might be her failing to still desire them, rather than the man who kept everything too guarded, his walls too high.
Desire.
It drummed a rhythm in her heart, warming the surface of her skin. She shook her head as if to rid herself of the sight, smell, and touch of him. She needed to be focused if she wanted him to listen to her and take her seriously.
Madeline was not exactly quiet, but Kenneth did not move, not right away, anyway. He just stood there, watching the rain patter against the window glass.
“Why are you in my rooms again, Madeline?” he finally asked. “Are you planning to make this a habit?”
His voice remained calm but with a dangerous edge. He seemed like he might snap at any moment, but he kept his patience. He had returned to being the impassive man Madeline was beginning to recognize.
“What kind of display was that earlier?” she demanded. She slammed the door behind her hard, causing it to rattle before settling, with the sound vibrating through the hallway and making her grit her teeth. “How could you just leave the nursery like that?”
Kenneth turned around to face her. He was a large man, but his movements were unhurried and graceful. His face appeared unconcerned, much to her consternation. What was there was a mask of calm—infuriating calm—on his devastatingly handsome face.
It was unfair. Madeline was supposed to be mad at him, but all she could notice was the way the dim light filtered through the window to highlight the sharp angles of his face.
“I do not understand what is upsetting you,” he replied coolly.
“I did what was required, and it was simply to point out that they were upsetting the household. Did they not stop, Madeline? I do not see why you found it objectionable when the children had stopped their noise, and there was no need to pull the servants from their tasks.”
“Is that all you care about?” she asked, her eyebrows shooting upward.
She huffed and walked to the middle of the room, her hands clenching into fists.
“Alexander was screaming and breaking things. He was making a mockery of his father’s drunkenness.
That is enough to show that the boy has been seeing and hearing things that someone so young should not witness.
Then, you walked in to survey the room, and the only thing you cared about was that everything should be in order.
You should have asked if he was upset. Or if Emily was.
You should have taken the time to reprimand them. ”
Kenneth remained expressionless. He did not even flinch.
However, as he walked to meet her in the middle of the room, Madeline could feel something change in his mood.
His eyebrows furrowed faintly as he crossed his arms across his broad chest. His movements made her fully aware of his presence.
He was getting so close, and it was becoming harder to breathe.
I am simply upset. That is all there is to it.
“I do not understand. Would you have been happier if I had beaten the boy, Madeline?” he asked.
His voice dropped a few levels. He sounded far more dangerous than she had ever given him credit for.
The lack of emotion no longer felt safe.
No, not at all. “I was not aware that was the preferred method of discipline in the Quinten household. Should I have turned him over my knee to spank him? Would that have satisfied you?”
“Stop pretending you do not know what I am trying to say!” she exclaimed, her cheeks turning flushed with frustration.
They were so close now that she could see the pulse thrumming on his neck.
Her fingers itched to touch it. To know that he was, after all, being affected by all this.
“Violence is yet another escape, just like silence. What I am trying to tell you is that those children are doing whatever they can to get your attention. They are screaming for help, seeking someone to notice that their needs go beyond food, shelter, and entertainment. Yet, you ignore them! This will not teach them how to behave better. They will just be more desperate and agitated. They think that they are nothing more than a burden to you!”
Kenneth studied her. He probably could not believe he had brought home a woman so full of emotion as she was. As his lip was illuminated by the gloomy light, she could still see the bruise from where she had bitten him.
Violence. Did she not have some of it, too? She recoiled at the evidence of her own loss of control. Or was it a bid for one?
“I do my best for them,” Kenneth said, his voice causing gentle vibrations across her skin.
“I provide them with the things that they take for granted because they are always available. Food. Education. Yes, shelter. They have a respectable name, even though their own father does not have to make much effort to sully it every night. As their guardian, I maintain a clean, respectable reputation. They have an inheritance that they can rely on. But I am not their father. No matter what I do, in the end, it is Malcolm’s presence and attention that they desperately need.
I cannot pretend to be their father when he is still alive and there.
I cannot manufacture that. The children are still my brother’s responsibility.
I am only holding up the walls for him.”
“They are still your blood, and they live in your house!” she insisted.
She blinked back tears, her chest heaving.
“You have seen what your brother is like. Will you wait for him to act like a father before you can give the children the attention they need now? They are not horses or cattle that only need to be given what they must have to survive. They need to know that they matter. In this world. To you. To us! You are their uncle, yes, but you should also guard their little hearts.”
Kenneth’s eyes looked down at her, the blue in them darkening. It was almost like the ice was melting, or like a storm was merely brewing. It was difficult to talk with this man. Something else was swimming beneath the surface, one that followed the movement of her lips.
“Perhaps you are right, after all,” he murmured. The deep timbre of his voice made her knees weak. “Perhaps I was so focused on building the walls around the people of Huntington that I have been neglecting what is important. My duties and responsibilities.”
The way he said those two last words made Madeline wonder if he meant something else.
It was in the way he edged closer to her, his broad chest nearly brushing her own.
And her heart was a traitor. It pounded wildly against her ribs when he was so close that she would absolutely die if he could hear the way it was galloping.
“Your responsibilities…”
“Yes,” Kenneth said. “And given what you have said, I should take care of my own responsibilities. Not Malcolm’s, but the ones that I chose to bind myself to.”
Madeline swallowed hard as she struggled against the fog in her mind, trying to understand his shifting meaning.
She still felt anger toward him. It burned inside her, like a small flickering flame.
It flickered back and forth, not landing on the man because she had become too aware of how close he was.
“What... what do you mean?” she squeaked.
He reached out then, his hand gripping her waist and pulling her flush against him in one smooth, unhurried motion.
His palm pressed warm and firm against the small of her back, and there was no more distance between them.
Her heart was galloping so loudly she was certain he could hear it.
Though as she pressed against his chest, she wondered if some of that rhythm belonged to him as well.