Chapter 18
Edmund had been avoiding the drawing room for three days.
Not deliberately—he told himself with the same conviction he’d employed since childhood to justify cowardice. Estate matters required attention. Correspondence couldn’t wait. Tenant concerns demanded immediate involvement despite the season making travel treacherous.
The fact that Isadora spent her afternoons in that particular chamber was entirely coincidental.
He stood outside the closed doors now, one hand raised to knock before entering his own damned drawing room, and wondered when precisely he’d transformed from the Dangerous Duke into a nervous schoolboy afraid of his own wife.
Not a real wife.
The words haunted him. Had been haunting him since they’d escaped his mouth three nights ago in a corridor decorated with Christmas greenery that mocked his failures.
He’d watched hurt flicker across Isadora’s face—had seen the exact moment when his cruelty landed like a blade between her ribs—before she’d armored herself in dignity and walked away.
Leaving him alone with the terrible knowledge that he’d wounded the one person who didn’t deserve his defensive strikes.
He should apologize. He should have apologized immediately rather than retreating into his study like the coward he’d apparently become.
But every time he’d tried to approach her, the words lodged in his throat—too honest, too revealing, admitting vulnerabilities he’d spent a decade learning to suppress.
What would he even say? I’m sorry I dismissed our marriage as meaningless when the truth is you’ve become the most significant thing in my carefully ordered world? Forgive me for being terrified that what I feel for you might destroy the last shreds of control I maintain over my own emotions?
Impossible. All of it.
So instead he’d hidden. Taken meals in solitary splendor while servants exchanged knowing glances. Buried himself in ledgers that didn’t require emotional honesty.
And absolutely did not listen for her footsteps in corridors, or track her movements through the house with the desperate attention of a starving man cataloguing crumbs.
Music drifted through the doors—Isadora’s voice raised in song, though the melody was unfamiliar.
Something bright and simple, designed for children rather than accomplished musicians.
Beneath it he caught another sound that made his chest tighten: Lillian’s laughter, genuine and unguarded in ways she’d never been with him.
His hand remained frozen on the handle. Logic screamed that he should leave. He should respect their privacy, continue the careful distance he’d been maintaining. He should absolutely not intrude on whatever lesson they’d arranged.
But he was so damned tired of logic. Tired of the walls he’d built, tired of the isolation he’d convinced himself was necessary. Tired of lying awake at night remembering the way Isadora had looked at him during the Fairfax dinner—as though she saw past his scars to something worth wanting.
Before she’d learned better. Before he’d reminded her that wanting him was folly.
He turned the handle.
The drawing room blazed with afternoon light that transformed winter into something approaching magic.
Furniture had been pushed against walls to create space on the carpet, and Christmas decorations adorned every surface with a warmth entirely absent from the rest of his carefully preserved house.
Holly wound through candlesticks, evergreen boughs arranged with surprising artistry, even paper chains strung between windows that could only be Lillian’s handiwork.
But Edmund barely registered the festive transformation. His attention fixed entirely on the two women moving together across the carpet in what appeared to be dance steps, though Lillian’s execution was enthusiastic rather than technically sound.
“One, two, three—no, darling, your left foot first.” Isadora’s voice carried patient instruction without the sharp edge that characterized Mrs. Hale’s teaching. “Like this. Watch my feet rather than worrying about your own.”
She demonstrated the sequence with fluid grace that made Edmund’s throat close. This was the woman he’d married—brilliant and kind and apparently determined to teach his ward social graces despite receiving nothing but coldness in return.
And she was beautiful. Not in the porcelain-doll way London ladies cultivated, but with the sort of natural elegance that came from genuine confidence rather than mere performance.
How had he convinced himself he could maintain distance from this woman? How had he imagined their arrangement could remain purely practical when watching her laugh with his ward made him want things he had no right to desire?
“I shall never learn,” Lillian groaned, tripping over her hem with enough violence to send her stumbling. “My feet simply refuse to cooperate with my intentions.”
“Nonsense.” Isadora caught her before she could fall, steadying the girl with gentle hands that Edmund had felt against his own arm, his shoulder, burning through fabric during their brief dance at the Fairfax dinner.
“You will master this. It just takes some practice and a partner who doesn’t mind missteps.
Dancing is meant to be enjoyed, not endured. ”
She hummed another phrase of that bright melody, guiding Lillian through steps with patience Edmund had never possessed. His ward’s face was flushed with exertion and something that looked dangerously like happiness—an expression he’d failed to inspire during six months of determined guardianship.
The observation settled like lead in his chest. Here was evidence of his inadequacy made manifest: Isadora had accomplished in weeks what he couldn’t achieve in half a year.
Had brought light to Lillian’s eyes, laughter to her voice, joy to an existence Edmund had reduced to rigid schedules and careful isolation.
What right did he have to intrude on this? What possible good could his presence bring to their lesson?
Isadora must have sensed him because her head turned toward the doorway with the sudden wariness of prey scenting predator. Their eyes met across the room’s expanse, and Edmund watched calculation flicker across her features before being replaced by something he couldn’t decipher.
Resignation? Determination? Some combination that suggested she’d made a decision he wouldn’t like?
“Your Grace,” she said, her tone carrying the careful neutrality she’d adopted since their confrontation. “Join us, if only for a moment.”
The invitation hit him like a fist to the solar plexus. She wanted him to join them? After he’d spent three days avoiding her with transparent desperation? After he’d dismissed their entire relationship as nothing more than practical arrangement?
“I am no dancing master,” he managed, the refusal emerging automatically even as every fiber of his being screamed to accept.
“Precisely.” Isadora’s chin lifted with that challenge he’d come to recognize—the one that made his pulse race despite his best efforts at control. “Which is why your ward will not fear clumsy steps with you. She needs practice with a partner who won’t judge her mistakes. Come.”
The command was delivered lightly but brooked no refusal. Edmund found himself moving forward before conscious decision had been made, drawn by forces he couldn’t name and didn’t dare examine too closely.
His boots were silent on carpet that had been rolled back to expose polished floors. Lillian watched his approach with an expression that mingled hope and uncertainty—as though she couldn’t quite believe he was actually participating rather than criticizing from the sidelines.
When had he become the sort of guardian whose mere presence inspired such wariness in a child he was supposed to protect?
“Uncle Edmund?” Her voice carried the tentative quality of someone expecting rejection. “You don’t have to—”
“Apparently I do,” he interrupted, surprising them both with the faint humor in his tone. “Your new guardian has issued orders, and I’ve learned that arguing with Her Grace tends to end poorly for everyone involved.”
Isadora’s eyes widened fractionally at this acknowledgment of her authority—the first he’d offered since their wedding. But she said nothing, merely gestured toward the space she’d cleared for their lesson.
“Take her hands,” she instructed, and Edmund’s pulse jumped at her voice washing over him like warm water.
“Not too tightly—you’re leading her through a dance, not restraining a prisoner.
Yes, like that. Now the steps are simple: forward, side, together.
Forward, side, together. The rhythm matches the melody I was humming. ”
Edmund positioned himself opposite Lillian with movements that felt absurdly formal. His ward barely reached his shoulder, her hands small and cold in his despite the room’s warmth. She looked up at him with those blue eyes that were pure James—questioning, hopeful, terrified of disappointing him.
The expression made something crack in his chest. How many times had James looked at him like that? Before the duel, before everything went wrong, when they’d been young and stupid and convinced friendship could overcome any obstacle?
“I’ll likely step on your feet,” Lillian warned, pulling him back to the present.
“I’ll survive.” He attempted the sequence Isadora had described, movements stiff with self-consciousness. Forward—his leg tangled with Lillian’s. Side—they nearly collided. Together—she stumbled against him with enough force to require steadying.
This was hopeless. He was hopeless. What had possessed him to think he could do this?
“This is hopeless,” Lillian muttered, echoing his thoughts with devastating accuracy. “I’m completely incompetent at dancing.”
“You’re learning,” Edmund corrected, then caught himself. When had he started offering encouragement rather than criticism? “Again. We’ll master this together.”