Chapter 12
Chapter Twelve
Hazel had believed quite firmly and with all the practiced stubbornness of a woman who had rehearsed her future for years that remaining in London after the wedding would offer her a sense of stability. Even Belvington Manor was only a short carriage ride away.
She had told herself she would feel safe here. But the night of their wedding, as she sat alone in her new bedchamber, with her hair unbound and heavy down her back, Hazel found that safety was far more complicated than she had imagined.
That was actually the first conclusion she reached upon stepping into what had become her chamber. The room bore quiet evidence of her husband’s forethought. There was a small bouquet of violets in a vase and a small dish of sugared almonds.
She wondered how he knew she liked them.
But then she remembered that he could have easily asked her mother or her sisters. Strangely enough, it showed care, despite the fact that what they agreed upon was a marriage of convenience.
She combed her fingers through a curl absently, then reached for her comb only to pause, with her reflection staring back at her with wide, alert eyes.
She half expected him to come.
The thought startled her so entirely that she fumbled the comb, sending it clattering to the floor.
“Do not be ridiculous,” she whispered sharply, placing a hand over her fluttering chest as though she could scold her own heart into obedience.
The house was still. The servants had long since retired. She had dismissed her lady’s maid early. She had insisted she needed no assistance preparing for bed, because she was not nervous or unsettled in the slightest.
That was, of course, a lie.
Hazel bent to retrieve the fallen comb, clutching it tightly as she rose again. Her gaze drifted to the looking glass across the room. Candlelight flickered, catching the loose strands around her face.
For some inexplicable reason, she hardly recognized herself. Only, it was not because she looked any different. She had only worn a simple gown and a little powder today. No. It was her expression of uncertainty, of anticipation, of something perilously close to hope.
She swallowed heavily.
“It is thoughts like these,” she told her reflection sternly, “that led entirely sensible women such as Evelyn, Cordelia, and Matilda to fall in love. And look what happened to them.”
Her reflection did not respond, but she grimaced at it all the same.
“Utter foolishness,” she added.
But the words did nothing to dispel the memory that rose unbidden and entirely improper. She could feel his hand at her waist as they danced. She could feel his fingers brushing her wrist. And finally, she could hear his voice, so deceptively composed, telling her he had not tried his hardest yet.
The way he had looked at her then, as though her face alone occupied all the space in his world, had unsettled her to her core.
It was absurd. It was impossible. When he had said it, she had been certain he was merely teasing. Greyson Thornhill, the famously impenetrable Duke of Callbury, could not possibly have meant it as anything but a provocation.
And yet…
Hazel pressed her fingers to her heated cheeks. What unsettled her most was that her body had responded before her mind could form a single coherent objection. Her pulse had leapt beneath his thumb. Her breath had caught. Her feet had nearly forgotten their steps.
It was a disaster… a thrilling, treacherous disaster.
“I am merely overtired,” she muttered. “That is all. Emotionally drained… disoriented from the day, and,” her voice wobbled, “and entirely misled by compliments.”
Compliments she had not expected.
Compliments she had not believed.
Compliments she… felt.
She firmly set the comb on her vanity, as though the object itself were to blame, and stared at her reflection once more.
“I am not falling in love,” she insisted, narrowing her eyes.
No. Certainly not.
She had seen love destroy sensible people.
She had watched it unravel families, shake her own sisters senseless, and cause otherwise rational women to swoon, sigh, and forget the existence of reason entirely.
And now, it seemed that even she, Hazel Thorne, the fortress of practicality, was swayed by the way her husband had held her in a ballroom lit by a hundred candles.
“Oh, this is dreadful,” she whispered.
Marriage of convenience. That was what they’d agreed to. That was what she wanted. That was what he wanted. Anything else was unacceptable.
She had control of herself. She did. She absolutely…
Her gaze flicked to the door. Her heart jolted. For one breathless moment, she thought she heard footsteps in the corridor. Her hands froze.
Greyson?
But the footsteps, if they had been footsteps at all, faded into silence. After several seconds of taut, suspended dread, Hazel let out a shaky exhale.
“Foolish,” she muttered.
Yet even as she rose to blow out the candles, her pulse betrayed her again. It was their wedding night. And while she knew that he wanted nothing more from their union than pragmatic companionship, a small, traitorous part of her was no longer entirely certain what she herself wanted.
Greyson had never imagined that resisting the impulse to walk down the corridor to his wife’s bedchamber would require anything resembling effort.
He had foolishly assumed that the arrangement they had agreed upon would safeguard him from such impulses.
A marriage of convenience was clean and rational.
What Hazel wanted aligned beautifully with what he himself wanted: companionship without entanglement, loyalty without vulnerability, and a household without heartache.
Yet as he stood outside his own chamber that night, he found himself rooted to the floor in uncharacteristic indecision. He was not going to consummate the marriage. That had been the agreement, and he respected it. He respected her.
But the urge to check on her, to knock, to speak to her, to see if her eyes still danced with that irritating, intoxicating spark, pulled at him with unsettling force. He took one step toward her door, then stopped.
Absolutely not.
He would not be that man, the sort who intrudes, who presses expectations upon a bride after an exhausting wedding day, who mistakes shared amusement for invitation. Hazel deserved better than that. She deserved control of her own evening, perhaps for the first time in her life.
As for himself, he needed distance… and a drink. Preferably several.
So, that very same night, he found himself in a small establishment that would provide exactly that.
The place was modest and dimly lit, but most importantly, it was blessedly free of wedding chatter.
Greyson had nearly convinced himself he had made the sensible choice when a familiar voice cut through the quiet.
“Callbury?”
Greyson turned, only to lock eyes with Robert Firming, the Duke of Aberon. He was seated alone at a corner table, nursing a glass of brandy and wearing the expression of a new father who had not slept in months but was too dignified to admit it.
Greyson exhaled. “Aberon.”
Robert’s brows rose. “You, my friend, are the last man I expected to see in a pub tonight.”
Greyson hesitated, then crossed the room. “Likewise.”
Robert motioned to the empty chair. “Sit. Before someone assumes we’re both fleeing scandal.”
Greyson sat. It felt wrong and right at the same time.
Robert studied him for several beats. “It is your wedding night.”
“Yes.”
“And you are at a pub.”
“So it would seem.”
Robert took a slow drink. “Should I assume something is terribly wrong?”
Greyson resisted the urge to pinch the bridge of his nose, which was a gesture Hazel had made him want to use far too often since their engagement.
“Nothing is wrong.”
Robert’s brows lifted further. “Nothing?”
Greyson shifted. “It is… complicated.”
Robert let out a breath of dry amusement. “Marriage often is.”
“No,” Greyson said, sharper than intended. “We agreed ours would not be.”
That caught Robert’s attention.
“We made an arrangement,” Greyson said, more controlled now. “A practical one. It is a marriage of convenience. Hazel wished to remain close to her family. I wished to avoid messy entanglements. The solution was obvious.”
Robert leaned back, considering him closely. “Ah.”
“You sound disappointed,” Greyson noted.
“A little,” Robert admitted. “I am a great believer in love these days.” His expression softened at the thought of his wife. “Though I was not always.”
Greyson frowned, uncomfortable with the direction of the conversation. “This is not about love.”
“No,” Robert said quietly. “But is it about you?”
Greyson stiffened. “I do not follow.”
“Callbury,” Robert said gently, “if this marriage is purely practical, why are you here instead of at home? And why do you look like a man who left something unfinished?”
Greyson stared into his drink. He could not tell Robert that he had wanted to see Hazel standing in candlelight with her hair down, that he had relived their dance in his mind more times than was reasonable.
He especially could not tell him that her laugh had unsettled him, that her stubbornness intrigued him, and that her acceptance of his hand had felt like an unspoken promise he was not prepared to understand.
So, he said nothing.
Robert inclined his head in understanding. “You do not have to explain. Newly married or not, a man sometimes needs space to gather his thoughts.”
Greyson nodded.
“And Hazel is a remarkable woman,” Robert added. “Any man would need a moment after dancing with her.”
Greyson’s grip on his glass tightened. “I am not—”
“In danger?” Robert finished, looking amused. “Of course not. Neither was I. Nor Jasper, nor Mason. None of us were ever in danger.”
His tone made clear exactly how true that was.
Greyson scowled. “This is not the same.”
Robert’s mouth curved. “No. It never is, until it is.”
Greyson drained his glass. He had not intended to speak again, certainly not of anything meaningful. The brandy burned pleasantly in his throat, offering the illusion of steadiness. Robert sipped his own drink with the calm of a man who had mastered contentment.
Greyson had mastered many things. Contentment was not among them.
He stared into the amber liquid a moment longer before unforgivable words left his mouth.
“Aberon,” he said quietly, “what made you change your plans with your wife?”
The question startled even him. He felt the sharp twist of vulnerability in his chest the moment it left his lips.
Robert looked at him with slow, dawning interest. “My plans?”
“You intended only practicality,” Greyson said stiffly. “You sought a marriage of sense. Yet you… strayed from it.”
Robert’s mouth curved. “Strayed?”
Greyson’s jaw clenched. “When did it go wrong?”
Robert lifted a brow. “Wrong?”
Greyson glared at the table because glaring directly at Robert would have been intolerable. “You know what I mean.”
A low chuckle slipped from Robert, warm and unhelpfully knowing. “Callbury, it did not go wrong. It went entirely right.”
Greyson’s scowl deepened. “That is not helpful.”
“No, I imagine it is not.” Robert leaned back in his chair, studying him. “You are asking how I lost the battle before it began.”
Greyson stiffened. “I am not battling anything.”
“Of course you are,” Robert said mildly. “You’re battling yourself. And to answer your question… there is no moment, Callbury. There is no single instant where a man realizes he has gone too far. No warning bell, no flash of lightning. You do not notice until it is already done.”
Greyson’s pulse thudded uncomfortably.
Robert continued, half amused and half sympathetic. “You asked when it went wrong. The truth is: there is no stopping the inevitable.”
“That,” Greyson said tightly, “is exactly what I feared you might say.”
“And yet,” Robert added with a shrug, “it is the truth.”
Greyson pushed a frustrated hand through his hair. “You sound like Jasper.”
“That is the gravest insult I have received all week,” Robert said lightly, then he lifted a drink. “If you are seeking advice on how to prevent falling in love, I am afraid I have none. I tried, and I failed spectacularly.”
Greyson stared at him, utterly appalled. “You are telling me it is hopeless?”
“No,” Robert said, giving him a look of gentle pity. “I am telling you it is human.”
Human.
He could not afford to be human. Humanity was weakness. Humanity had destroyed his brother, broken his mother, twisted his father into something cruel.
Hazel deserved better than a man unraveling at the sound of her laugh. Greyson Thornhill, the man who prided himself on discipline above all else, suddenly wished that he had gone nowhere near that ballroom.
And at the very same time, he wished, even more desperately, that he had never left it.