Chapter 15
T he next morning came, and Emily did not feel any sense of peace in the slightest.
She walked into the garden with Adam’s confession still lodged inside her like something too sharp to carry comfortably.
Now she knew.
She knew what he had seen, what he feared, and why fatherhood and desire and marriage had become one tangled terror in his mind.
The knowledge should have made everything easier to bear.
Instead, it had only changed the way she felt about his reservations.
She could no longer call him merely cold.
She now understood that his distance came from fear, but that understanding did practically nothing to warm the emptiness in her heart.
The garden lay neat and still around her, the gravel pale under the morning light, the spring growth beginning along the borders, and the air mild enough to mock the unrest inside her. She stood with one hand on the back of a bench and tried to breathe like a reasonable woman.
She was about to begin another breathing exercise when a voice suddenly called behind her,“Your Grace.”
She almost jumped out of her skin but managed at the very last minute to keep her composure. Her eyes dimmed a little as the figure before her came into focus.
Lord Roger Holton.Adam’s uncle.
Emily cleared her throat. “My lord.”
He bowed. “I wished to thank you for bringing Theodore home last night. The household owes you more than can easily be said.”
“That is kind of you.”
“It is also true.”
For one brief second, she thought the conversation might end there.
Roger’s gaze stayed on her face with the exact degree of concern people liked to falsify when they intend to pry. “You are too lovely a young woman to have poor luck in marriage, are you not?”
The words struck with surgical precision, but she managed to remain still.
“What?”
Roger raised his hands and shrugged, gesturing around the garden. “Well, it is clear, is it not? You see it, he sees it, everyone in the house sees it.”
Emily nodded, seeing quite early that this conversation wasn’t going anywhere. “How fortunate I am to have my domestic condition assessed so early in the day.”
Something flickered across his face. He was too intelligent not to hear the cut in it. “I meant no offense.”
“Then I advise you to aim more poorly.”
She did not wait for whatever answer he might give. She turned and walked back toward the house with every scrap of dignity she possessed, though the shame of the exchange burned hard enough to make that even more difficult than ever.
By the time she reached the stables, all she knew was that she could not remain indoors another moment.
She saddled her horse with hurried hands, mounted, and rode out.
The estate opened before her in swathes of grass and hedgerows, then further ground where the paths grew rougher and the house became more distant.
She let the horse carry her faster than was sensible. The speed helped. It also gave more depth to her humiliation and anger at Roger’s remark.
She hated that he had pried. And worse, she hated that he had been right.
Adam saw her from the window of his study and knew at once that something had happened. She was already mounted and already riding hard out of the estate.
Roger stood in the garden below, with his hands clasped behind his back and the expression of a man who seemed to have said too much and knew it.
That alone was enough to sour Adam’s mood.
He did not stop to think. He took the back stairs, crossed the yard, and went after her.
By the time he caught up, Emily had reached the rougher edge of the estate, where the path settled near the trees and no one from the house could have heard them even if they shouted. She heard him coming and sharply reined in her horse, her whole body tense with anger.
“Duke.”
“What did he say to you?”
Emily looked at him as if the question itself was an intrusion. “How very husbandly of you.”
Adam brought his horse level with hers. “What did he say?”
“He thanked me. Then he informed me, with the most exquisite courtesy, that I have poor luck in marriage. I suppose bluntness runs in the family.”
The answer landed hard, despite her attempt at humor.
So Roger had noticed. Others would, too.
The thought made Adam want to break something.
Emily gave him no time to answer. “Perhaps he was only remarking on what everyone can already see.”
“That is enough.”
“No,” she insisted. “It is not enough. Nothing about this is enough.”
She swung down from her horse before he could stop her and stood facing him with her skirts stirred by the breeze and anger bright on her face. Adam dismounted too, more out of instinct than decision.
“What sort of marriage do you expect me to live in?” she demanded. “Not in theory. Not in one of your noble speeches. But in practice. Day after day. What am I meant to be?”
Adam’s jaw tightened. “Emily.”
“No. You do not get to soothe me with my name and then retreat into silence again.” She took one step closer.
“You offered me a marriage with no companionship, and then punished me whenever I felt the absence of it. You will not share my room. You vanish from the table. You touch me when it suits your torment and leave me cold afterward. What sort of life is that meant to become?”
He had no answer she would not hate.
Emily saw that and pressed harder. “Shall I take a lover, then? Is that what would make this arrangement easier for you? If some other man did the work you refuse to do?”
Adam caught her by the arms before he had fully registered moving.“Emily, there are a lot of things I can tolerate. That is not one of them.”
“Adam—”
“Never say those words to me again.”
“Let me go!” The words came out sharp.
“Not until you tell me you understand.”
Her breath hitched once from the force of the reaction she had been waiting to elicit from him.
“And what if I say I do not? Who is going to stop me?”
“Me.” He pulled her closer without meaning to and felt the full, dangerous line of her body against his. “I mean it, Duchess. Do not push me.”
She looked up at him with fury and hurt all mixed together. “Then stop pretending your restraint is kindness.”
He felt the words pierce his chest.
Emily’s voice shook once, then steadied. “If I had known my life would be this empty, I would have preferred scandal to this. At least the scandal was honest.” Her eyes held his. “Whatever this is, Adam, is not principle. If anything, it is simply cruel.”
Adam let go of her as if the word itself had burned.
For a second, neither of them moved. Then, Emily stepped back. “We leave for my mother’s house party tomorrow. And unless you mean to build another wing overnight, we may have to share a room there.”
The warning hung between them.
Emily turned anyway, mounted again with more grace than her anger should have allowed, and looked down at him once.
She kicked her heels into her horse’s flanks and rode back toward the house, leaving him standing in the path with her accusation lingering in the air around him.
That evening, Adam did not go to his study.
He stood in the corridor for a moment with one hand on the door, then turned away from it and went toward the softer noise coming from the family sitting room.
Harriet had built some sort of nest on the rug near the fire using cushions stolen from two chairs and a shawl that plainly belonged elsewhere.Gilbert lay in the middle of it like a small, spoiled king.
Theodore sat on the sofa with a book half open in his hand and only half his attention on the page. Emily was beside the fireplace, not doing anything remarkable at all, only threading a ribbon through one of Harriet’s wooden animals.
The room looked lived-in and warm in the most inviting manner.
Harriet saw him first. “Brother! You came!”
Adam stepped into the room. “What is this?” he asked.
“A grand adventure,” Harriet said. “Gilbert is lost in the forest, and we must save him before the wooden cow loses its courage.”
Gilbert opened one eye and closed it again, unconcerned.
Emily glanced up then. Their earlier quarrel still lived between them, but it felt a bit gentler now. A strip of firelight caught her face and softened the sharpness that had defined the afternoon.
For a minute, Adam debated speaking first. But then, Emily took that burden away from him.
“The cow is not naturally brave,” she said. “But I am improving her character.”
Theodore snorted once. Adam, on the other hand, exhaled and sat in the empty chair near the fire. For some reason, standing made him feel too much like a visitor.
Emily did not overplay anything. She was simply in it, answering Harriet seriously and listening when Theodore spoke. The whole thing was nonsense.
In fact, it should have been nonsense. But for some reason, it hurt him, and the pain came from how natural it all looked. Theodore, less guarded than he had once been, and Harriet bright and secure enough.
Adam felt himself relaxing by increments he did not approve of. He found himself answering the questions Harriet asked. One time, he even took the toy cart when she thrust it at him.
For a little while, the room ceased feeling like a battleground.
Then, Harriet looked up, that same mischievous look he had come to recognize settling on her face. “When will you make babies for me to play with?”
The silence that followed was deafening.
Harriet looked from one face to another, puzzled by the sudden stillness. Theodore went rigid, while Adam felt the question land with cold force.
He swallowed, about to give a random response, when Emily rose to her feet. He watched as she set the ribboned animal down on the mantelpiece and yawned as loudly as she could. Something he could tell was partly for show.
“I think I am tired.”
Harriet blinked. “Already?”
“Yes, little one.”
Emily did not look at him as she left. A moment later, the door closed behind her, and all the warmth left the room.
Harriet turned back to him with immediate concern. “Is something wrong with her?”
Adam shook his head. “No.”
“So, it wasn’t the babies?”
“It wasn’t the babies.”
She studied him, then looked toward the door. “She looked sad.”
Adam set the toy cart down and held out a hand. Harriet came to him at once, climbing onto his knee with utter trust. He smoothed her hair back from her face and kept his hand there.
“You did nothing wrong,” he assured her. “Some questions only come too soon.”
That seemed to satisfy her enough. Theodore watched from the sofa with far too much understanding in his young eyes.
After Harriet had been taken up to bed and Theodore had followed, the room grew quiet again.
Adam remained in the chair by the fire and stared at the flames with nothing but sheer clarity. Emily’s ribboned animal sat abandoned on the mantelpiece, and every trace of the evening remained, even though they all pointed toward the same unbearable question.
Where exactly did he see this marriage going?