Chapter 4
For several seconds after he declared his intentions, Ewan heard nothing at all.
Voices moved around him in fragmented waves; Lady Brentwood gasping, the Earl barking commands, guests whispering behind fluttering fans as lantern light bobbed over the lawn.
But every sound felt distant, muffled, as though he stood beneath the surface of the lake again instead of on its bank.
Only one thing cut through the fog.
Arabella Tempest.
Standing there drenched and trembling, wrapped in his coat like a shield against him rather than a comfort. Staring at him as though he had struck her.
Not fearful. Not grateful.
But stunned. Wounded. Disbelieving.
The expression landed harder than her father’s accusations ever could. As though she thought he had taken something from her. As though he had wronged her deliberately.
Ridiculous, he told himself. She was a stranger. He owed her nothing, and she owed him even less.
And yet her gaze unsettled him.
She drew the coat more tightly around her, stepping back as if distance alone might hold back the tide of consequences.
“I do not wish to marry you,” she said, her voice low but steady, trembling only at the edges. “I do not wish any of this.”
“I am aware,” Ewan replied, forcing calm he did not feel. “But the matter is no longer a question of wishing.”
Her eyes burned. “This is barbaric.”
“It is necessary.”
“For whom?” she pressed.
“For us both.” He kept his tone level, though frustration coiled beneath each word. “Your father was prepared to meet me with pistols at dawn, Lady Arabella. You saw the state he was in. He meant it.”
She glanced toward the cluster of ladies whispering loudly enough to be heard across the garden. Their expressions were sharp as knives, hungry for scandal.
Arabella swallowed. Her chin lifted, but her resolve faltered. He saw the exact moment the weight of it pressed down. The inescapability of reputation, of duty, of the rules society had crafted for her long before she was born.
Her shoulders slumped, ever so slightly.
Lady Brentwood swooped in at once, enveloping her daughter in frantic fussing while the Earl snapped orders at footmen: blankets, hot tea, more lanterns, a physician immediately. The air was thick with panic and gossip and far too many voices.
Ewan stepped back.
There was nothing more he could do there. Nothing he could say that would not worsen the spectacle or the girl’s distress. She was pale with shock, shaking visibly beneath the weight of his coat. The last thing she needed was more attention.
Or more of him.
He inclined his head toward her parents. “I will call on Lady Arabella in the morning to settle the formal arrangements.”
The Earl gave a curt nod, still stern, but no longer murderous.
Arabella’s head jerked up at that, her gaze finding his with startling precision. For a heartbeat they simply looked at one another; her eyes wide, pleading, furious, resigned all at once. All the things she could not voice, written plainly across her face.
And for a foolish moment, he wished he could offer her comfort. Some assurance that he meant her no harm. That he had not set out tonight intending to trap her… or himself.
To promise he would rather bear the burden of this marriage than fire a shot at her father or take one in return. To assure her that, in choosing the lesser harm, he had not meant to become the villain in her story.
But he was not a man given to comforts he did not know how to offer. And even if he were, the words would not have mattered. Not then.
So he bowed instead—formal, distant, controlled—and turned away.
Behind him, the commotion continued. The gossip grew. And somewhere among the voices, he heard the soft, unsteady sound of a young woman trying not to cry.
He did not look back.
He doubted he could bear it if he did.
Ewan left the Fairfax estate without ceremony, refusing his valet’s attempt to drape him in blankets. The night air bit through his damp clothes, but the cold sitting in his chest had very little to do with the lake.
The coach rolled into the quiet London streets. Gas lamps cast thin halos across the cobblestones, the horses’ hooves striking steady rhythms that should have soothed him.
They did not.
He leaned back against the leather seat and dragged a hand across his face, feeling more weary than he wanted to admit.
Engaged. Bound to a young woman he had spoken to for all of five minutes—and quarreled with for nearly all of them. He exhaled slowly.
He had not wanted it. He had not gone to the ball seeking it. He had gone for one reason only: to secure a match that would save Balfour from financial ruin.
When he pulled her from the water, recognition had struck belatedly. Tempest. Edmund’s sister. He had known the family years ago… well enough that Lord Brentwood’s identity, and hers, had returned to him at once.
And now he was to marry her.
A practical match. Simple. Unemotional.
A sensible match would have been a calm, wealthy widow. Someone who understood solitude. Not a bright-eyed debutante with sharp opinions and tender hopes he would only break.
He cursed softly under his breath.
The coach turned down the street toward his townhouse. He closed his eyes, but all he could see was Arabella plunging into the lake, her skirts ballooning, her hand reaching instinctively for anything to hold.
And then, on the bank, her expression when she realized what must happen next. That expression lingered like a bruise along his ribs.
The townhouse was quiet when he entered. His butler rushed forward at the sight of Ewan’s disheveled appearance, but a curt gesture dismissed him.
“I require no assistance tonight,” Ewan said. “Send everyone to bed.”
“Yes, Your Grace.”
He crossed the dim foyer without pausing and moved through the sitting room to the study just beyond it. The need for isolation clawed at him, familiar and unwelcome. He shut the study door behind him and the house finally fell into a silence he could breathe in.
A decanter of whisky sat on the sideboard. He poured a glass. Then another. The burn seared down his throat, hot enough to momentarily drown the whirl of thoughts.
He crossed the room to stand at the window, looking out over the street. The night was still. The lamps flickered. Household servants dozed in rooms above the stables. The quiet felt like a balm against his frayed nerves.
Marriage. He was not ready. He doubted he would ever be again.
Anne-Marie’s portrait hung above the mantel, its familiar weight drawing him like a magnet he could not resist. He turned slowly, glass in hand.
Her painted eyes—a soft blue, framed by fair hair—regarded him with the same cool indifference she had worn in life. Beautiful. Remote. Unreachable. He swallowed the rest of the whisky in one long pull.
He had loved her once. Or thought he did. That was long ago. Before he learned the truth. Before grief hardened into something sharper.
He looked away from the portrait abruptly, pacing the room.
What would his second marriage look like? Would Arabella resent him forever? Would she fear him? Would she shrink from the life waiting for her in Scotland? A life of solitude, duty, and bleak northern winters?
She would hate it. She would hate him.
He shut his eyes and wished he were the sort of man who could offer her something better. Something warmer. But he was not.
He opened them again when a firm knock sounded at the front door.
He froze.
Another knock sounded, sharper this time. Ewan set his glass aside and crossed the study, listening as footsteps moved through the hall as he braced himself for whatever waited on the other side of the door.
The butler’s low voice murmured some greeting, followed by the unmistakable tenor of a younger man.
By the time he stepped into the sitting room, the butler had already shown the caller inside. Edmund Tempest stood near the hearth, and for a long moment Ewan could only stare.
Odd how quickly old memories stirred: shared youth, easy laughter, hours spent riding across Scottish hills, secrets traded like currency. Edmund had been as close as a brother. And one of the first casualties of Ewan’s withdrawal after Anne-Marie’s death.
Edmund cleared his throat, bringing Ewan sharply to the present. “May I come through?” he asked, nodding toward the study door.
Ewan stepped aside at once. Edmund’s gaze swept the room in a single thoughtful glance: the decanter on the sideboard, the empty glass, the traces of tension around Ewan’s eyes and mouth.
He folded his arms and leaned against the edge of the desk, studying him with a calmness Ewan could not quite interpret.
“I suppose I should begin by saying I am not here to demand satisfaction,” Edmund said.
Ewan blinked, taken aback. “You are not?”
“No.” Edmund’s tone was dry. “I might have, if I had believed you forced Arabella into the water. But she assured me she slipped.”
She had spoken to him already. That should not have relieved him. But it did.
Edmund continued, “I thought you might want to speak to someone who is not trying to threaten or gossip about you.”
Ewan exhaled slowly. “You assume incorrectly, if you think I desire conversation.”
“That is precisely why I came,” Edmund said lightly. “You always prefer solitude when you ought not.”
Ewan bristled. “I am not in need of companionship.”
“You are in need of sense,” Edmund replied in an untroubled tone, “and perhaps a friend.”
The word settled heavier than Ewan expected, catching somewhere deep in his chest. Friend.
He had not thought himself entitled to such a thing in a long while, not after everything that had happened, not after the self-imposed distance he had forced between himself and nearly everyone who once cared for him.
He turned away to steady himself, planting his hands on the back of a nearby chair as though grounding his thoughts there. “I did not intend to compromise your sister,” he said quietly.
“I know,” Edmund answered.
Ewan glanced back over his shoulder, searching his old friend’s expression for judgment and finding none.
“I believe her,” Edmund said simply. “She said the boards were slick. I trust her.”
Ewan closed his eyes. “Your father demanded marriage.”
“Yes. He would have demanded it of any man in that position, even if that man were the Archbishop of Canterbury.”
Ewan huffed something that could have been a laugh, had it not been steeped in exhaustion.
“Do you wish to marry her?” Edmund asked quietly.
“I wish for neither marriage nor scandal,” Ewan said. “But there is no avoiding one without accepting the other.”
Edmund nodded. “Arabella is… unusual. She will not take kindly to being told her future has been decided.”
“I gathered that,” Ewan said wryly.
“But she is also kind,” Edmund continued. “And imaginative. And stubborn, of course. Far more stubborn than is strictly good for her.”
Ewan turned fully. “Imaginative?”
“A literary sort,” Edmund said, smiling faintly. “She loves poetry. Novels. Romance.”
Ewan stiffened.
Romance. The very thing he could not offer.
Edmund read the hesitation in his face. “Do not look so alarmed, man. She does not expect you to sweep her away on horseback.”
“She expects love,” Ewan murmured.
“She expects respect,” Edmund corrected. “And companionship. And a husband who does not make her feel like a burden.”
Ewan’s jaw clenched.
Edmund softened. “She could do much worse than you, Ewan.”
“And much better,” Ewan replied, voice low.
“That is for her to decide,” Edmund said. “Not for you.”
Silence settled between them… a gentler silence.
Ewan cleared his throat. “You have changed, Edmund.”
“So have you,” Edmund said quietly.
They held each other’s gaze for a moment suspended between past and present.
Then Edmund straightened. “If you need anything—guidance, information about Arabella, or simply someone to remind you not to be a complete ass—you know where to find me.”
Ewan felt a surprising warmth in his chest. “Thank you.”
Edmund nodded and moved toward the door. Before exiting, he paused and added, “Despite tonight… I am glad you are back in London.”
With that, he let himself out.
When the door closed, the study seemed quieter than before, though not quite as hollow.
Ewan stood still for a moment, letting the silence settle around him, then slowly turned toward the mantel. Anne-Marie’s portrait gazed down from above the hearth. The sight of her stirred the familiar ache in his chest.
A tight knot made up of guilt for failing her, resentment for the truths he had discovered far too late, and sorrow for everything their marriage was supposed to have been.
What tormented him most was the secret he had uncovered only days before her death.
Secrets dark enough to break a marriage and dangerous enough to ruin a life. He had told no one. And when she died so suddenly… he had wondered what others might think of him.
He rested his palms on the mantel, breath unsteady. What would his second marriage become? Would he fail again? Hurt again? Disappoint again?
A breath escaped him, faint and weary, and when he finally spoke, his voice was almost soundless in the stillness. “I do not know how to do this again.”
The room remained silent in return. Only the candlelight flickered softly against the walls, casting long shadows that shifted with each wavering flame. Outside, the city slept, unaware of the turmoil inside the duke’s study.
And somewhere in that silence, Ewan could almost hear the memory of a young woman’s voice; breathless, chilled to the bone, standing on a moonlit bank and declaring she wished to marry for love.
A love he feared he could not give her. A love he was not certain he knew how to give anyone anymore.