Chapter Sixteen
“This cannot possibly be correct.”
Eleanor frowned at the ledger in her hands, angling it toward the lamplight to better examine the figures. The estate accounts for the northern farms had never balanced satisfactorily, and she had spent much of the evening attempting to trace the discrepancy.
Across the library, Benjamin looked up from his own sheaf of documents. “What have you discovered?”
“Either the former steward possessed no talent for arithmetic, or someone has been systematically underreporting the wool yields for the better part of a decade.” She turned the ledger toward him, indicating a column of figures.
“These totals do not correspond with the shipping records I translated last week. The difference is… considerable.”
He rose and crossed to where she sat, his uneven gait softened by the thick carpet. The fire had burned low during the hours they had worked, casting the room in warm shadows that lent it an unexpected intimacy.
Eleanor had not intended to spend the evening in the library.
She had come only to retrieve a reference volume, had found Benjamin already occupied with estate papers, had mentioned the discrepancy in passing.
Somehow—she could not quite determine when—passing mention had become shared investigation, and shared investigation had become hours of collaborative labour, the two of them moving between ledgers and manifests with the ease of long habit.
It felt comfortable.
It felt right.
It felt dangerous, in ways she preferred not to examine too closely.
“Show me,” Benjamin said, taking the chair beside hers.
He sat nearer than he ordinarily allowed himself, his shoulder almost brushing hers as he leaned forward to study the ledger. Eleanor became acutely aware of the faint scent of sandalwood and paper, of the warmth of his presence, of the quiet cadence of his breathing.
She forced her attention back to the numbers.
“Here,” she said, indicating a line of entries. “The recorded yields for 1811. And here—” She reached for the shipping manifest at her elbow. “The quantities actually delivered to market. The difference approaches two hundred pounds of wool.”
“Two hundred pounds.” His tone remained thoughtful. “Each year?”
“Each year for at least the past eight. Earlier records are… unreliable.” She drew another ledger closer. “I suspect the previous steward was either incompetent or dishonest. Possibly both.”
“The former steward withdrew from the position three years ago,” Benjamin said slowly. “His successor was recommended to me by an old family acquaintance, and I accepted the arrangement with little scrutiny.” Benjamin’s brow furrowed. “I ought to have investigated more thoroughly.”
“You had other concerns.”
“That is not an excuse.”
“No,” Eleanor said quietly. “But it is an explanation. And explanations retain value, even when they do not absolve.”
He turned toward her then, his dark eyes catching the firelight in a manner that unsettled her breath.
They sat very close—close enough that she could discern the fine lines at the corners of his eyes, the subtle pull of scar tissue along his cheek, details that had become, over recent weeks, unexpectedly familiar.
“You are remarkably charitable,” he said.
“I am remarkably practical.” She lowered her gaze to the ledger, willing her pulse to steady. “Recrimination rarely improves accounts. Solutions generally do.”
“And your proposed solution?”
“A complete audit of the northern farms, conducted by someone unconnected with the previous administration. Revised record-keeping procedures, with regular comparison against verified yields.” She paused.
“It will require time—months, perhaps longer. But if the discrepancy proves as consistent as it appears, the estate has suffered considerable losses. Recovering even part of it would justify the effort.”
Benjamin fell silent. When he spoke again, his voice held a curious softness.
“You speak of this estate as though it were yours.”
Eleanor stilled.
He was correct. Somewhere in recent weeks, she had ceased thinking of Thornwood as solely his and begun to think of it—quietly, almost without noticing—as home. The tenants, the household, the gardens and rooms and books—they had become hers in a manner nothing had ever been hers before.
“Forgive me,” she said carefully. “I did not intend to presume—”
“Do not apologise.” He reached forward, and for a breathless instant she thought he meant to touch her—but his hand settled instead upon the ledger between them, his scarred fingers spread across the page. “It is not presumption. It is precisely what I hoped for when I asked you to marry me.”
“You hoped I would uncover accounting irregularities?”
A short, startled laugh escaped him. “I hoped you would claim this place as your own. That you would… care for it. For those who depend upon it.” He paused. “I did not anticipate how much I would value watching that happen.”
The words rested between them, warm and weighted.
Eleanor reached for another volume—anything to steady her hands—and discovered she had grasped the same book Benjamin reached for.
Their hands touched.
It was nothing. A fleeting brush of fingers, lasting scarcely a heartbeat. The sort of incidental contact shared countless times by people working in proximity.
Yet neither withdrew.
Her hand remained upon the spine of the book. His fingers rested lightly against hers—warm, rough, unmistakably present. She felt the contact with alarming clarity: the calluses along his palm, the uneven ridges of scarred skin, the quiet heat that seemed to travel from him into her.
She ought to move. Ought to withdraw, offer some light remark, restore the careful distance they had always maintained.
She did not move.
“Eleanor.”
Her name, spoken low and rough. Neither question nor command—only her name, offered with unmistakable care.
She looked up.
His eyes were very dark in the firelight—dark and intent and fixed on her face with an expression that made her breath catch in her throat. He was not looking at the ledgers anymore. He was not looking at anything except her.
“You have ink on your cheek,” he said quietly.
The words were ordinary. Entirely practical. Yet his voice trembled faintly with something perilously close to uncertainty.
“Have I?” she whispered.
She ought to remove it herself. Ought to laugh at her inattention. Ought to do anything other than remain perfectly still with her hand beneath his and her heart beating with such force she feared he must hear it.
Benjamin lifted his free hand.
Slowly—so slowly she might have drawn back, might have turned aside, might have halted the moment before it formed.
She did not move.
His thumb brushed lightly across her cheekbone.
The touch was gentle—almost hesitant. He was removing the ink, she knew. A simple, harmless courtesy.
Yet his thumb lingered.
It followed the curve of her cheek with a deliberation that could not be mistaken. His palm came to rest against her jaw, his fingers curving softly along her face, holding her as though she were something easily broken.
Eleanor forgot how to breathe.
Forgot how to think.
Could only remain still as this scarred, silent man touched her with a tenderness that felt almost reverent.
“Eleanor,” he said again.
And she understood—suddenly, completely—that he was asking.
Not with words. Words had never been his skill. But his gaze asked. His hand asked. The stillness of his body asked. All she needed to do was lean forward—only slightly, only enough to close the fragile distance between them—
A door opened somewhere within the house.
The sound was faint. Inconsequential. A servant moving along a corridor, perhaps. Nothing requiring notice. Nothing that ought to have shattered the moment with such abrupt finality.
Yet shatter it did.
They sprang apart as though burned.
Benjamin’s hand fell from her face. Eleanor’s fingers released the book. The distance between them, which had seemed negligible only moments before, now stretched wide and insurmountable.
“Forgive me,” Benjamin said. His voice was rough, uncertain. “I ought not to have—”
“There is nothing to forgive.”
The words escaped too quickly, breathless with urgency. Eleanor pressed her hands against her skirts to steady their trembling.
“The hour is late,” Benjamin continued, as though she had not spoken. “You should retire. I will… finish reviewing these documents myself.”
He was retreating. She could see it—the walls rising, the warmth draining from his expression, the man who had touched her face vanishing behind the duke who kept the world carefully at a distance.
She ought to let him go. Ought to accept the withdrawal, preserve the fragile balance they had constructed.
“Goodnight,” she said instead, her voice unsteady.
He met her gaze. For a fleeting instant, the walls faltered, and she glimpsed something raw and unguarded beneath his composure.
“Goodnight,” he replied.
Then he turned away, returning to his desk, presenting her with the rigid line of his shoulders and the unmistakable message they conveyed: the moment was finished.
Eleanor rose on unsteady legs and left the library.
***
She did not sleep.
She lay beneath the canopy of her bed, staring upward, replaying the moment again and again in relentless clarity.
His thumb brushing her cheek. His palm resting against her jaw. The way he had spoken her name—low and rough and trembling.
He meant to kiss me, she thought. Or I meant to let him. Or we meant to—
She did not let herself finish the thought.
It was madness. They had agreed upon a practical arrangement, a marriage of convenience, a partnership without expectation of affection or intimacy. They had been explicit, careful, had built their understanding upon the assurance that neither required—nor could offer—anything more.
And yet.
His fingers on her cheek. The look in his eyes—uncertain, wanting, afraid.
He wished to kiss me.
I wished it too.
The realisation ought to have frightened her. Ought to have driven her back behind the familiar defences of usefulness and practicality. Ought to have compelled her to swear that such a moment would never again be permitted.
But Eleanor was weary of walls. Weary of distance. Weary of guarding herself against possibilities that might, if allowed, prove precisely what she had long been denied.
She pressed her fingertips lightly against her cheek, following the path his thumb had traced.
What would it have been like, she wondered, had the interruption not come? Had we not drawn apart?
What would it have been like to be kissed by a man who looked at me like that?
She did not have an answer. And she suspected sleep would remain elusive until she found one.
***
In his study, Benjamin sat in darkness and stared at nothing.
His hand still tingled with the memory of her skin. His pulse had yet to steady.
I almost kissed her.
The thought circled relentlessly.
I almost kissed my wife.
It ought not to have been remarkable. She was his wife. To kiss her was neither improper nor unexpected—merely the natural expression of the bond they had agreed to share.
Yet their bond had been founded upon practicality. Their marriage upon convenience. They had promised one another security, respect, and freedom from expectation.
He had never promised he would not want her.
He had simply never expected to want her like this—with a desperation that frightened him, a hunger that threatened to overwhelm every carefully constructed wall he had built around his broken heart.
She looked at me, he thought. She looked at me as though she wanted it too.
But what if I was wrong? What if I misread the moment? What if I am simply seeing what I want to see, because I want it so desperately?
He lowered his head into his hands.
For years, he had accepted that he could never be loved—that his scars, his silence, his memories had rendered him beyond such hope. He had arranged his life accordingly, embracing solitude, duty, and the quiet satisfaction of feeding a creature that would likely never trust him fully.
And then Eleanor had come.
Eleanor, who did not recoil. Eleanor, who remained when he revealed the darkest fragments of himself. Eleanor, who regarded his scars and saw only the man beneath them.
Eleanor, whose breath had caught when he touched her face.
I should apologise, he thought. Tomorrow. I should apologise, explain that it was a moment of weakness, and assure her it will not happen again.
Yet even as the thought formed, he recognised it for falsehood.
He did not wish to apologise. He did not wish to promise restraint.
He wished to go to her chamber now and complete what had been interrupted.
To cradle her face between his hands and kiss her until thought deserted them both.
To tell her everything he had never learned how to say—that she had brought light into his darkness, warmth into his cold, hope into a life he had believed finished.
He wished.
Sweet mercy, he wished.
Benjamin remained alone in the dark, sleepless, wondering how long he could continue to pretend that wanting was not, in truth, indistinguishable from needing.