Chapter 11 #2
Thaddeus leaned back slightly in his chair, and for one brief instant, his carefully maintained mask slipped entirely.
He looked younger somehow, vulnerable in a way she had never seen.
His hand moved as though he might reach for hers, then stopped halfway, hovering uncertainly before falling back to his knee.
“Thank you,” he said. “For listening. For not judging me. My cowardice.”
“It is not cowardice to be afraid,” Maribel replied. “Only to let that fear stop you from living.”
He nodded slowly, his gaze still fixed upon her. “You are not what I expected.”
“What did you expect?”
“Someone more biddable, I suppose. Someone willing to maintain the fiction without questioning the walls I have built.” His mouth curved slightly. “Instead, I find myself married to a woman who insists on seeing past those walls. Who refuses to allow me the comfort of my distance.”
“Does that anger you?”
“No.” He shook his head. “It makes me—”
He stopped abruptly, and something shifted in his expression. Something that looked remarkably like panic.
“It makes me realize how much I have revealed this evening.”
The words fell between them with uncomfortable clarity.
Maribel watched as he withdrew—not physically, but emotionally. She could see it happening, could watch him reconstruct those walls brick by careful brick. The vulnerability in his eyes shuttered. His posture straightened. The mask of the Duke of Blackwood slid back into place.
“You should return to your chambers,” he said, his voice suddenly formal, distant. “It grows late, and I have taken too much of your time.”
The dismissal struck her like a physical blow. Maribel remained frozen, trying to comprehend the sudden transformation. One moment he had been open, achingly human. The next he had retreated behind walls so high she could not begin to scale them.
“Thaddeus—”
“Please.” The single word held an edge of something that might have been desperation. “I should not have—that is, I spoke too freely. It was inappropriate to burden you with such matters.”
“Burden me?” Maribel heard the tremor in her own voice. “How can Oliver’s welfare not concern me? How can your—”
“We have an arrangement, Lady Blackwood.” His use of her formal title felt deliberate, calculated. “You are here to care for Oliver, for which I am grateful. But I should not have presumed. Should not have imposed.”
He rose abruptly and moved toward the window, presenting his back to her. Every line of his body radiated tension.
“You should go. Please.”
Maribel remained seated for a moment, her hands clenched in her lap. Her chest felt tight with hurt, confusion, and the terrible understanding that he had shown her something real—and was now desperately trying to pretend it had never happened.
“Very well,” she said at length, rising with what dignity she could muster. “Goodnight, Your Grace.”
She heard him flinch at the formality but he offered no response. Nothing at all.
Maribel retrieved her candle and moved toward the door. For one wild moment she considered turning back, demanding some acknowledgment that what had passed between them had meant something.
But the rigid set of his shoulders warned her that pressing now would accomplish nothing.
She slipped into the corridor and closed the door softly behind her. Only when she stood alone did she allow herself to lean against the wall, one hand pressed to her chest where her heart hammered.
What had just happened?
One moment they had been speaking with unprecedented honesty. He had shown her his pain, his fear, his humanity. Had let her see the wounded man beneath the duke’s careful facade.
And then—nothing. As though a door had slammed shut. As though he had suddenly realized how much he had revealed and could not bear to show her more.
From within the study, she heard the sharp crack of glass—a tumbler meeting the wall with enough force to shatter.
Then silence.
Maribel pushed away from the wall and made her way through darkened corridors toward her chambers. Her mind kept returning to the study, to the rawness in his voice when he had spoken of his mother, to the vulnerability in his eyes when he had admitted his fear.
And then his sudden, complete withdrawal.
She reached her chambers and closed the door, leaning against it as the full weight of the evening settled upon her. Her candle flickered, casting dancing shadows.
Her hands were shaking.
She had thought—what had she thought? That one evening of honest conversation might change something between them? That seeing his pain might somehow bridge the distance he maintained?
How foolish.
Thaddeus was a man who guarded his heart like a fortress under siege. Who viewed vulnerability as weakness and connection as danger. Who had spent eight years building walls specifically designed to keep everyone out.
And she—she who had sworn to maintain appropriate distance, to keep this marriage exactly what it was meant to be—had just discovered something terrifying.
She cared what happened to him.
The realization settled over her with crushing weight.
She pressed her hands to her face, willing herself to maintain composure.
Willing herself to remember that this was an arrangement, nothing more, and that allowing herself to develop feelings for a man who would never return them was the height of foolishness.
Yet her hands continued to shake. Her chest ached. She could still hear the rawness in his voice when he had said: I am terrified.
How much she wished that when he had shown her his humanity, he had not immediately regretted it.
And how terribly afraid she was that he would never allow himself such honesty again.
Morning came grey and cold, with autumn rain pattering steadily against the windows.
Maribel rose before dawn, having slept rather poorly. She dressed with mechanical precision, her fingers clumsy on the buttons. Her reflection showed shadows beneath her eyes that told their own story.
She made her way to the breakfast room, uncertain whether she hoped to see Thaddeus or dreaded the encounter.
Mrs. Allen informed her without a sign of emotion, that His Grace had taken his meal in his study and requested not to be disturbed.
Of course he had. She pursed her lips at this. Was it so frightful to him to have been remotely vulnerable?
Maribel accepted toast and tea she had no appetite for and sat alone at the long table, staring out at the rain-soaked gardens.
He was avoiding her. That much was clear. Whether from embarrassment at having revealed so much, or anger that she had witnessed it, or simply because maintaining distance was easier than acknowledging what had passed between them—she could not say.
But the message was unmistakable. Last night had been an aberration. A momentary lapse. Something to be forgotten rather than examined.
The door opened, and for one wild moment her heart leapt.
But it was only Oliver, still in his nightshirt, his hair in wild disarray.
“Maribel!” He hurried to her side, climbing into the chair beside hers. “You’re awake early. Did you sleep badly too?”
“A little,” she admitted, pulling him close. “And you? Did you have nightmares?”
“No.” He shook his head. “I had a dream. That His Grace was my papa. Do you think… Do you think he would like that? Do you think he likes me?”
“I think,” she said carefully, “that His Grace cares very much. Even if he does not always know how to show it.”
Oliver considered this gravely. “Mrs. Allen says some people don’t know how to use their words properly. Do you think His Grace is one of those people?”
“Yes,” Maribel said softly. “I think perhaps he is.”
Oliver nodded, apparently satisfied. He leaned against her side, and they sat together in comfortable silence while the rain continued its soft percussion against the windows.
And if Maribel’s gaze drifted toward the study door more than once—if she found herself listening for footsteps that never came—she told herself it was merely concern for Oliver’s wellbeing.
Anything else was too dangerous to contemplate.