Chapter Twenty-Two #2
"Which is part of the original Montclaire grant from 1487. Would you like to see the documentation? I have it memorized." Alexander's smile was all teeth. "You have three minutes to leave before I have you removed for trespassing."
The landowners left in a flurry of outrage and threats, but they left. The moment they were gone, the square erupted in cheers. The saved families surrounded Alexander and Ophelia, tears and thanks pouring out in equal measure.
"Your Graces," Mr. Fletcher said, speaking for the group, "we don't know how to thank you. What you've done tonight..."
"What we've done," Ophelia corrected gently, taking Alexander's arm, "is what any decent people would do given the means. Use this chance well. Build that support network. Help each other. That's all the gratitude we need."
It took another hour to sort out the immediate needs, ensure everyone had shelter for the night, and establish a plan for the morning.
Through it all, Alexander and Ophelia worked in tandem—he handled the legal and financial aspects while she managed the human element, organizing temporary aid and comfort for the most distressed families.
Finally, exhausted and muddy, they climbed back into their carriage. The moment the door closed, Ophelia felt the adrenaline that had sustained her drain away, leaving her shaky and overwhelmed.
"That was..." she began, then stopped, not sure how to finish.
"Expensive," Alexander supplied, though there was no recrimination in his tone. "Roughly seven thousand pounds expensive."
"I'm sorry. If I hadn't insisted on helping the Wheelers..."
"Then a child would have died, and these families would have been evicted anyway, just without anyone to stop it." He was looking out the window and said, "you were right, and I was wrong. About all of it."
The admission was so unexpected that Ophelia couldn't immediately respond. They rode in silence for several minutes, but it was a different kind of silence than their usual uncomfortable quiet. This felt charged with something new, something that had sparked when he'd defended her so fiercely.
"You called me your wife," she said finally.
"You are my wife."
"Yes, but you've never called me that before. Not like that. Not like it meant something."
He turned to look at her then, and even in the dim light, she could see something had shifted in his expression.
"It did mean something. It meant that anyone who insults you insults me.
It meant that we're united, whether we planned it or not.
It meant..." he paused, seeming to struggle with words.
"It meant I'm tired of pretending you don't matter. "
Her heart stopped, then resumed at double speed. "I matter?"
"You've mattered since the beginning. I just didn't want to admit it." He ran his hand through his hair, disturbing its perfect arrangement in that gesture she'd come to recognize as his tell for emotional distress. "Do you have any idea how terrifying you are?"
"Terrifying? Me?" Ophelia couldn't help but laugh. "I'm about as terrifying as a butterfly."
"No, butterflies are predictable. They follow patterns, respond to stimuli in expected ways.
You're chaos incarnate. You arrive in my perfectly ordered world and immediately start changing things; the servants smile more, there are flowers everywhere, you make me feel things I've spent years learning not to feel. "
"Is feeling really so terrible?"
"It is when you've built your entire life on not feeling.
When emotion has only ever led to loss and pain.
" He turned back to the window. "My mother died when I was young.
She was everything warm and bright in that house.
When she was gone, my father retreated into coldness, removed every trace of her, acted like she'd never existed.
I learned that loving someone meant losing them, and the only way to survive the loss was to never love at all. "
Ophelia wanted to reach for him but didn't know if she had the right. "That's not survival, Alexander. That's just existing."
"I was quite good at existing until you arrived."
"And now?"
"Now I don't know what I'm doing. Tonight, when Harrington insulted you, I wanted to call him out. Actually challenge him to a duel over words. That's insane."
"That's protective. That's caring."
"That's dangerous."
They arrived at Montclaire House before she could respond. The great entrance was lit with torches, and servants appeared to help them from the carriage. Both of them were muddy, exhausted, and emotionally wrung out from the evening's events.
"Your Graces," Mrs. Morrison appeared, taking in their disheveled state with raised eyebrows. "Shall I have baths drawn?"
"Yes," Alexander said, then paused. "And Mrs. Morrison? Have some brandy sent to the library. The good stuff from the cellar."
"The 1798, Your Grace?"
"Perfect."
Ophelia looked at him in surprise. "Brandy?"
"We've just spent seven thousand pounds, saved eight families, and made enemies of half the county's landowners. I think that calls for a drink, don't you?"
An hour later, bathed and changed into simpler clothing, he in shirtsleeves and trousers, she in a soft wool dress that was warm and comfortable rather than fashionable, they met in the library.
A fire crackled in the hearth, casting dancing shadows across the book-lined walls.
The brandy decanter sat on a side table, catching the light like liquid amber.
Alexander poured two generous measures and handed one to her. "Do you like brandy?"
"Well, it is strong."
"It's meant to be. Liquid courage, my grandfather used to call it."
"Did he need much courage?"
"He married my grandmother, who was apparently a terror. So yes, probably." Alexander took a deep drink of his own brandy, then settled into one of the leather chairs by the fire. "My goodness, what a night."
Ophelia curled up in the chair opposite, tucking her feet under her in a way that would have horrified any proper chaperone. But they were alone, and she was exhausted, and the brandy was already making her feel warm and slightly loose-limbed.
"You were magnificent tonight," she said, watching him over the rim of her glass. "The way you handled Harrington, turned his own cruelty against him—it was brilliant."
"It was expensive."
"It was worth it."
"Was it? We've made serious enemies tonight. Harrington won't forget this humiliation, and neither will the others."
"Would you do it differently if you could?"
He considered this, taking another drink. "No. The looks on those families' faces when they realised they were safe... that was worth seven thousand pounds. That was worth making enemies." He paused. "You've done something to my priorities, and I'm not sure if I should thank you or blame you."
"Both, probably." She sipped her brandy more carefully this time, enjoying the warmth it spread through her chest. "You know what surprised me most tonight?"
"What?"
"When you defended me. Really defended me, not just from duty or propriety but because you were genuinely angry at how they spoke to me."
"Of course I was angry. Harrington's a simpleton who wouldn't recognize real nobility if it introduced itself formally at a ball." He poured himself another brandy, his movements already slightly less precise than usual. "Do you know what real nobility looks like?"
"Enlighten me."
"It looks like a woman in silk kneeling in the mud to comfort crying children. It looks like someone organizing community support while their husband plays power games with bloated aristocrats. It looks like..." he gestured vaguely at her with his glass, "you."
"I think you're a little drunk."
"I'm definitely a little drunk. Maybe more than a little. This brandy is excellent. Have I mentioned this brandy is excellent?"
Ophelia laughed, and he smiled at the sound. "You're much more talkative when you're drunk."
"I'm much more everything when I'm drunk. It's why I rarely drink. Alcohol makes me forget to maintain proper barriers and appropriate distance and all those things that keep me from saying what I'm actually thinking."
"And what are you actually thinking?"
"That you look beautiful in firelight. That your hair has bits of gold in it I never noticed before. That when you laugh, you do this little snorting thing that should be unattractive but is actually adorable." He paused, seeming to realize what he was saying. "I should stop drinking now."
"Don't you dare." Ophelia poured him another brandy herself. "This is the most honest you've been since I met you."
"Honesty is dangerous."
"Why?"
"Because if I'm honest, I have to admit things. Difficult things. Impossible things." He was definitely drunk now, his usual careful articulation becoming looser, more natural. "Do you know what the worst part is?"
"What?"
"I don't want to not feel things anymore. You've ruined my perfectly functional emotional suppression with your kindness and your compassion and your foolish, beautiful, snorting laugh."
"It's not foolish," Ophelia protested, though she was smiling.
"It's completely stupid. It makes me want to make you laugh just to hear it. I've actually thought of jests—me! Thinking of jests!—just to see if I could make you laugh." He seemed appalled by his own admission. "This is your fault."
"My fault?"
"Entirely. You and your Coleridge chaos magic or whatever it is that makes you impossible to ignore.
" He stood, swaying slightly, and moved to pour another brandy.
"I tried so hard to ignore you. To put you in a box marked 'wife: do not engage emotionally' and just coexist. But you wouldn't stay in the box.
You kept being interesting and infuriating and kind and beautiful. .."
"You think I'm beautiful?" Ophelia interrupted, her own head fuzzy from the brandy.
"I think you're the most beautiful thing I've ever seen, and I hate you a little bit for it."
"You hate me for being beautiful?"