Chapter 24
“ Y our Grace?” Agatha asked several hours later. Cordelia and Lavinia had been sitting together, swapping stories and going over theories and such for hours now.
She felt almost like a child again, being so close to her mother. While it was such horrible news that had brought them to this state, perhaps there would be a positive ending in sight.
“Yes?” Cordelia answered with a gentle smile. There was still so much that they needed to go over, so many events from their history that were only slowly starting to add up and fall into place, and likely would take many months to come… but at least the pair of them had closure now. At least they knew that her father had not taken his own life and abandoned them. She also knew that Dorian had not even meant to kill him; it had been self-defense.
“The duke has been waiting outside for you, Your Grace.”
Cordelia did not know if she was ready to speak to her husband just yet. It was not surprising to her in the slightest that he had come all this way to meet with her when he realized that she was not home. Dorian had been waiting outside for hours now, having only asked that she allow him to explain. “Perhaps I have punished him enough for one day?”
There was just so much that they all needed to speak about, so many things to be covered.
“Shall I invite him inside? It is starting to rain, after all. The butler and I agree that there is a storm brewing on the horizon. I predict that the storm shall hit before nightfall.” Agatha advised softly. She had never been wrong about the weather before. At least not when it came to predicting when storms were going to happen. She had come to rely on that in her youth to help keep her from panicking.
If there was going to be a storm tonight… she certainly did want Dorian here. The nightmares were never half as bad when she was around. “Very well, bring him in,” Cordelia answered, and Agatha left them. With weary arms and tired legs, she pushed herself up off of the floor. “Do I look all right?”
Lavinia smiled up at her with a nod. “At least you managed to marry a man with virtue, my dear. Sort of.”
Cordelia could feel herself blushing as she pressed the back of her hand into her cheek. “I shall be in the parlor, then, if you need me?”
Cordelia made it halfway to the parlor when Agatha came rushing back toward her, meeting in the middle of the hall, looking distressed right as the sky seemed to open up. A shock of thunder clapped, and Agatha frowned. “His Grace seems to have left…”
“He left?”
That was not like him in the slightest.
“Well, I mean, he is not outside anymore, but his horse is still tethered out front…”
A knot of dread curled in her stomach as lightning flashed outside of the window. It was so much more than mere panic over the storm that plagued her now.
Where could he have gone without a horse or carriage in this weather?
“Please tell me that you at least have some sort of grand plan for all of this?” Dorian asked his captor.
Matthew paced back and forth in front of where Dorian was bound, seated, and his arms tied behind his back. Matthew had found Dorian in front of Cordelia’s family home and forced him into his carriage at pistol point. At the time, it had not even occurred to him to fight him on it. Cordelia was finished with him, that much was obvious. She had refused to allow him into her house, not even to let him explain, and he could not imagine what she thought of him.
“You know that you will not be walking out of this room alive. Do you not?” Matthew warned him, still pacing.
Dorian’s brow arched. “Are you planning to talk me to death, or will you just get on with it?”
“You are that eager to die? How cowardly!” Matthew laughed.
Cowardly had nothing to do with it, and he was certain of that. “I do not care what happens to me anymore. If I cannot have Cordelia, if she hates me… then what is the point?”
Matthew scoffed. “As if you do not deserve her hate? You are nothing more than a dirty murdering bastard!”
“And yet, here you are, wishing to reduce yourself to my level.” Dorian sighed. It was all too ironic for him. This was a waste of time. If he was to die here, if that was truly Debonaire’s plan, then he ought to get on with it as quickly as possible so that he did not have to waste his last moments. It was already bad enough that Debonaire, of all people, was going to be the last thing on earth that he saw.
“I shall never understand what she sees in you,” Matthew scoffed, stopping to squat down in front of where Dorian knelt.
“Are you looking for a list of reasons why I am superior to you?” Dorian prodded, knowing very well that it was only going to serve to make him even angrier over the situation. “Or is it that you have no plan? Were you hoping to kidnap my wife instead? Did you think that abducting her would somehow make her choose you? She could have, and she chose me.”
It might not be the wisest thing that Dorian had ever done, provoking such a madman, but he was not going to meet his death as a coward or with any fear in his heart. Cordelia had become so important to him, his everything, and now that she knew what he truly was… well, what was the point of anything else?
“For now. I have told her the truth, you know! I have told her what you have done and she is never going to trust you again. I am merely doing her a favor by hurrying along the process. I will save her from your loveless marriage and then when I swoop in to support her, she will be only too grateful for me!” Matthew finished with a grin. He pressed the tip of his pistol just under Dorian’s chin as he spoke.
So that was his end game all along? He thought that he could handle a woman like Cordelia? How very unlikely. If anything was to be said about Debonaire, then it was certainly something to be said about the sheer ego that the man possessed.
“Have you ever even held a pistol before today?” Dorian pressed further.
“Do you really think that it is wise of you to continue pushing me like this?” Matthew sneered, his teeth clenching as the vein in his forehead started to stand out prominently against his pale skin during his rage.
“If you are going to kill me, then do it!” Dorian sighed, allowing his eyes to drift closed. “If you think that you have what it takes to pull the trigger anyway.”
If he pushed the man hard enough, then perhaps it would actually just end it all.
It would be doing him a favor. It would be what was best for Cordelia to be free and able to live any life that she chose. Matthew could not have been more wrong about the loveless marriage. He was absolutely head over heels in love with his wife. So in love with her, in fact, that he could not accept a future where she was not his. If he could not have her… he deserved death for the crimes that he had committed in this life.