Chapter Five
The week that followed passed in a blur of preparations that felt increasingly unreal.
True to his word, the Duke’s man of business managed every financial matter with an efficiency that left the Beckett women slightly dazed.
Bills that had languished for months were suddenly settled.
Merchants who had long stopped calling arrived with their finest wares.
A modiste appeared to fit Celine for a wedding dress—a soft dove-grey silk that made her skin luminous and her eyes appear almost violet.
“His Grace suggested this colour,” the modiste said, pinning the bodice with brisk competence. “He has excellent taste.”
“He chose the colour?” Celine asked, startled.
“He was very specific. Dove grey, minimal ornamentation, elegant but not ostentatious.” The woman stepped back to inspect her work. “He said you required no frills to enhance your beauty.”
Celine stared at her reflection, uncertain what game the Duke was playing. Compliments delivered secondhand through dressmakers? Asserting control over her appearance before they were even wed?
Yet when the dress was finished, she had to admit it was perfect—sophisticated, flattering, precisely what she might have chosen herself if she’d possessed endless funds and exquisite taste.
“It’s as if he knows you,” Lucy said during the final fitting. “Or at least knows how you should look.”
“He knows how his countess should look,” Celine corrected. “There’s a difference.”
But Lucy’s comment lingered. In the few times she and the Duke had met, he had observed her with unnerving intensity. What had he seen? What had he deduced about her character, her preferences, her very self?
The night before the wedding, sleep eluded her. She stood at her bedroom window, watching the gaslight flicker on the damp street below, trying to imagine what tomorrow would bring. By this time tomorrow, she would be the Countess of Rothwest. A new name. A new home. A new life.
A soft knock interrupted her thoughts.
“Come in.”
Her mother entered, carrying a velvet box. “This was your grandmother’s,” she said, opening it to reveal a strand of pearls, glowing softly in the candlelight. “She wore them on her wedding day.”
“The grandmother who died without ever hearing she was loved?”
A sad smile. “The very same. But she also raised six children, managed a vast estate, and was respected by everyone who knew her. There are worse fates than a loveless marriage, my dear.”
“Are there?” Celine took the pearls, letting them slip through her fingers. “Sometimes I wonder if it might be easier to feel nothing at all.”
“Is that what you expect with His Grace? Nothing?”
Celine thought of the heat in his eyes, suppressed yet unmistakable. The way the air shifted when he entered a room. The dangerous thrill that skittered along her spine when he smiled that knife-edge smile.
“No,” she admitted. “I don’t think it will be nothing.”
“Then be careful.” Her mother kissed her forehead. “Whatever it is, be very, very careful.”
***
The morning of the wedding dawned grey and softly raining, which felt appropriate somehow.
Celine dressed with mechanical precision, her hands steady though her thoughts whirled.
The dove-grey gown fit perfectly, the pearls lay cool at her throat, and the reflection in the mirror looked like a stranger—pale, composed, eerily calm.
“You look beautiful,” Anne said softly. “Like a heroine of some old romance.”
“Romances end happily,” Lucy murmured, adjusting Celine’s veil. “This feels more like a cautionary tale.”
“Lucy,” their mother warned.
“It’s all right,” Celine said. “She isn’t wrong. Though cautionary tales have their uses. They remind us of choices, consequences… and the prices we pay for what we want.”
“And what do you want?” Lucy asked.
Celine paused. What did she want? Security, certainly. Safety for her family. Freedom from the gnawing dread of poverty. But beneath that, something else stirred—curiosity, perhaps. Or something more perilous.
“I suppose I’ll find out,” she said at last.
The Duke’s carriage arrived precisely at nine, as promised. A magnificent vehicle of black lacquer bearing the Rothwest arms, drawn by four matched greys. The interior was dark leather and velvet—more luxurious than anything Celine had ever known.
“At least you’ll be comfortable in your captivity,” Lucy muttered, running her hand along the upholstery.
The journey to St George’s passed in silence save for the rain tapping against the windows. Celine found herself counting the droplets racing down the glass—a childhood game that now felt like marking the last minutes of her former life.
The church was nearly empty. The Duke had been true to his word: only family and the required witnesses. He stood at the altar in severe black, looking like a particularly elegant undertaker. When he turned to watch her approach, his expression revealed nothing.
She walked alone—her father had offered to give her away, but she had refused. If she was choosing this, she would choose it under her own power.
The ceremony was brief, the vows familiar.
Celine heard herself promising to love, honour, and obey—words that felt brittle in her mouth.
When it came time for the ring, the Duke produced a band of white gold set with diamonds and dark sapphires—unusual, bold, nothing like the plain gold of most brides.
“With this ring, I thee wed,” he said, sliding it onto her finger. His touch was brief, almost clinical, yet her skin burned where his fingers had been.
Then the vicar was pronouncing them husband and wife, and the Duke stepped toward her for the customary acknowledgement. She braced herself, though she wasn’t sure for what—coldness, indifference, some inscrutable gesture of possession.
What she received was control.
He lowered his head and pressed a single, deliberate kiss to her forehead—light, brief, but so startlingly intimate her breath caught. The touch lasted no more than a moment, yet her skin tingled as though he had marked her.
It was a gesture that promised nothing… and threatened everything.
When he straightened, his eyes held hers, and she saw that banked heat again, swiftly shuttered.
“My lady wife,” he murmured, low enough for only her to hear.
“My husband,” she replied, surprised by the steadiness of her own voice.
He offered his arm, and she took it, allowing him to lead her back down the aisle. Behind them, her family followed—Lucy sniffling despite her bravado, Anne openly crying, her mother stiff with composure, her father looking like a man who had just watched his daughter walk into a dragon’s lair.
Which, Celine supposed, was not entirely inaccurate.
Outside the church, a second carriage waited for her family. The Duke handed her mother in first, then her sisters.
“The house remains yours,” he told her father quietly. “The papers were filed this morning. Your debts are cleared.”
“I… thank you, Your Grace.” Her father’s voice was thick with equal parts shame and relief.
“Don’t thank me. I’ve gained far more than I’ve given.” His gaze shifted to Celine. “Shall we, wife?”
Wife.
The word sent an unexpected shiver through her. She was his wife now—irrevocably, for better or for worse.
He handed her into their carriage—their carriage, she supposed she would have to grow accustomed to the plural possessives—and took the seat opposite rather than beside her. The distance was both a relief and, strangely, a disappointment.
“Where are we going?” she asked as the carriage pulled away from the church.
“Rothwest House. The London residence, not the country estate. I assumed you might prefer to remain in town for now—close to your family.”
It was unexpectedly considerate. “Thank you.”
“Don’t thank me yet. You haven’t seen it.”
“Is it dreadful?”
“That depends entirely on your perspective.” His gaze fixed on her with the intense focus she was beginning to recognise as habitual. “Some find it oppressive. Others find it… instructive.”
“Instructive?”
“Every house reveals its master’s nature. The choices made, the priorities established. Rothwest House is particularly revealing.”
“And what will it reveal about you?”
His smile returned—that dangerous edge of amusement. “You shall tell me. You strike me as observant enough to draw your own conclusions.”
The carriage turned into Berkeley Square, and Celine leaned closer to the window. She’d passed Rothwest House before—everyone knew the Beast’s residence—but she had never dared to look directly at it.
Now she looked.
The mansion was vast, built of dark stone that seemed to swallow light. The windows were tall and narrow, like watchful eyes. The front door was black oak polished to a mirror sheen, its brass knocker shaped like a wolf’s head.
“Subtle,” she murmured.
“My grandfather’s choice. He had a fondness for dramatic statements.” The Duke stepped out first, turning to help her down. “Welcome to your new home, Lady Rothwest.”
The name struck her like cold water. Lady Rothwest. She was no longer Celine Beckett—she was someone else entirely, someone she didn’t yet know how to be.
The door opened before they reached it, held by a butler who might have been carved from the same stone as the house—tall, grey, utterly expressionless.
“Your Grace,” he intoned. “My Lady. Welcome home.”
“Thank you, Morrison.” The Duke’s hand at her elbow was light, almost formal. “This is the Countess. You will extend her every courtesy, and ensure the staff does the same.”
“Of course, Your Grace.” Morrison bowed to her. “We have been eagerly awaiting your arrival, my lady.”
Eagerly felt like an overstatement. The entrance hall was as austere as the exterior—black-and-white marble floors, dark wood panelling, a chandelier that provided light without warmth. No flowers, no paintings, nothing that suggested comfort or joy.
“Charming,” she murmured.