Chapter 29
“Will you be dining in the study again tonight, Your Grace?” The butler’s voice cut through the hallway as they entered the house.
Catherine paused, half a step behind Duncan. The echo of their carriage wheels still haunted the marble floors, the faint chill of the late afternoon clinging to her cloak. She turned her head slightly, just enough to see him.
Duncan didn’t even glance at her. “Yes,” he said simply. “Have a tray sent there.”
He handed the butler his gloves and walked past her, his strides purposeful, his shoulders tense. Not once did he meet her eyes.
Her throat tightened. “Duncan,” she called after him, but he didn’t slow.
The study door closed with a quiet, final click.
For a long moment, Catherine stood alone in the corridor, the silence pressing down until even the tick of the clock on the wall sounded too loud. The firelight from the sconces flickered against the polished wood, casting her reflection in brief, broken fragments.
She wanted to follow him right then. To demand why he’d gone cold again after everything they had survived, after the fire, after the tenderness that had begun to bloom like something fragile and alive between them.
Helen’s words echoed in her mind. Men like him frighten easily when they begin to feel too much.
Catherine drew a slow breath. If she confronted him in anger, he would retreat further. She knew that much. But if she left him alone, the distance might grow into something she could no longer bridge.
She turned toward the staircase. For a moment, she considered going to her room, letting the night pass in silence. But the image of him alone in that dark study—the same man who had held her after the flames, whose heartbeat she had felt under her cheek—refused to leave her.
No. She wouldn’t let fear or pride keep her from him. Not again.
She went to his study. The door was slightly ajar. Candlelight flickered within, golden and dim. She could hear the scratch of a pen, the faint rustle of paper, and the steady sound of his breathing.
She knocked softly. “Duncan?”
A pause. Then, “Come in.”
She stepped inside. The room was the same as always—maps and ledgers spread across the wide mahogany desk, the faint scent of smoke and ink clinging to the air.
But there was something colder about it tonight, something in the way he sat with his back straight, eyes fixed on the paper before him as though it alone held his sanity.
“I didn’t mean to disturb you,” she said quietly.
“You didn’t.” His tone was too even.
Catherine hesitated. “Then may I sit?”
“If you wish.”
He didn’t look up as she crossed the room. She sat across from him, her skirts rustling softly against the chair, and studied his face. His jaw was tight, his hair slightly disheveled from running a hand through it too often. The candlelight carved harsh shadows beneath his eyes.
“Duncan,” she began, “I know you’re troubled.”
He said nothing.
“I’ve tried to give you some time, but it’s been days, and you’ve hardly spoken to me. When you do, it’s as if I’m a stranger again.”
Still, nothing. The pen kept moving across the page, controlled and relentless.
Her patience frayed. “Please look at me.”
He set the pen down, finally meeting her gaze. His eyes, usually so calm and calculating, burned tonight with something harder to name.
“What is it you want me to say, Catherine?”
“The truth,” she said. “Whatever it is that’s haunting you.”
He leaned back, exhaling. “There are matters you need not concern yourself with.”
“That’s what you said before,” she replied softly. “And yet here we are — you closing every door between us, and I standing outside all of them.”
His hand tightened against the armrest. “You wouldn’t understand.”
“Then help me,” she said, voice trembling but steady. “Help me understand.”
For a long moment, he said nothing. The fire crackled between them, throwing golden light across his face.
Finally, he spoke. “I can see you will not let this go.”
“No,” she agreed resolutely.
He opened the top drawer of his desk and withdrew a folded sheet of paper, its edges creased as though it had been handled many times. He held it out to her without meeting her eyes.
“Here,” he said, offering her the note.
Catherine took it with both hands, as if the small thing might burn her. The paper was coarse under her fingertips. Her pulse beat in her throat as she unfolded it. The handwriting was clinical and deliberate, each letter a small, patient cruelty.
Interfere in my business again, and the next fire will be yours.
Her breath left her in a small, involuntary sound. For a second, she had no words—only a cold, roiling terror that had nothing to do with flame and everything to do with the man who dared threaten what she loved.
“My God,” she whispered, the syllables cracking. “Duncan—”
He nodded slowly. “It was waiting for me the night we returned.” He folded his hands on the desk, as if to steady them, though his shoulders were tight enough to show the strain beneath his composure. “No name. No seal. But I know who sent it.”
Her heart pounded like a frantic bird against her ribs. The name came from her as if from the same frightened creature. “Felton.”
He let the single syllable drop into the room like a verdict. “Of course.”
She sank slowly into the nearest chair, the letter trembling in her hands. “Then this—this could be everything you need. Proof of his threats. It could solidify your case—”
“I intend to use it,” he interrupted. His voice was cold, measured, and almost detached. It chilled her.
“Then why do you sound as though you’ve already lost?” she whispered.
“You don’t understand what Felton is capable of. If he’s willing to set fire to an orphanage, he’ll stop at nothing. He knows you care for Brightwater. He knows I—”
He stopped short.
She stepped closer. “Knows what?”
His silence was deafening.
“Say it,” she whispered.
He didn’t. Instead, he moved to the decanter and poured himself a drink, the sound of liquid against glass the only reply.
“I understand the danger,” she pressed on, voice trembling. “I know what Felton is capable of. But I’m not afraid to face it with you. Don’t you see? We’re stronger together.”
He shook his head, turning away again. “You think strength lies in feeling. It doesn’t. It lies in control. And right now, control is the only thing keeping us safe.”
She stared at him, her heart twisting. “And what happens when control is all you have left?”
He didn’t answer.
“Tell me,” she said, stepping closer, “what happens when you’ve beaten Felton, when he’s gone?
” Her voice trembled as she struggled to bring up something that had weighed on her heart for months but had never dared mention it before.
“I…I remember that when you first asked me to marry you, there was a timeline placed on our…relationship.” She gulped.
“You said that we should feign happiness…project love until…until Christmastide and then…then…”
She could not bring herself to finish that statement. So much had changed between them since that fateful night when they were locked in that room together that she was sure her husband had long forgotten about his once-made promise.
Her heart fractured in the silence that ensued.
For a moment, she simply looked at him, at the man she had come to love more deeply than she’d ever thought herself capable of. The man who had carried her from fire, whose touch had once felt like safety.
And now, this stranger with his cold words and distant eyes sat in Duncan’s place.
She drew herself up, every muscle trembling. “Very well, Your Grace.”
“Catherine—”
But she was already turning away. Her throat tightened. She had no words left. Only the hollow ache spreading through her chest.
She looked at him one last time—the man she had loved, the man who would not love her back. Then she turned and walked to the door.
“Catherine.” His voice was low, strained.
She stopped, her hand on the handle, but didn’t turn. “Goodnight, Your Grace.”
The door closed behind her with a soft click, sealing the silence between them.
The corridor outside was dim, lit only by the flicker of a single candle.
Her reflection wavered in the glass of a nearby window—pale, tear-streaked, unrecognizable.
She pressed a hand to her chest, trying to steady the uneven rhythm of her heart.
It felt as though the air itself had been stolen from her lungs.
Christmas has come and gone. He no longer cares to keep up appearances. The fire at Brightwater only served to remind him of how much he had already sacrificed on my behalf.
She made it to her chamber before the first sob escaped her. She caught herself against the door, burying her face in her hands, the quiet sound of heartbreak swallowed by the walls.