Chapter Fourteen
S hay dropped to the ground from the back of his gelding and tossed the reins to one of the boys who hurried toward him from the stables.
He’d just spent the last hour placating an irate Enfield, so irate, in fact, that the man had hunted him down at the Jansen farm and interrupted his inspection of the barns. He had assured the steward that he still controlled the estate and all that happened here, although Her Grace would play a larger role in estate management than previous duchesses. And no, they were not opening the home park to all kinds of riff-raff, strays, and vagabonds.
He yanked off his gloves as he jogged up the front steps and across the portico. “Where’s the duchess?” he demanded of Henley when the butler opened the door for him.
“In the gardens, Your Grace. She said she wanted to meet with the head groundskeeper to discuss plans for—”
With a curse, Shay spun on his heel and charged back down the steps. Each crunching step of his boots in the snow as he marched toward the walled gardens only raised his irritation. Yes, Ravenscroft Manor was Sophie’s home now, too. Yes, she was entitled to make changes.
But damnation , did she have to cause so much upheaval?
He heard her before he saw her. Her voice was carefully controlled, made even more so in contrast to the rising anger from the man arguing with her. Shay rolled his eyes, not having to see the man’s face to know who he was—MacHeath, the head groundskeeper. The old Scot had been working at Ravenscroft Manor long before Shay was born, starting off as a hall boy and slowly working his way outdoors into the park, where he rose over the years to be in charge of the grounds. He now answered only to Shay and Enfield, although it surely stuck in the man’s craw to have to answer to anyone. For the most part, he didn’t, and was on his own to tend the gardens, terraces, and greenhouses, most of which had been left unused over the years.
But right then, the old man’s failure to respect Ravenscroft’s hierarchy infuriated Shay. No one —not Malcolm, not Enfield, not even old MacHeath—had the right to raise his voice to Sophie.
He rounded the corner of the brick wall separating the formal terraces from the greenhouse’s gardens and found MacHeath shaking his head furiously at what Sophie was patiently attempting to tell him. The old Scot was so angry, in fact, that he’d drifted into such a thick Highland accent that Shay could barely understand him, but he knew whatever he was saying, it wasn’t good.
So did Sophie, apparently, from the way her cheeks had flushed; that pinking wasn’t from the wintry air.
“MacHeath!” Shay called out to interrupt as he approached. “I see you’ve met Her Grace, Duchess of Malvern.” His gaze darted to Sophie, whose mouth had pressed into a hard line of frustration and restrained anger. “Are you discussing changes to the gardens?”
“Not changes,” MacHeath bit out in answer. “Destruction.”
“Oh, for heaven’s sake!” Sophie threw up her hands, her patience snapping. “Simply changing the use of the outer gardens and orchards so that—”
“ Destruction ,” MacHeath repeated.
Sophie continued mid sentence, “—so that the villagers and tenants can make use of areas the manor house doesn’t need is not destruction. It’s improvement.” A frustrated groan rose from her lips. “What’s so wrong with that?”
“Unless they work in the house or are delivering goods, villagers have no business being inside the home park,” MacHeath responded before Shay could jump into the argument.
“They have every right,” Sophie countered with mounting anger so palpable it hung on the cold air with every cloud of breath from her lips. “The home park wouldn’t exist without the support of its tenants.”
“You are new here,” MacHeath argued. “You don’t understand the way Ravenscroft Manor has been run.”
She shook the sheet of paper in her hand. “I understand domestic agriculture far more than you realize.”
The old gardener shook his head. “You’d be wise to stay in the house where womenfolk belong and let men who know how to—”
“MacHeath!” Shay raised his voice. He had no choice but to interrupt for fear that Sophie would throttle the man for whatever nonsense about women was about to spill from his lips. “You will not address Her Grace in that manner. Do you understand?” He gestured at Sophie. “She is your duchess, and she will have whatever she wishes.”
A bitter laugh came from Sophie. “That’s a damnable lie!”
Raging anger had flushed her cheeks scarlet, and she shook fiercely, her hands clenched into fists at her sides. Flames danced in her bright eyes, and her jaw clenched like a vise. Every bit of her fury was directed not at MacHeath for being yet another man who had thwarted her plans, but at Shay.
“If the duchess can have whatever she wishes,” she shot back fiercely, her blazing eyes locking with his, “then she wishes to have her husband!”
MacHeath’s mouth fell open, shocked. The old gardener darted glances between the two of them, not knowing where to look, before finally lifting his gaze to stare up at the trees edging the garden.
Sophie spun on her heel to stomp away.
“Oh no, you don’t!” Shay ran to catch up with her, took her arm, and pulled her toward the greenhouse. “We’re having this out. Now.”
He shoved open the door and led her into the greenhouse, then closed the door behind them for privacy. Through the panes of frosted glass, he could see MacHeath beating a quick retreat for the gardening shed behind the stables.
“What on earth is going on?” he snapped. “First, I had to calm down Enfield, now MacHeath. When I said you could make whatever changes you wanted, I meant to work with the staff in making them, not—”
“ No ,” she interrupted, so fiercely her voice turned low and heated in its frustration. The single word whipped surprise through him. “Is this place my home? Or is everyone here under the belief that I’m simply wasting time until spring when they hope I’ll flee, like the previous duchess?”
Shay straightened beneath her accusation. The pain was visible on her face.
“I am not some pretty little doll whose only purpose in life is needlework and watercolors.” Frustration practically dripped from her. “I want to make this place into a real home for us.”
“I know that.” Very well, too. Her optimistic spirit had always been one of the aspects that had most attracted him to her. “But the staff are set in their ways and need time to adjust to having a new mistress.”
She crossed her arms over her chest and leveled a furious stare at him. “What’s your excuse, then? Do you want to be my husband, or are you simply wasting time until spring—” Her voice cracked with emotion as she repeated her earlier words. “When you hope I’ll flee?”
The question drove a barrage of daggers into his gut, yet he somehow managed to ask quietly, “Is that what you want?”
“No! I want to create a real home here with my husband and our children.” She swiped the back of her hand across her eyes, and the vulnerable gesture nearly undid him. “What I don’t understand is why you don’t want that, too.”
I do want that, more than you’ll ever know. “I married you because I wanted to protect you.”
“Liar.”
He clenched his jaw. “All I want is an amicable marriage.”
She stepped forward to close the distance between them and repeated, “Liar.”
She rose up on her tiptoes and brought her mouth so close to his that her warm breath pulsed across his lips with every angry inhalation she took. He froze, unable to bring himself to move away from her.
“I’m not stupid, Shay, nor so innocent as not to notice the way you look at me, how you stare longingly at my mouth as if you want to kiss me—No, as if you want to devour me. Like you’re doing right now.”
Damnation. His eyes snapped up to hers.
“I know you so well that I can feel when you catch your breath whenever I even barely brush against you. Right now, I can practically feel your pulse racing, and I haven’t even touched you.” Her voice lowered to a throaty rasp, as if daring him to disagree. “What would you do if I did touch you, hmm? If I give you the same pleasures you gave me, only to pull away as you did? Would you let me go?”
She placed her palm on his chest. The innocent touch scalded him through to his soul, and his breath hitched before he could stop it, proving her right.
“Don’t tell me you don’t want more of the pleasures we’ve shared,” she murmured, “because I certainly do.”
Her whispered confession heatedly tickled his lips. It took every bit of restraint he possessed not to grab her and crush her to him, to plunder her mouth and shove his hands beneath her thick coat to feel the warmth of her soft body.
“Don’t you remember how your hands trembled when you caressed me, how wonderful it felt when your fingers moved inside me? It was heavenly.”
No. It was torture. He’d thought of little else than of touching her intimately again like that, of spreading her thighs wide beneath him and burying himself deep within her tight warmth. His restless dreams had been filled with her and all the pleasures he wanted to take in her, all the intimacies he wanted to teach her, all her beauty engulfing him…all the absolution he wanted her to bestow.
But when he woke, he was still as scarred and empty as before, still just as desolate.
Her fingers curled possessively into his waistcoat. “I have yearned for that same pleasure during every minute apart from you, hoping you would claim me again with your touch and your kisses. I want that more than anything, and I know you want it, too.”
He couldn’t let her continue. If she kept whispering those things to him, she would break him, simply shatter him like a pane of glass in the walls around them. “You want a monster for a husband, Sophie?” He took her hand by the wrist and lifted it to the scarred side of his face, to drag her fingertips over the leathery ridges. “You want this face coming to you in the darkness, like something from a nightmare?”
Worse—the body that went with it. When she saw the full extent of what the fire had done, she would be horrified. He’d never be able to live with the look of horror he knew he’d see on her face. Or one of unbearable pity.
“I don’t care what you look like! I never have. It’s not your face I fell in love with. It was your goodness, your bravery, your kindness—dear God, Shay, that above all! Where did that man go? I want him back.” Her voice hitched. “I want him .”
“That man died in the fire.”
Her voice hitched as she repeated, so softly this time that he could barely hear her, “Liar.”
She leaned forward and brushed her lips across his scarred cheek to his ear. His eyes squeezed shut against the torment of her soft lips. Yet for all her gentleness, he could feel the anger still pounding away inside her, like hot coals ready to flame into a fire.
“But I know the truth,” she whispered. “For all your lies, I know you love me.”
She stood back and took his hand, then pulled something from her coat pocket and placed it on his palm. He stared down at the little metal bird she’d slipped into his coat pocket during their sleigh ride.
“So stop lying to me.” Brutal disappointment replaced the anger in her eyes. “And stop lying to yourself.”
Grimacing as a tear finally broke free and slipped down her face, she angrily swatted it away as she turned to leave.
“I don’t deserve you,” he confessed, his voice hoarse.
She stopped, her hand resting on the door handle. She didn’t move, not to leave, not even to breathe.
“Because you’re afraid I’ll leave you the same way your mother did,” she guessed, her voice barely more than a breath.
“No.” With his heart thudding like a death knell in his hollow chest, he somehow managed to keep from howling in rage at the life fate had cast him into, at the guilt and grief that radiated through him. There would be no salvation for him. “Because I am a heartless monster, more than you realize. I didn’t lose my face in the fire.” He paused to keep his voice from cracking as he admitted, “I lost my soul.”
He came up behind her and slipped his arms around her. Not to selfishly steal an embrace from her, not to physically ask forgiveness—he did it so she couldn’t turn around. Because if he saw the look on her face, if he saw her outrage and condemnation, it would end him.
“I murdered my brother that night.” The world shattered around him as he admitted, “And I did it for you.”
Sophie shoved herself away and spun around to gape at him. What he’d said wasn’t true. It simply could not be true!
But the guilt she saw in him sliced into her like a poisoned blade, and the anguished breath ripped through her lungs.
He gestured at his scars, his hand tightening into a fist. “ This is my punishment for wanting what was never meant to be mine, for hating my brother for having you. I pushed you away after the fire because I couldn’t bear to see you and be reminded of what I’d done, of exactly what kind of monster I truly am.”
She couldn’t resist any longer and reached to take his hand, to ease away the pain being squeezed in that fist. “No. You’re not a mon—”
“ I should have died that night, not John!”
His angry shout shook the panes of cold glass around them, and she stared at him, her body flashing numb.
Suddenly, all of what he had done following the fire struck her with an icy-cold realization, one that formed a hard block of ice in her chest. He hadn’t been punishing her by staying away; he had been punishing himself. Worse, the way he’d behaved since their marriage, how he drew away every time she tried to come closer, how he’d refused to open his heart to her—
Oh God. He thought she was his punishment for his sins.
“And that’s why—” Her voice choked off with grief. She pulled a deep breath and tried again. “That’s why you think you don’t deserve to be my husband.”
“I know I don’t.” The self-hatred and guilt gripping his face stopped her heart. “You don’t deserve to have a murderous monster in your bed, and I sure as hell don’t deserve your love in return.”
“Then…” She fought hard to voice the question because she was terrified of the answer. “Then how do we save our marriage?”
His broad shoulders fell, and he slumped back against a tin-topped workbench, all the fight leaving him—the same tin-topped bench on which she’d cut herself earlier, when she’d still possessed hope of having his love and creating a family together. Now, that hope vanished like smoke into the winter sky, leaving only icy nothingness behind.
“I’ve been thinking, ever since Malcolm visited…” His voice trailed off, then he slowly shook his head. “Maybe we shouldn’t save it. Maybe it’s time we put an end to it.”
And with that, he simply ripped her heart right out of her chest.
She struggled to ignore the unbearable pain searing her insides and find her breath enough to rasp out past numb lips, “You don’t mean that.”
“I do.” He pulled in a ragged breath, so fierce that it shook him from hat to boots.
“I won’t destroy another life. Especially not yours.”