Chapter 10 #2
Anger and panic clouded Caroline’s mind, and she cursed herself for having to rely on the Duke’s word.
It was too late to turn back now, though.
The marriage was sanctified, and if she did not sign the contract, there was nothing to enforce the other promises Damien had made.
Picking up the pen, she scribbled her name, then shoved both the pen and the contract toward Damien.
There was a brief moment of silence as Caroline kept her fuming gaze to the floor, then she heard the scratching of the pen.
The contract, like their marriage, was now sealed.
“You should leave now,” Damien’s deep, anger-filled voice said, breaking the quiet.
The solicitor did not respond, but simply picked up the contract and all but ran to the door. For the next several moments, both Caroline and Damien sat in silence, their anger radiating throughout the room like a furnace.
“I swear, if this is a trick...” she finally gritted out, but the slamming of Damien’s fist upon his desk stopped her.
She flinched before looking at him, her body coiled and ready to strike back if need be.
Yet aside from his fist now wrapped tight atop the desk, Damien had remained still.
His eyes, however, held a promise of vengeance if she did not watch herself.
“I truly am a monster to you, am I not?”
His question, and the hurt barely lacing his otherwise angry tone, caught Caroline off guard. If she did not know better, she might have thought he could actually feel offended.
Why would he even care what I think of him?
“Tell me about George,” she stated, ignoring his question as she kept a wary eye on Damien, who remained seething behind his desk.
His jaw worked back and forth, as if he were grinding his teeth.
“I already told you all that I know,” he gritted out. “A woman I never met before brought him here. He had a stutter when he spoke. He barely eats when he is with his nurse, and he never does when I am in his presence.”
“And is that truly how he came to you?” Caroline asked, staring right through his glare. “Or did something happen to make him fearful of you?”
Damien glowered at her for another moment, then guilt clouded his gaze, if only a little, and he looked toward the window.
“The day after he arrived, Adrian came over for our usual boxing practice,” Damien begrudgingly explained. “I had not yet hired a nurse for the boy, so I had entrusted one of the maids to look after him. I do not know how, but the boy must have gotten away from her and wandered to my practice room.
“It was a rough day for Adrian. He still had not... has not fully dealt with Evander being the way he is. He was particularly aggressive that day, and we fought harder than we had in a very long time. By the time we were finished practicing, we were both worn out and covered in blood and bruises. That is when I turned around and discovered that the boy had been watching us. I do not know precisely what he saw or how long he had watched, but the moment I faced him, he let out a scream and ran away crying. He has been the way he is now ever since.”
Damien’s gaze moved back to Caroline then, his amber eyes a mask of numbness.
“That is all I know. I swear it,” he stated. “I never laid a hand on him, nor would I ever lay a hand on a child.”
“Be that as it may,” Caroline said carefully, “what he saw must have scared him. Whatever he has been through before he came to you, he carries it with him.”
Damien’s jaw tightened.
“He is a boy,” he said flatly. “He will need to grow into a man one day. These things are not something he can afford to shy away from. On the contrary, he needs to face them. It will only make him stronger.”
“Or it will break him,” Caroline shot back, her voice rising before she could stop it. “George is only a child. You speak of hardship as though it is a gift, but a privileged man like you cannot possibly know what it is like for a boy like George, at the mercy of everyone.”
Something shifted behind Damien’s eyes, dark and quick.
“You know nothing about me,” he said quietly.
“I know what people say about you,” Caroline replied.
His eyes narrowed. “And what is it that people say about me?”
She lifted her chin. “That you are not a man who receives violence, Your Grace. You are a man who inflicts it.”
The silence that followed was suffocating. Damien moved toward her slowly, deliberately, until he was close enough that she had to tip her head back to hold his gaze.
“And is that what you are afraid of, then?” he asked, his voice dropping low. “That I will be violent with you?”
Caroline’s heart hammered, but she did not step back.
“You have a contract sitting on that desk with your signature on it,” she said, her voice steady despite everything. “You are not allowed to lay a hand on me.”
Pain crossed his face then, quieter and far more unsettling than anger. He stepped back, his expression shuttering completely as he turned toward the door.
“Where are you going?” she called after him.
“None of your business. Just see to the boy,” he coldly commanded over his shoulder. “That is what you are here for.”
Caroline stood alone in the large study for a long moment after that, trying to process all she had just seen, heard, and felt in the last couple of hours.
Then, though she did not want to obey him, Caroline left the room and went on her search for George’s room, hoping to learn more about the terrified boy left on the Duke of Ravenshaw’s doorstep.
He is the sole reason I am here, after all.