Her. A chit of a girl. His wife whom he had married under duress. Yes, he was weak in the flesh, and it had been too long since he’d had a woman. And yes, now when she smiled, he felt the expression in his chest as though she had lit a candle there. He had the oddest urge to make sure it happened more often, which could only be a reflection of more weakness. Once he got the space from her he very much needed, he would go back to normal.
He would not break. Not give in. Not allow her the liberties she so obviously wanted. It was better this way. Better.Safer.
Even if, when he was cleaning up the mess he had made of her, he had imagined her spending the night in his bed, warm and safe in his arms.
His.
Stupid, weak, ludicrous thought. He despised it. Despised her.
Never again. He would not give another person the means to hurt him again, no matter how tempting she made the prospect appear.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Eleanor woke refreshed and reinvigorated. The things he had done to her body certainly helped her feel as though she was ready to take on the world, but more, she had seen the pain in his face when he denied being discontented with his lot in life.
There was something more under the surface here, and she would discover it.
This was the day the servants changed once more—with the exception of Abigail, whom Eleanor had requested remain—and Eleanor took advantage of the relative chaos to slip into his study and close the door behind her. Sebastian had ridden out to London again, no doubt to avoid the confusion of people entering and leaving the house—and to ignore her—so she knew this was her moment.
To her surprise, she found the study to be far cleaner and tidier than she recalled it being the first time she visited. After she had tidied everything, and his subsequent annoyance, she hadassumed he’d have gone back to his old ways. But although the decanter of brandy lay on his desk, an empty glass beside it, the clothes and trays of used plates had been removed. Whether Sebastian had done so himself or whether he had instructed a servant to clean up after him, she couldn’t say, but it sent another spiral of warmth through her. Perhaps he didn’t want to admit it even to himself, but she had made an impact on him. Hehadchanged because of her.
A pleasing prospect. A remarkably satisfying one. She had been the direct cause of this, and it had changed the trajectory of his life, even by a very small amount.
She moved to his desk where he kept his correspondence. One thing she had noticed since being in the house was that he kept no paintings of his ancestors on the walls—and particularly none of his parents. Either of them. A gallery of portraits lay on the second floor, and she had walked the uneven floorboards often enough, staring into the faces of King Charles II and other such famous men—but she had not once seen a face that pertained to the Dukedom.
It did not take an oracle to conclude that Sebastian held something against them. Or even that he grieved their deaths to such an extent that seeing their portraits around would have hurt more than he could have borne. But she did not think that could be the sole reason for his seclusion. Not only did he reject her, but he rejected everyone else in his life—including servants and his former friend.Somethingdid not quite add up.
She flicked through the invitations and cards across his desk, as well as inventories, letters to his steward and man of business in town, and set them aside with a sigh. This had nothing of use.
Unless anything more sensitive had been hidden.
She opened and closed the drawers in the desk, rifling through papers and ink and wax, a large ring rolling around the wooden bottom of one drawer. She ran her fingers across the crest stamped at the top. His signet ring. Most gentlemen she knew wore theirs, but then again, Sebastian did not resemble the other gentlemen she knew.
As she placed the ring back, her fingers brushed against the end of the drawer and she heard a faintclick. A hidden panel opened, and Eleanor saw a flash of white. Paper.
Fingers trembling now, her heart in her throat, she pulled the panel free and drew out the papers, all tied together with string. There were a collection of letters and newspaper clippings, meticulously cut and bound together. She sank onto his chair as she flicked through them. A recording of his parents’ deaths, suspected poisoning—though by the look of things, nothing had ever been confirmed. The article mentioned the way that Sebastian, described as a mere boy, had stumbled across his parents’ bodies.
Her throat burned, and she lowered the clipping, staring into the distance with blurring vision.
In her mind’s eye, the scene played out in heartbreaking detail. Young Sebastian—only thirteen years of age—entering his parents’ bedchamber. Their frozen bodies. His horror.
She could not bear it.
Poor Sebastian. How could he have borne such a thing?
No man should ever endure what he, as a boy, had been forced to suffer.
For a moment, she attempted to imagine what she would have felt if she had walked in on her father’s lifeless corpse. Her throat closed, and a tear slid down her cheek. Phantom pain ripped through her chest; her stomach cramped. The grief—not hers, not earned by her, yet still so achingly present in her body—nearly stopped her lungs.
No. She could not fall apart over something that happened fifteen years ago, and to someone else. But even as she picked up the paper and continued reading, she had an image in her head of the dark-haired, mischievous boy, whose childhood had been stolen so abruptly.
Behind the first clipping was another, briefly detailing how Sebastian’s uncle made a claim regarding Sebastian’s supposed illegitimacy. Eleanor knew nothing about it, not even rumors, but from what she could gather, nothing could be proven. Sebastian’s father, the former Duke, had claimed Sebastian as his son; that was enough. The claim of succession had evidently not been altered. Yet the fact that Sebastian’s uncle would betrayhis own nephew in such a way, at such a time… Eleanor could hardly believe it. She had been betrayed many times by her stepmother and her family, but could it be classed as betrayal if she never cared about them or their good opinion to begin with? This here—thisfelt like betrayal. She pressed a hand to her mouth as she stared at the cold typed words, then carefully set them aside to see what lay underneath.
Letters. A pile of them, kept so carefully it made her heart sting. She gently unfolded the first. This missive was short and to the point, an official resignation by what sounded like a butler. The date listed it as being delivered only a few days after the death of Sebastian’s parents. Such a cruel, heartless thing to do to a boy who needed nothing more than familiarity and support. Ifshehad been there, she would have—
Well, she would have been too young to be of use to him. But she would certainly have done her best.
The note itself held no emotion, but the fact Sebastian had held onto it even after all this time told a different story. Even if the butler in question had felt nothing, Sebastian must have felt the blow acutely. And he kept the letter to…
