He rubbed at his face. “I cried quietly for you once the first night. I remember. Just once. He sent the nurse away. Locked the door. Told me—told me crying didn’t suit a future duke. I was eight.
“After that it was just... tutors. Quiet. No hugs, no stories. Meals alone. Smiles—when he needed them. I wasn’t a son. I was a… a thing he was polishing. Like silver for display. Kindness always meant something was coming. And mistakes... meant silence. That cold, tragic silence.”
He dragged in a shaky breath. “All I ever wanted was to breathe. To run. Go somewhere. Anywhere. So I... I found what I could. Cards. Women. Drink. Foolish pastimes... Just to feel something that was mine. Just to feel like I wasn’t still trapped in this damnable house...”
He squeezed her fingers, and she squeezed back, watching his anguished features through the gaps in the books.
“I’m sorry for that,” Charlotte whispered.
“I’m sorry if I have disappointed you, Mama. I have behaved... poorly,” he uttered in a broken voice.
“But you are betrothed to a beautiful woman, are you not?” Charlotte asked.
The need to know if he intended to marry her sister burned in her. She felt torrents of guilt for taking advantage of his sodden state and impersonating his mother.
But he has behaved abominably, too. I have no choice. I must protect Amelia.
“I was not. She was selected for me by Papa. But it is the strangest thing...”
Charlotte found herself stroking his hand with her thumb, trying to comfort him. In every word, she could hear his pain.
I need not feel sympathy. I am attracted to him, but he has behaved worse than poorly. Why do I feel his sorrow?
“What is?” Charlotte murmured.
“She changed. I cannot put my finger on it. It happened all at once. She looks the same, but it is as though there is another person looking out at me with her eyes. And this other person is...captivating.”
The words made Charlotte’s heart both sing and slump.
“What… what about her captivates you?”
“Her spirit. She is a lioness. Intelligent and sharp as a rapier…”
“Beautiful?”
“I have spent my life seeing only the physical beauty in women. Yes, she is beautiful, but in more ways than on the surface. But...”
“But?” Charlotte breathed.
His fingers were slipping from her grasp as he withdrew his hand, turning to slump against the bookshelves.
“But?” she whispered again.
“But I cannot have her... never...”
Then he was silent. Deep breathing was followed by the thump of a book hitting the floor and then by light snoring. Charlotte stared at the shape half in shadow, half in light, candle on its side before him.
Did he just say that he did not love Amelia until she seemed to change? Until another person was staring out at him from her eyes. Me? It cannot be…
She carefully rounded the shelves and knelt beside his sleeping form. She snubbed out the candle lest it torch the library. Then she unfastened her heavy dressing gown and draped it over him like a blanket.
“Sleep well, and forget this conversation, my sweet lord,” she whispered and kissed him softly on the forehead before leaving the room, quiet as a ghost.
CHAPTER 11
The carriage stopped outside Wiltons, a restaurant on Jermyn Street not far from St James’s Square. Seth had invited Charlotte to dine with him, the first contact she’d had with him for a week. After her enigmatic encounter with him in the library of Hillcrest Manor, he had been withdrawn.
He didn’t join Charlotte and the Willoughbys for breakfast the next day, not making an appearance until noon. Later, they had played croquet on the lawn, but Seth seemed out of sorts. Aunt Phyllis had concocted an excuse that afternoon to allow them to take their leave of Hillcrest and spent the ride home telling Charlotte that she should rethink her betrothal.
