She landed a quick welcome kiss on his cheek. “I’m glad you like it.”
He took her hands in his and stepped back, assessing her. “You’re looking”—Did she catch a slight hesitation?—“well.”
She looked peaky, at best, and they both knew it. The Duke noticed everything.
“Has Lulu left for school?”
“You’ve just missed her, I’m afraid.”
“Good,” he pronounced, eliciting a start of surprise from Olivia. “Now, show me this magnificent rooftop garden everyone is talking about.”
“It would be my pleasure,” she replied smoothly, even as dread blossomed in her gut. He’d all but pronounced that he wished to speak with her privately, and she couldn’t help feeling she wouldn’t like what he had to say.
With the Duke at her heels, she placed a balancing hand on the bannister and a few short minutes later, they reached the rooftop. Despite the London morning oppressive with soggy clouds, she experienced the same rush of love for this oasis that she’d felt from the very start. Unlike her dark and wintry state of mind, this rooftop, with its colorful riots of peppermint tulips and marigold forsythia, illustrated life’s ability to move forward into spring, bright and effulgent.
She couldn’t bear the glory of it and looked toward a sky indistinct and fuzzy with cottony mist.Indistinct.Fuzzy. Words that nestled inside her with disconcerting familiarity. Nothing lately was sharp or acute. Like the clouds hanging above her head, so close she could reach up and touch them, she’d gone indistinct at the edges, like a walking blur. Would she ever be sharp again?
“When my solicitors first informed me of your intention to purchase a townhouse in Mayfair—”
“Your solicitors?” she asked, his words jarring her out of her cloud.
“Of course, my dear. Did you think they would keep your correspondence from me? They understand who butters their bread.” He held out his arm to her, and they began strolling along the crushed granite path. “My first thought was that it would be a fitting endcap to these last several months of courage.”
“I’m not certaincourageousis the word I would use to describe myself.”
“I agree, my dear. You’ve turned out to be quite the little coward, haven’t you?”
Her body drew up in a rigid line, and she opened her mouth to speak, but only a rough, unformed croak emerged. When she began to pull her hand from the Duke’s arm, he subtly tightened his hold. It appeared he’d only gotten started. “I thought you’d finally allowed yourself the opportunity to move forward with your life, to fully unburden yourself of the ghosts of your past.”
“I have,” she said, her voice still a raw scrub against her throat, but, at least, she could now form words, even if only monosyllabic ones.
“Percy was a boy,” the Duke began, “a boy I loved with all my heart, but a spoilt one, I can admit. He was the spitting image of his mother, and I couldn’t help doting on him. A willful child can be charming, no? A willful man, on the other hand, can be decidedly less so.”
“I know exactly the sort of man Percy was . . .is,” she retorted, a snap in the words. She had no desire to speak of Percy.
“Yes, I’m afraid you do.” He hesitated. “I didn’t want the two of you to marry. Did he tell you?”
“I had no idea.” Betrayal and hurt rushed through Olivia, feelings that had become too familiar of late. Tears welled up behind her eyes, and she dare not blink lest they break and stream down her cheeks.
The Duke squeezed her hand. “Oh, my dear, it isn’t like that. The rush of your young love was so sudden and complete that I advised Percy to extend the engagement, to give you time to know one another. I rather think my advice had the opposite effect as you were married by the end of the Season.” He shook his head, bemused. “Percy wanted what he wanted, and he found a way to have it. He wanted you, and he had you.”
“Until he didn’t.” She hated the bitter note that sounded.
“I won’t defend him, but I shall say this. Percy was like every other young man of wealth, popularity, and rank in London. But you, my dear, weren’t like every other young lady. I saw from the beginning that you would want more from your marriage than he would. Percy wanted a marriage that would allow him to skim across its surface. You wanted something deeper. But once you married, I was powerless to do anything about it. Then Percy ran off to the Continent and got himself blown to bits.” He pinned her into place with his piercing gaze. He wanted her to know that she was seen. “Do you know what I saw through the dark haze of my grief for him?”
She shook her head, unable to speak.
“I saw a ray of light for you. You were free of my willful, spoilt son, and my guilt lifted.”
“Guilt?”
“I could have stopped your marriage. I could have saved you from the misery of it.”
“We would have found a way. Percy wasn’t the only willful, spoilt child in our relationship.”
“Over the years, I watched you grow and blossom into an accomplished woman, a woman who I was and remain proud to call daughter. Then Percy rose from the dead, and I’ve never been more grateful to God in my life.”
“Of course.”
