“Oh no,” Evan explained. “I rejected his offer when he tried to buy my loyalty with promises of wealth and the power associated with hisname.” His lips curled into something resembling disgust.
“Then, how did…?” Isadora blinked rapidly. “You are the Duke.”
“Not by choice,” he corrected her. “I had rejected him outrightly, told him that I wished to have nothing to do with him nor his cursed legacy, but in the end, it did not matter what I wanted.”
Her brows furrowed. “What do you mean?”
“The bastard went ahead with it anyway,” he muttered. “He had the legal proceedings started without my consent. When he died, I received a letter informing me that I was to be the next duke.”
“Did you try to refuse?” she asked softly.
“Of course. But he had made his will ironclad—the title was forced upon me, and if I did not take it, he had put in measures to make my life rather difficult.”
“So you did not ask for this life?” Isadora surmised. “It was forced upon you by a father you never knew?”
“You are correct.” He smiled bitterly. “Forced to carry on a legacy that I never wished for. But you see, I will be the one to have the last laugh because his bloodline ends with me.”
Isadora could only stare back at him blankly as she tried to comprehend what he had just said.
His bloodline ends with me.
It was not a declaration of principle but rather one of revenge.
“That is the basis of your reasoning to deny me children?” she finally spoke.
He would not have a child—not because he feared what kind of father he would be but because he wanted to spite a dead man.
“I have told you about my past,” Evan replied. “What you make of it is up to you.”
She could sense the difficulty he had saying the words. In normal circumstances, she would have offered more of a listening ear, but her anger from earlier had not yet diminished.
“And in no circumstance will you make an exception for your wife,” she continued, “who wishes badly to give you an heir and to continue onourlegacy? Not your fathers’ but yours and mine.”
“I have no reason to change my mind.” His words came out flat.
Isadora felt her frustration boiling over once again. He had chosen to put his anger and his spite before their marriage.
“You’ve decided to choose selfishly. Only to seek out revenge for a man who is no longer here,” she spoke.
“I do not wish for him to have the satisfaction of his blood line continuing. It ends with me.”
“Evan, he is no longer in this world. You will not be causing him any form of satisfaction or dissatisfaction to speak of.” She shook her head. “You will only be causing me pain through your rejection.”
“Perhaps we see things differently.”
“No.” She shook her head again. “I would have understood if you were doing this for yourself. But you are doing this for him. For a man who no longer even breathes. Don’t you see how you are giving him power in your life even now?”
His jaw tightened. “It is not that simple.”
“Then make it simple for me, Evan,” she demanded, stepping closer. “Explain it to me. If not for spite, then what?”
He opened his mouth, but no words came out.
She waited for him to explain himself—something, anything to ease the turmoil that rose inside of her.
Evan’s throat bobbed, as if struggling for the right words, but ultimately, he chose silence. And that was all the confirmation she required.
“I thought you were afraid. I thought you were trying to protect yourself.” She shook her head. “But you were never thinking about us at all, were you?”
