“Royce, your father is not coming back.” She took his hands in hers.
He bobbed his head. “Yes, he is. Papa promised me. He always keeps his promises.”
“He can’t keep this one, Royce.” The pain in her heart cracked and a tear escaped. “He died, sweeting.”
Royce’s face never changed. It was as though she hadn’t spoken at all. He never breathed, never moved.
“No. I don’t believe you.” He pulled his hands away and picked up a tin soldier that had fallen on the braided rug. Making a shooting noise, he pretended the soldier had killed an imaginary enemy.
“It’s true.” She reached out to embrace him, but he jerked away.
“No. I know he’ll come. He said he would.”
Emily bowed her head while Royce continued to manipulate the soldier, acting as though she hadn’t spoken a word. With the tears caught deep in her throat, she squeezed his shoulder. “We’re leaving in the morning. Gather the things you want to take along.”
His demeanor changed in the fraction of a moment. “I can’t leave. Papa knows we’re here. This is where I’m waiting for him.”
Emily rose to her feet. “I am going down to the kitchen. I’ll have Mrs. Deepford prepare your favorite meal tonight. Then we'll go to London tomorrow.”
“I won’t.” His voice trembled, a note of anger rising. "You cannot make me."
She did not reply but turned her back to leave. Something small and sharp struck her on the shoulder before it clattered to the floor. Emily saw the fallen soldier Royce had thrown, but did not bend to pick it up.
Behind her, her nephew wept softly.
The next morning, Stephen dispatched messengers to all the parishes across the Scottish border. Though his mother insisted he was unmarried, he wasn’t sure who to believe. At certain moments, erratic images flashed shadows upon his mind, of Emily in his embrace. He didn’t know if they were true or not. Behind her insurmountable wall of anger lay a woman whom he’d cared about once.
But he couldn’t believe he’d married her.
The library door opened, and his father, Alfred Chesterfield, Marquess of Rothburne, stood at the doorway. The marquess studied Stephen without speaking a word. Alfred wore black, as he always did, a streak of grey marring the temples of his dark hair. Tall, thin, and ingrained in the belief that his blood was superior to everyone else’s, his father knew precisely how to command a room with a domineering presence.
“Would you care to explain your actions?” Alfred began without prelude.
Stephen did not rise to the bait. “It is good to see you again also, Father.”
There was no welcome, no show of affection. Often, Stephen wondered whether his father had any feelings toward his children. They never talked. Since the death of Stephen’s eldest brother William many years ago, his father had behaved as if nothing were amiss. He had never spoken of the tragedy.
The marquess firmly believed in duty and tradition. It didn’t matter that Stephen was never meant to assume the title. He was the heir now, and as such, he was expected to embrace those expectations.
“Your mother tells me you got married.”
The unspoken words were,Without my permission.
Stephen did not deny it, nor did he affirm his father’s accusation. “The choice of a wife is mine, I believe. I do not require your consent.”
“You are wrong in that.” Alfred straightened into the posture of a military general. “Your responsibilities as my heir include choosing a suitable wife.”
“There is nothing unsuitable about Emily Barrow. She is a baron’s daughter,” he reminded his father.
“And her family is ridden with scandal. You might as well have married a scullery maid. No one in polite society will receive her.”
And, of course, society’s dictates were of the utmost importance. Stephen suddenly grasped a very real reason why he might have wed Emily. Marrying her was the perfect way to defy his father’s wishes. Alfred Chesterfield could not control his choice of a wife.
“Is that all?” he asked. He stared at his father, eye to eye.
“Not quite. You will see to it that no one learns of your…indiscretion, until I have investigated the means of dissolving the marriage. I hope, for your sake, that it can still be done.” Having voiced his decree, the marquess saw no reason to remain. He departed without another word.
Stephen opened a cabinet and poured himself a brandy. As he warmed the glass in his hand, his fingers tightened around the stem. The marquess seemed unaware that he could no longer dictate his son’s choices.
