He scoffed. “There will be no moving past it.”
“We will see,” she said.
Alaric forced himself to look at her. That only made things worse. In her eyes, he could see clearly how much she adored him, how much she hoped that whatever it was he was about to tell her would not change her opinion. She wanted to believe in him.Why does she? Because she cares for me, that is the truth. But where that should make me feel better, it only makes things worse.
“To understand my marriage to Helena, first you must understand my father,” Alaric started, his voice growing distant as he felt himself transported back to his childhood. “He was like my uncle in many ways. A stern believer in the importance of propriety and appearances. All he cared about was what others thought of him. He did not need to be liked. He certainly did not need to be loved…” He laughed bitterly. “He required respect above all else.”
“Were you two close?” she asked.
He shook his head. “There was no one close to my father. He was a cruel man, distant and emotionless…” Another bitter laugh. “In case you were wondering where I got it from.”
She laughed softly. “I had suspected.”
“But still, all I ever wished was to please him. And the harder he pushed me away, the worse he treated me, the more desperate I was for his approval. I spent my entire life doing everything he asked of me, without question, not caring if it made me happy or if it was what I wanted. I did it because I thought that…” His lips curled. “I thought that if he was happy, so would I be.”
“And Helena?” she pushed gently.
He nodded and breathed in deep; his chest hurt from the action, or rather, his heart did. “I met her by accident, at a ball, a night when my father was working tirelessly to find me a lady who was worthy of our family name. I came upon her on the balcony…” He smiled briefly. “Much like you and me, in some ways. She was being harassed by a lord who I thought to be obsessed with her, and when I saw it, I pretended to be with her so he might leave her alone. I thought little of it, keeping her company for the night so that no harm might come to her.”
“Was it… a scandal?”
“No,” he shook his head. “What I came to learn was that the lord I had saved her from was brother to another who loved Helena as she loved him. He was trying to scare her off, but Helena…” He laughed to remember it. “She would not be scared. She loved him, and still did even after that lord was forced to marry another. Done so to keep her away. By then, I had grown close to Helena, and it pained me to see her so broken. Worse, rumors had started about her, that she was harassing the lord, that she was crazed. She was not of a politically well-known family, she had few options before her, and with the rumors growing, those options became even less….”
For a second there, Alaric disappeared back to that moment in time, the night that would come to define him. Memories of a decision he made not out of love, but a desire to, for once, do what he felt was right, rather than what his father demanded of him. His own choice made, the consequences be damned…or so I thought.
“I offered to marry her,” he continued. “To protect her,” he then sneered in self-disgust. “My father be damned. Rumor be damned. We married quickly, so it could not be stopped. And the truth of it…” Another smile. “I did not regret it. Our marriage was not out of love or passion, but friendship, because we both needed one another. And for a short time, I was truly happy.” He stopped them, the pain starting to wreak havoc with his insides.”
“And then what happened?” she pressed gently, squeezing his hand to keep him strong and let him know she was there.
“My father was furious with me,” he said darkly. As he spoke, he looked ahead, picturing now his father and the fight they’d had. “And he told me in no uncertain terms that if I did not annul the marriage, I would regret it. Worse, he told me that Helena would be the one who suffered. But I did not listen. I thought the threats were empty. I didn’t even waste words warning Helena, thinking that so long as she was with me, she would be safe. That I… that I could protect her.” He shuddered as the cabin seemed to turn cold. “I found her a week later…”
“Oh no…” she gasped.
“In the garden just below the window to her bedroom. It looked as if she fell… or jumped…” He grimaced. “Or was pushed. My father insisted that she did it to herself, to save herself the shame of an annulment. But I knew the truth. That he… that my father…” His body started to shake again, and Clara wrapped an arm around his shoulder. “That he killed her.”
She gasped. “He would do such a thing?”
“You have met my uncle,” he huffed. “I do not doubt it for a second. Worse than that, my father became sick shortly after, taken by an illness that saw him bedridden and unconscious for weeks. Weak. Decaying. He did not even have the strength to look me in the eyes and tell me what he did.”
“I do not…” She hesitated, biting into her lip. “I do not understand. Lord Wolfe implied that you killed your father…”
“I may as well have,” he sighed. “When he was taken with his sickness, I had him brought to my home and locked in his room. I denied him care, feeding him, keeping him comfortable, but refusing to call for the doctor. My thinking was that if he was strong enough, he would pull through. And if not…” His expression and tone darkened together. “I suppose God had other plans.”
“But Alaric…” She kept a hold of his hand, still looking at him, even if he could not bring himself to look at her. “What happened to Helena. That was not… You did not kill her.”
“I did.”
“No, you did not.” She tried to take his face to make him look at her, but he pulled away. “Your father was the one who killed her, not you. You know this – you just said it.”
“He killed her because ofme…” Alaric groaned as the room turned around him, the memory of that morning crashing down upon him like a tidal wave, so he could hardly breathe. “I knew what my father was capable of. I knew what kind of man he was. Just as I knew that if I did nothing…” He dropped his head, shoulders going rigid. “I should have told Helena of his threat. I should have given her a chance to save herself. But I was arrogant. Ignorant. I did nothing, and that is why she is dead.”
Clara said nothing. But he could feel her watching him closely.
Alaric could not bring himself to meet her eyes, a part of him almost hoping that she simply stood and walked from the cabinso he would not have to face her accusations. Yes, what she said was technically true, but it made no difference to Alaric. As far as he was concerned, Helena was dead because of him, and nothing would change that.
“All this time,” she began softly. “You have blamed yourself for your wife’s death.”
“As it was.”
